Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Customer complaints taken to extremes!


I'm delighted at the solution devised by an unhappy customer to get what he needed from a motor dealership in England.

It is not the best advertisement to have outside your car dealership.

This Range Rover Sport HSE is convincingly decorated like a ‘manager’s special offer’, but it promotes a set of features that are far from appealing.

The owner has daubed it with a catalogue of the faults it allegedly suffered after he bought it for £50,000 [US $82,865] at Lookers Land Rover showroom in Colchester, Essex.

When the dealership failed to deal with his complaints to his satisfaction, he parked the negative advertising outside.

As the vehicle is on a public road, the showroom has no power to move it. Staff refused to reveal the owner’s identity.




Large yellow vinyl letters along one side of the car read: ‘If you want trouble free motoring do not buy one of these!!!’

On the side and rear windows it lists: ‘Problems with . . . 6 front ball joints, 4 front arm bushes, new seat base, front and rear n/s [nearside] struts, full n/s suspension unit, anti-roll bar bushes, air con.’

A passer-by said: ‘It looks really realistic until you actually read what the words say. Then it’s obvious someone has put it there to have a dig at the dealership. It’s a brilliant idea.’

Mark Foster of Jaguar Land Rover said: ‘Land Rover operates a comprehensive warranty programme and a strong goodwill policy.

'All necessary repairs to this vehicle over 42,000 miles have been carried out under warranty.

'However, we are disappointed this customer’s experience has been unfortunate and as such we have made a goodwill offer towards helping him into a new vehicle.’


There's more at the link.

I'm not sure I believe that the dealership's offer was motivated by 'goodwill' . . . probably more like desperation, if you ask me! Still, the owner's actions got the desired reaction.



Peter

1 comment:

deadstick said...

Nice tactic, but this chap didn't invent it...I remember seeing it in action in the States as far back as 1963.