Customer Service And After Sales With Car Brands Is NOW More Important.
Customer service is vital in all kinds of purchases from battery operated toys to expensive watches, but it is arguably most important with an expensive item such as a brand new car.
After a house, a car is most likely going to be the most expensive purchase you will ever make especially in Malaysia where car taxes are relatively high and salaries are not. It is a rare occasion that a Malaysian will decide on the spur of the moment to walk into a car showroom and buy a brand new car (well this above statement does not apply to people who earn corrupt money).
Covid-19 has been a new speed-bump in the movement of new and also used car sales as the economy takes a slow reversal and the introduction of a sales tax discount in the middle of last year was just a temporary measure to assist the automotive industry to recover from the lockdown losses.
A recent study in Europe found that the average car buyer spends around 14 hours researching online, reading reviews and visiting dealers’ websites before making their decision to buy a new car.
Malaysian car buyers are probably the same, give or take an hour or so and we have our share of car brands who never look after their customers. It is all about selling selling selling and when the time is right, they will exit and leave their customers hanging.
Research has discovered that businesses in Britain lose around £12 billion every year simply due to poor customer service. So, how much is Malaysian businesses losing each and every year with bad after sales.
We are all able to track the deplorable after sales service with many car brands in Malaysia by just doing a little research on facebook with the many car owners facebook pages. The solution for these deplorable after sales experiences from some car brands is to just ignore and pretend nothing is wrong. This is why during the good times (these past few years) they still managed to earn a decent profit. Now with an economic downturn and with car purchases taking a back seat for many Malaysians, these car brands will now not be able to stay afloat and you will start seeing their dealers closing or even worse, the brand will exit Malaysia and leave current owners with warranties that are as good a s toilet paper.
These will be the car owners who will be left in financial ruin as they find alternative after market workshops to keep their cars running or even worse, park their cars and leave them to rot. Without a ‘Lemon Law’ to protect Malaysian car buyers, many foreign car brands continue to earn high profits and ignore the many after sales and warranty issues with new cars.
We have seen this before with brands that exited Malaysia before and these brands have yet to return to Malaysia today as the trust in the auto manufacturer is low and Malaysians business are worried to invest in an auto manufacturer that does not look after its customers.
Brand loyalty is lost and a resurgence is usually never possible, even with grand designs and great new products. Time to change and it starts now.
