When it comes to getting good customer service, everyone wants the best service. And that includes me. It doesn’t matter whether we’re dining at a fine restaurant, flying in an airplane, staying in a hotel, having our A/C at our home repaired... or how about collision repair.? You were right on board until I said, “collision repair.” Ha-ha! 

When a customer contacts us with an accident, they need our help. Accident defined: “An unexpected, unplanned, and unintended event that typically results in physical harm, property damage or loss.:  

During the 2021-2023 Gold Rush of wrecked cars, some shops didn’t have stellar customer service. If they ticked off a customer or two, many more cars were waiting in line to get in. Here’s the deal, folks, in feast or famine, we must ALWAYS provide great customer service! When we become arrogant and lazy, we will eventually pay the piper. With claims count currently down, some shops are barely paying bills. 

So, what does good customer service look like? If you haven’t read “Customers for Life” by Carl Sewell, I highly recommend it! Carl owns 20+ auto dealership franchises throughout Texas and is a genius at great customer service. FYI: It doesn’t matter one bit that the book was written 20+ years ago! 

Customer service (CS) has many components. For starters, when a customer calls our shop, is it answered promptly by a pleasant voice who wants to help? Is the customer just told to stop in whenever? Or are they given an appointment time for scheduling, photos etc. so we can give them our full attention? How about when a customer comes in? Is the CSR dressed nicely and our office clean? Is there nice music or CNN blaring the latest overseas bombings? Have the wall colors, flooring, and chairs been updated in the last six to eight years? Just as important, are the bathrooms female-friendly, updated, and most importantly, CLEAN? In Carl’s dealerships, they clean their upscale bathrooms every hour! Their technician’s bathrooms are even updated and nice.  

Good CS is more than just good aesthetics and nice people. We must keep our promises. Example: Did we contact them after, say, the blueprint like we said we would, or did they have to call for an update? CS is so much deeper than most realize. I have personally had two different medical surgeries in the last 24 months, and both cost probably $75-100k each. Notice I said “probably.” I never heard one word about any of the negotiations between the hospital and my insurance. Between the two surgeries, I only paid an additional $185 out of pocket.  

Now everyone is thinking, “Greg is on the insurance companies’ side when it comes to a safe and proper vehicle repair.” Not so fast; here’s the deal on insurer short pays. We must have good business sense. Example: I was trying to help a shop owner with low profitability. While reviewing their P&L, I realized they were spending an astronomical amount of $ on marketing just to keep the work coming in. After dividing their yearly marketing expenses by the number of cars they had repaired, it was over $1,000 per vehicle!! It was a vicious cycle of the higher the co-pays, the more was needed for marketing to bring customers in. If they just cut their marketing in half, their customer would save $500 extra out of pocket, and they would make the same net profit! I strongly suggest you look over your P&L and do the math for your shop. If you’re spending over, say, $150-200 per repaired vehicle for marketing, I would stop and look at your entire business model. If we let them, some marketing companies will take every dime we have! At the end of the day, we must become expert negotiators with the insurers, to solve this tit-for- tat conundrum to shrink short pays.  

Here’s the deal: EVERY customer who leaves our shops are FOR SURE causes a ripple effect for our reputation, whether that be good or bad! Are they giving their family, friends, and co-workers reasons to come to our shops or to avoid them? We MUST strive to be the best collision shop in our market. Just because we’re the highest priced shop around does NOT mean we’re the best! I DARE YOU to go to a local grocery store and ask 20 random people, “Where is the best body shop around here?” It could be a real eye-opener.  

As Carl wrote, “If the customer doesn’t want to come back, none of us will have a job!”  

I about wore out my highlighter while I was reading his book, as there are so many golden nuggets (boulders) in there. He even discusses the crucial data they track for the numerous systems they have in place.