Its all about quality of service AND personal relationships - FleetGuy
It seems like I deliver a truck for service there almost once a week. Almost all our trucks have been converted to the Isuzu NPR. I do not think I would define my experience as ‘satisfying’. As the guy in charge of our fleet, I look to place our vehicles with a company that knows the vehicles first hand and has experience with all the odd quirks that other independent dealers are probably not aware of. I don't want to deal with a repair shop that reads a blog on their phone or reads a manual to figure out a problem. I want to know when I step on that property that I can see a company that projects warmth and enthusiasm and massive amounts of knowledge. I look for a service department that can communicate well and jumps at the opportunity to serve me. I expect that what is behind the service manager is a crew of well-equipped individuals with a strong background of experience working on these vehicles. I DO NOTwant the shop where my truck is worked on to look like a service station from the 1950’s with crowded unkempt parts shelves and tools scattered about and all the techs are covered in grease. I am not in this venture to save a dime at the cost of unreliable machinery or electronics; I want these trucks to work hard and be dependable night and day, seven days a week. I need to rely upon a company that can provide sound results with reasonable turn-around time. Too many times I have left other service providers’ locations with less than superb results. That means the truck runs but something else rubs me wrong:
1. A service tech explains a repair that causes me to think that he/she has no clue what they were doing.
2. A service manager passes the keys to my truck back to me (which basically says “I have checked over this truck and everything works great”), only to find a week later that things were put together improperly and more work needs to be done which equates to more down time for that truck.
3. I use their restroom and find it to be the most disgusting room ever visited.
4. I read an invoice and can’t figure out what I am being charged
If a provider is not clean, not well-organized, not well trained, not on-time with commitments, not able to communicate clearly and pushing a lot of phony excuses on me, I am not willing to give the organization another shot at my business. In these days of "OK is not good enough", I want the provider to whom I am sending my vehicles to really be interested in my company and my vehicles and look at my bringing them business as part of a long term relationship.
So, when I visit Harris Mitsubishi, Isuzu, Hyundai, etc. I come with a lot of customer related experiences already. Harris provides a service far beyond ‘satisfying’. In my estimation, they are running on all cylinders. I have never had to return a vehicle for something that still wasn’t fixed properly the first time. I often stick around the shop when small repairs are being done and enjoy a cup of coffee while I possibly chat with an employee passing by. Two individuals come to mind as highly exemplary in the Harris organization. Jerry Truman, as the Fleet Director works with us in supplying us with new vehicles to our fleet. When I run into him at the office he always has a smile and a pleasant demeanor and willing to spend a moment to catch up. That means a lot to know that he cares enough to move out of his ‘busy day syndrome’ and spend a moment to chat. Another individual at Harris that I work with very regularly and in fact look forward to seeing at each visit is Mike Erickson, the Service Manager. He is the main reason I stick with Harris. I send trucks in need of maintenance and repair to Harris because of him. He knows his vehicles, he knows the problems, he works great with his crew and has a great gift of gab while also handling massive amounts of work (I know this because of the number of invoice sheets he has on his desk each time I walk in his office. He and I click on a lot of levels and I trust him with the decisions we have to make for each vehicle I bring in. Some guys you know you can’t trust, some guys you are not sure how much you can trust them, and some guys you just know they will give you 100% all the time with a good heart, a positive point of view and an interest in the person (not just the customer or the vehicle). I trust Mike wholeheartedly. I am not surprised by the number of Employee of the Month awards on his wall. In fact I am surprised he doesn’t get one every month. He is a pleasure to work with.
Bottom line, Harris Isuzu provides me with Excellent Service that is far beyond just simply ‘satisfying’. Would I recommend Harris to others? Yes I would, and I have. I thank them for allowing me to keep faith in dealerships that actually care about how they go about their business along with caring about and keeping their customers.
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