Dealer survey - AC Nielsen

[Golfitup]

How long ago did you purchase the car? Did you buy it through a lease company? Is it in your name? They send it to the address that the dealer has for you and it can take a while for it to come out (mine was 4-6 weeks from memory)

I have only had the car couple weeks so based on people are saying I should get a survey in a few more weeks.

I intend to be honest. Although I was not happy with the sales person, overdoing the negative feedback can sometimes make your response seem less credible. Credit where credit is due I say.

I intend to give an unbiased account of my experience and hope that whoever reads it will draw the same conclusion I did which is the dealers conduct was unacceptable.

[Tux]

I am waiting for an issue to be resolved with my car. Althought there's been a bit of a hiccup I'll give them a good rating when all is resolved. I think you have to be fair about these sorts of things.. I agree with what Dermot said as far as giving them a fair chance to get things right.

[PassatB6]

I intend to be honest. Although I was not happy with the sales person, overdoing the negative feedback can sometimes make your response seem less credible. Credit where credit is due I say.

I intend to give an unbiased account of my experience and hope that whoever reads it will draw the same conclusion I did which is the dealers conduct was unacceptable.

I am waiting for an issue to be resolved with my car. Althought there's been a bit of a hiccup I'll give them a good rating when all is resolved. I think you have to be fair about these sorts of things.. I agree with what Dermot said as far as giving them a fair chance to get things right.

Some years ago I bought a new MkIII which was a great car (now has 350,000 km on the clock) but had one significant problem from new - a coolant leak. The Dealer would just top it up and say it was "normal" but it just kept leaking. They refused to do any better than that. I then received a satisfaction survey and reported that I could not get the problem fixed. Suddenly I got a call from the Dealer who offered to fix it immediately which they did. It was clear that they had no interest until pressured 'from above'.

So the moral of the the story is - when filling in a survey always tell it like it is. Had I not mentioned my problem it would have never been fixed. You're not doing anyone any favours by making poor performance look better than it is.

PS The Dealer lost the dealership soon after, so I wasn't the only one who was having problems.

[Someone]

I assume the survey focuses on the dealer you actually bought the car from. If VW really want to understand and improve the customer experience, they should be surveying the whole buying process from end to end, including the dealers we visited and rejected because of poor pricing, service, attitude, etc.

[ConR]

I assume the survey focuses on the dealer you actually bought the car from. If VW really want to understand and improve the customer experience, they should be surveying the whole buying process from end to end, including the dealers we visited and rejected because of poor pricing, service, attitude, etc.

+1 on that. I`ve had dealers whose sales was fantasic, but their service dept. was utter garbage, and vice versa. Then again, it`s very hard to find a dealer that is great at everything. I have no issues with going to one dealer for sales, and to another for service.

[moniker]

Agree to previous posts about dealers you rejected during the pre-buying phase.
Visited one particular Perth dealer and had pretty poor dealings with them (and a laughable trade-in offer)
The Dealer we DID purchase off got pretty good survey results from me, the 'dodgy' dealer of course just withers and dies in the long run I suppose...

[Corey_R]

But Volkswagen already know the dealers that people are rejecting... they measure that by the sales!

If a dealer is under performing, then they already know they have problems.
The thing is, one of the dealers I went to are the biggest in Sydney, and I went elsewhere. I just didn't get the service I was after, for whatever reason. But obviously, lots and lots of people DO buy from them. Let those people who have experienced the full buying experience from them do the surveys. If there is underlying problems at that dealership, the survey responses from the people who did buy will weed them out.

We don't need 10,000 people who've walked into a dealership in the past few months who didn't buy giving all the reasons why they didn't... especially when some may have only had 2 minutes with a sales person etc.

[Brian]

Interesting to note that all the replies here refer to the survey being about the "purchasing experience".

I too have received an invite to the survey purely on the basis of having my 15k service done at the local dealer.

It would appear then that this is an overall snapshot of Australia's dealerships commissioned by Volkswagen Australia.

[elephino]

I received a box with VW assistance card and it mentioned 2 surveys that I'd be receiving. Still haven't received either survey 3 weeks later.

Did get a survey with the first GTI, though. You should always answer honestly, no matter what pressure you get from the salesperson. If you don't, then the dealer won't know what they're doing well as well as doing poorly.

There will be a reasonably harsh response in my survey due to a few hitches with the dealer, but anything related directly to the car will be generally high.

[Beaker]

While I kinda agree that the rejected dealers should be included to some point. You get a much better view of a dealer you deal with more then once.

Case in point - I've had an exceptional buying experience (far better then any other car I've bought) from a particular sales person (and have noted that in the survey), another person I know had an attrocious experience with the same person, and as a result bought his car from another dealer.

I dealt with the dealer on a number of occasions (as you do when buying) the other buyer may have only spoken to him once (I'm not sure - Flappa?) Its possible the sales guy was just having a really crappy day (it happens) and it came across in his attitude on that occasion. While that (in this case) cost him a sale - it may not be a true reflection on his attitude, on the other hand if it is, the result will show in the number of sales.

[Maverick]

But Volkswagen already know the dealers that people are rejecting... they measure that by the sales!

If a dealer is under performing, then they already know they have problems.
The thing is, one of the dealers I went to are the biggest in Sydney, and I went elsewhere. I just didn't get the service I was after, for whatever reason. But obviously, lots and lots of people DO buy from them. Let those people who have experienced the full buying experience from them do the surveys. If there is underlying problems at that dealership, the survey responses from the people who did buy will weed them out.

Some dealers however may perform well because of their location but may engage in underhanded tactics constantly in order to achieve sales, they don't care about the damage to the Volkswagen name but only care about making as many sales they can no matter what the cost. A dealer here in Brisbane is constantly screwing customers yet still makes plenty of sales, they've been involved in manipulating the survey results and despite constant promises to clean up their act and changes to staff nothing has changed.

IMO Volkswagen should do more then just have key staff removed but should look towards taking over or shutting down dealerships like this, whilst it would cause short term a drop in sales and public confidence I think that long term it would pay off. I suspect that at the end of the day what matters is sales to Volkswagen and if a dealer is selling lots but has poor customer satisfaction this is acceptable as many customers will have forgotten the sales "experience" when they go to buy a car next time round.

[flappa]

While I kinda agree that the rejected dealers should be included to some point. You get a much better view of a dealer you deal with more then once.

Case in point - I've had an exceptional buying experience (far better then any other car I've bought) from a particular sales person (and have noted that in the survey), another person I know had an attrocious experience with the same person, and as a result bought his car from another dealer.

I dealt with the dealer on a number of occasions (as you do when buying) the other buyer may have only spoken to him once (I'm not sure - Flappa?) Its possible the sales guy was just having a really crappy day (it happens) and it came across in his attitude on that occasion. While that (in this case) cost him a sale - it may not be a true reflection on his attitude, on the other hand if it is, the result will show in the number of sales.

Not quite. Spoke to him a few times and just didn't seem interested in selling to me. Was slow, didn't get back to me. Just enough for me to go elsewhere because I could.

[Beaker]

Fair enough. Can't explain it, because he was simply brilliant for us.

[cme2c]

I think it would be useful to find out why customers didn't purchase from another dealer. When we purchased the Golf we had a short list of cars that fit the bill. The Honda salesman didn't know he sold the Civic Si. The Volvo dealer closed at lunchtime Saturday, till Monday (guess all Volvo drivers are retar.. sorry, retired) The Ford salesman when asked about the new Focus said "that's it over there, mate". Mazda were good, the 3 is an alright car, but the trade in was crap. Subaru and Mitsubishi dealers were good, but the product didn't stack up. Never got to the Toyota dealer.

[Corey_R]

The thing is, as per every other thread in this place, if we simply striked off every sales person and dealer that a customer decided not to buy from, there'd be no dealers.

Same goes for whether the customer likes the salesperson or not.
Same goes to whether the customer thinks they're getting a good deal or not. I've heard people warn others that they shouldn't go to a particular dealer and especially not "salesman John" because they're not willing to negotiate, and yet another forum member has managed to get a 16% discount from the salesman John.

So as I said. The survey they're doing is a great start. Let them concentrate on the people who actually did buy and their experience. If the service of particular dealers even with great sales is bad (such as the dealer that Maverick has mentioned), they'll get weeded out eventually