Team-BHP (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/)

-   Indian Car Dealerships (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/indian-car-dealerships/)

-   -   VW Whitefield, Bangalore books fake service appointment for my Vento! (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/indian-car-dealerships/194840-vw-whitefield-bangalore-books-fake-service-appointment-my-vento.html)

Hi fellow BHPians,

Something very weird happened yesterday. I received a message from my car dealership - VW Whitefield (Apple Auto) in Bangalore asking me to bring my car in for a 10:15 appointment. What was strange was that this was not initiated by me, and that the message was sent to me at 10:16, thereby making sure that I would never be able to inquire about it in time.
The contact number mentioned in the message was a number that doesn't actually exist - on trying to call it, I was advised to check the number.
After about 20 mins or so, I get another message saying that my car has been received and will be delivered by 6:00pm the same day.

This is apparently some campaign rolled out by VW under which they were supposed to take in cars and do god knows what. Do let me know if anyone else has had a similar experience.

Abhi

Looks like they have to achieve some targets for a VW initiated campaign or to show increase in workshop load.

This is normal for Maruti/Hyundai where you won't even get the messages but when you check the service history, the car will have a couple of SC/OC (Service Camp/Outreach Camp) job cards. :deadhorse

Wow, really! That's quite a surprise for me. In my five and a half years of owning a Hyundai earlier, this had never happened to me. This might be normal but is certainly not the correct way to do things.

Abhi

Could be a case where vehicle number was entered incorrectly by the feeder, which triggered these message. I would not worry much about this, just check your car history with the VW dealer. If it is clean, it is clean. Ignore & move on.

My Gosh what is happening with the German carmakers in India ?!

First it was the Mercedes saga where a loyal customer in Gurgaon was being offered peanuts for his used Mercedes.

Then came the shocker from BMW regarding non honoring of warranty on Battery of 4 month old car!

And now this.

And by the way, i have owned a Hyundai, couple of Maruti's as well as a Chevrolet. Never ever i have witnessed a fake service so far.

The last message you received says about a "Campaign job" with the final amount as Rs.0. This points to a recall campaign and from what I know, it should be the Dieselgate software update. These crooks (VW Whitefield) tried to con me and update my car despite me telling multiple times not to do it. The car went for a completely different job and they were trying to squeeze this in. Luckily I understood their intentions and decided to stay near the car and managed to get it without applying the ECU update. :Frustrati

It could be a case of them trying to achieve the targets for dieselgate campaign. Is your car a TDI covered under the dieselgate fix?

This is a rare possibility especially with VW IMO. With the huge number of service centres dotted around the city, MS/Hyundai ASC may have this problem. But there are only few VW ASC in the city and all of them would be operating at almost full capacity. This is also the reason why when we call them to schedule an appointment, we will get it only after 3 or days.

Very good chance of this happening. After the wrong entry, the only way to close it would be to make a Zero bill.

It's a Vento Petrol

Apart from these three, one other possibility that I can think of is that it might be a software bug!

Like Engine_Roars mentioned, just check your car history with the VW dealer; If it is clean, ignore and move on.

Yes, this very much could be a possibility.


True, most are operating at full capacity but still there are cases where fake Job cards are observed. However this really depends on city as well as VW/Dealer Principal targets.

I'm surprised you haven't called the dealer already to figure out why you got this message.

But wouldn't these targets be more financial, than just the no. of cars being brought in. Would a 0-invoice entry really help the dealer's cause?

Most OEMs have number of cars as targets. HMIL has a scoring parameter (among other parameters) where a dealer can score highest if they reach 15% month on month workshop load growth. MSIL has similar YoY requirement for scoring top marks.

You would be surprised by the percentage of job cards which are below Rs. 100 for mass market dealerships. These are done just to increase the workshop load growth. A dealership actually makes a loss even on a Rs. 100 job card.

Crossing certain scoring threshold gets dealership (very large) bonuses at the end of the year and are designated as "Platinum" or "Royal Platinum". Different OEMs have different nomenclatures.

I received such a message from an unknown service center for my Nano. I had not requested for an appointment. But I assumed it was done as part of an auto reminder and I ignored it. well, at least till I saw this thread.

I wonder what this could be for. No one ever called me to check or follow up why I did not turn up.
However, I did not receive any other message about car delivery, so I presume it was only as a reminder for servicing. Which (before I get flamed) will be done on the earliest convenient date lol:

Yeah, that seems unlikely. Sending a number to my phone with my car number for a 0 invoice bill seems to hardly be a mistake. I guess, like someone mentioned in this thread, should be a campaign of some sort. I've no idea what campaign though. Mine is a TSI, so not the dieselgate stuff for sure.

Well, mine is a TSI, so it would have to be some other campaign. And booking an appointment is fine, but actually showing that they received and delivered my car is the stupid bit TBH

Abhi

I did, and they said they will "look into it". They should be getting back to me, or they are going to receive a call from me again

Abhi

No chance this is a clerical error. It's most definitely intentional.

1. A 'recall' / software fix target imposed by VW and the dealer is artificially boosting numbers.

2. The dealer inflating his workshop numbers for commercial reasons.

Since yours is a TSI, do check with VW & this dealer on any DSG software updates they're rolling out?

Awesome post man :thumbs up. Thanks for sharing this industry info.

Not sure about Hyundai but it has never happened till date that a Job card was officially opened in the DMS system at the ASC and the SMS was never sent.

I have a history with both my cars and I always received Text messages every time a job card was opened. It is only when my cars were informally taken for some assessment of issues that the Job cards were never opened and obviously I never received any text messages.

Further to this, my question is simple - Why would an ASC with Maruti also want to create a fake job card when the load at most of their workshops are usually settled (and high) for the numbers of cars they sell and hence service? Also note that the only for Job cards opened by the Dealer ASCs will broadcast a text message and these ASCs are anyway doing brisk business in terms of servicing and extracting maximum from that owner in the name of unwanted jobs apart from the usual service.

Again, they have a target to achieve not to open a Job card but to close one and it has happened with me few times. Unless there is a delay at the ASC for parts or other dependencies that do not directly hint towards the competency levels of the ASC to fix or address my problem, the Job card needs to be closed on the same day! This is one of their Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).

Did you take any extended warranty or RSA for your car recently, in that case something simliar is created. It was done for my car too, when i took extended warranty.