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After-sales services of car companies in India's small towns

29th January 2022, 17:50 by Utkarsh Chaudhary

I'd say the after-sales services in the tier 3 cities still need a huge improvement. I am sharing my firsthand experiences with brands like Mahindra, Tata Motors & Maruti Suzuki.

BHPian dicor recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

Whenever we read a Mahindra vehicle review on team-bhp, we always see a line - "After-sales service, hit or miss.". I was always wondering what this means, but I guess I have witnessed both sides of the coin now.

I am a guy from a remote village (nearest any ASS 120 KMs away) and when I was 15, I used to take my M&M Commander and M&M Marshal Royale to the service station and the working process used to be like any public sector bank. The advisor, the accountant all used to talk like civil servants. The mechanics wanted the tip, the washing guy needed 5 or 10 bucks compulsorily to do the work as intended.

Fast forward, I moved to big cities, bought a car and saw a huge change in their improved behavior. I was pleasantly enjoying these services until I moved back to my hometown post 1st lockdown and then I started seeing the difference in customer orientation of Mahindra / Maruti service centers. All my vehicles have been serviced in various states and cities. Right from metros to tier 3 cities. I would say tier 3 cities still need huge improvement in their behavior.

Metro and big cities experience

While the service advisors (SA) are sometimes incompetent and cross-sell things like engine de-carb, wiper washing fluid, if you know what to get done and what not to, you can still drive the show. The senior-level staff are helpful, escalation works. My experience with big cities workshops was satisfying.

Small towns & Tier 3 towns

The problem with small town (tier 4) workshops is that they are not designed to take big jobs, they are there for basic troubleshooting and scheduled service, but tier 3 town workshops can take bigger jobs but they are awful.

Customer orientation is missing, false billings, customer presence in the workshop area and their interaction with mechanics lead towards a different game. Mechanics are the real bosses here. They don't listen to higher-ups. If you tip them, they will replace parts from other vehicles with your vehicle. If you escalate, GM will try to sort out the issue but again SAs and mechanics will be on revenge mode.

I am quoting a few examples here which I have experienced firsthand, and I am documenting this company-wise.

Mahindra

Good experiences

It's not that I am condemning Mahindra, I have fairly good experiences at following dealerships in the past.

Silver Jubilee Motors (Pune), Unnati Motors (Pune), Rajbir Automobiles (Chandigarh), Raj Vehicles (Mohali), Patwa Automotive (Indore), Win-Win automobiles (Bhopal).

Bad experiences (in order from least frustrating to most frustrating)

Year 2020 - Star Automobiles (Jabalpur), Mahindra XUV5OO

Issue – Mechanic attitude and spare parts scarcity

I reported that the front fender strip needs to be replaced and one of the keys is not working. The front fender was not available readily and post initial investigation I was asked to deposit 5000 in advance, as they will have to order new keys. The cost would be around 18000 and the wait time will be 30 days. I told them this needs to be covered under warranty. Upon which their direction of the investigation changed. Now, I was told to leave the key and they will try to fix it. Which I didn’t do. Later that evening, I got a call from one of their mechanics, saying if I get it repaired there, they will charge me 2000, but if I approach him, he will fix it for Rs 300.

Eventually, I ordered a front fender from Boodmo and installed it on my own.

Year 2020 - Star Automobiles (Katni), Mahindra Scorpio

Issue - Spare parts scarcity

I sent my dad’s Scorpio for scheduled service plus some other jobs. At the end of the day, the guys returned the vehicle with only the oil and filter changed. Not even a single thing was addressed on the job card. The reason is simple, being a tier 3 service center, they have limited business and they don’t want to jam their inventory. Nothing wrong, but my frustration is that they could have told me about this in the morning. I will now anyways have to send the vehicle to Jabalpur ultimately to increase the number of unusable days and fuel expenses.

Year 2021 - Star Automobiles (Satna), Mahindra XUV5OO

Issue - Frustrating CX, Dirty customer lounge, arrogance

This one is the second most horrendous experience. Parked my vehicle at sharp 10 AM. Nobody was at the desk until 10:15. Then a lady arrived, she asked me if I had made the appointment, I told her that I made the appointment with WYH (With you Hamesha) app, she was clueless about it. She gave me a card and asked me to call this number after 10 minutes. The number belonged to the SA, who appeared within 15 minutes. Asked me about problems and I asked him if the jobs can be pulled from WYH as I have already spent 30 mins a day before documenting everything there. Nevertheless, the work began, all good, the vehicle was promised to be delivered at 2 PM but somehow it became 3. That’s fine, acceptable.

Now, SA had to give me the bill and he disappeared. Then a front desk lady appeared and she shouted my name in public like a police officer. English will not do justice with our accent, so let me write it in Hindi.

She: “Shantanu, Shantanu, koun hai yahan par. (Who is Shantanu here?)
I raised my hand.
She: Chaliye aap, yahan kinare aaiye. (Come-on move, come to the corner)
I followed her.
She: Gmail khol kar, apna phone dijiye. (Open Gmail and give me your phone)
I asked why.
She: Mahindra ko feedback dena hai. (Have to give feedback to Mahindra)
Now, it was my turn to shine.
Me: I will do it on my own. You don’t have to bother about it. Also, what is this nonsense behavior?
She : Are nahin sir waisa nahin hai, actually customer ko problem na ho isliye hum hi de dete hain. (No sir, to save customers from extra work, we do it on their behalf.)
Me – What feedback will you give, your SA is missing, he didn’t explain the work to me, he didn’t explain the bill to me, he didn’t adhere to the delivery time, I wasn’t attended at all in the morning. What feedback will you give?

The lady silently left the place after understanding she has messed up with the wrong guy.

Finally, the service advisor showed up, I asked him the reasons for the delay, and he told me that after washing my XUV started signaling that front brake pads are worn out. He asked me I want them to be replaced, which I politely declined as I had to travel back 120 KMs and it was already 5 PM. I asked him to go for a test drive and I didn’t notice any warning. I asked them where the warning was. The over smart mechanic told me that he has unplugged the sensor so it will not bother me. I can drive fearlessly. I firmly asked him to plug it back and not to do such things.

Finally, SA made the bill and I saw that I was charged with two unwanted items, (4 tyre valves and wiper washing liquid). I just paid the bill but recommended that he should not put anything over and above without the customer’s consent.

As I sat on the driver's seat, the mechanic came from somewhere, rubbed his head, winked at me and said those 3 magical words, “Aaj shanivar hai” (today is Saturday). I handed him a paper with a photo of the father of the nation and he left the place.

On my way back home, that warning kept piercing through my ears after every few hours.

Note: I later checked my dashcam to exactly figure out when the front brake-pad warning surfaced and they were right, it appeared after washing. Though I have driven XUV close to 3000 KMs afterwards, that warning did not appear again.

Year 2022 - Star Automobiles (Satna), Mahindra Scorpio

Issue - Force selling of accessories, false billing and frustrating CX, Babu culture

This is a horrendous experience.

So, my driver took the Scorpio to the service center. The SA quoted him 80000 and asked him to first deposit 50% of the money, then the work will be started. My driver called me and explained the situation. I demanded an explanation of the service cost, he had given me a rough breakup of major work, on which, I asked him to not carry out suspension work and remote key work. He also told me that he will do the coating on the silencer on which I clearly told him not to carry out any job which is not on the original job card.

The real pain started in the evening when I was presented with the bill and a lot of things were not covered in the job card and despite that, I was charged a hopping 12500.

When I checked the bill, I found the following items which should not be there. 4-wheel valves, wiper washer liquid, a car perfume, upholstery repair charges, maxi care charges.

I called up the service advisor again and asked about these items and he gave me a lame explanation like the silencer coating was Rs 2500 but as I had denied it, the work was already done, so added another item to the bill for 50% charge and rest 50% he has adjusted against labor charge of scheduled service. According to him, my vehicle has run 1,45,000 KMs, so the applicable band is 1,50,000 but he has put the labor charge of 1,40,000 KMs which is cheaper.

I asked him to waive off those upholstery charges, take the perfume back. But he declined. He said perfume is mandatory by Mahindra and once opened, he can’t take it back. Also, if he rolls back upholstery charges, he will charge me for 1,50,000 service which is Rs 1200 expensive. I was feeling, I am talking to a person who doesn’t have a reasoning section enabled in his brain, so I disconnected the call and called up GM service. He patiently listened to my problems, took service advisor on the conference, asked him to take back perfume, waive off Maxi care, upholstery repair charges back.

When I received the final bill, I noticed that SA had taken all those things back, quoted me for 1,50,000 KM charge (which was expensive by Rs 400, not 1200), put two more sensors on the bill which he said he forgot to add them earlier). Even after this, my bill was Rs 2000 lighter than the first pre-invoice.

I asked my driver to come back, and I swear to God, Scorpio is never ever going to Star Automobiles again and once XUV5OO is out of extended warranty it will also follow the same league. Mahindra loses business here.

Apparently, Mr. Mahindra has recently tweeted on a Bolero customer incident, and I am going to send the link to this thread. Not as a complaint, but as feedback.