Submariner1
Senior Member
- Joined
- Sep 3, 2016
- Messages
- 4,692
- Reaction score
- 788
- Location
- Windsor Berkshire
- Your Mercedes
- CL500 2009 5.5
Had a call with the “new” Technical Workshop manager ..... tbh bricking myself at the thought of the impending bill!
Many critisize their Main Dealers even calling them Stealers ... regarding mine, in the past that would have been offensively unjustifued with mine.. they were Great!
Hopefully I am wrong, but call it a gut feel ...
Whereas in the past, the old highly technical manager; would have instantly latched onto my logic of asking the technician to read the last 3 Mobilo breakdown reports ( supplied) and the 5 Star reports ... and my summary notes highlighting what the Mobilo tech said were the key indicators i.e. piggy back off the work done and 7 hours! of time [= £] taken looking at an intermittent fault. And maybe just sort the bad earth out ... and if it works job done!
But this one said something like “ well of course we will have to do our own diagnostics, and take it from there.”
And definitely didnt seem to take on board my counter of “I would normally completely agree, but in this instance, as proved by the first 2 breakdown reports, where no current faults could be found. It would seem logical to apply the recommended fix diagnosed at the one time the fault did show up (especially as its exceptionally cheap, and the alternative possibility is imo relatively expensive £1,061 plus hours of labour).
The previous chap would have said something reasonble like “that seems like a good plan, but you realise if we dont do a fully comprehensive check, we cant guarrantee we have definitely got the issue 100% sorted. However as long as you realise this, in light of the intermittent nature of the fault ; it might be sensible to go that route initially, and then if it comes back permenantly we can zone in on the true fault.”
All I could say was “I really dont want a lot of time spent chasing an intermittant fault, if its not manifesting itself at the moment. As I realise you could rack up £1,000 of fruitless diagnostics ... charges ...ending up with a ‘Sorry but we couldnt find anything wrong’ !”
OK in fairness he did not challenge anything specifically, or say anything wrong, but I just got the gut feeling, this new manager just wanted the rich and stupid customers , who gave them a carte blanche authorisation to do anything.
Hopefully the trio of really bright technical sub managers get involved.
I hope he was just busy, and I dont get stung.
As for getting help to replace the defective battery that passes the RAC battery test.
He actually said “ I am not sure there is warranty on a battery .. I will have to check into this!”
**** me .. did he really say that?
This smells of a purely commercial guy, who got the job based on a great interview sales pitch of “ I will radically improve the bottom line of the Repair Workshop”.
So I don't see much help forthcoming there.
Note: in the past even if the battery could start the car, and had the acceptable min. volts; Mobilo engineers could take the sim card out of the Midtronics Battery tester and put it into the Star Xentry kit? And look at the cells and the ampage under load. They no longer can or allowed to do that.
If the Volts are OK and the car starts, the battery “breakdown issue” is deemed resolved. The fact that under load it goes legs up! Is irrelevant ... that is pushed to your next impending breakdown. I see this as fundamental!
The RAC sees it as great. Good First time fix stats, frees up the breakdown guy quicker for the next call, and they get paid again for your next guarranted breakdown.
Call me stupid, but my Gut feeling is I should have pushed the old dear to MBS ! Lol
Lets hope I am pleasantly surprised, as the only other localish Dealer near me has already fully endorsed the New Mercedes Concept of Customer Service, namely by applying these rules:-
1. Front absolutely any interaction with the customer with a cretinatious “Call Handler Service “Manager” Agent. Who isnt even qualified to manage himself taking a leak.
2. NEVER EVER EVER let the customer talk to a good Technician.
3. Always do untold amounts of Star Diagnostics , which they are then unable to interept correctly.
4. Where ever possible, always replace any expensive module, until you hit the jackpot!
5. If possible, dont actual fix the problem totally, so you can screw him over again on the return.
6. Never do anything for free, even if its justified to do so.
7. Dont worry if the Customer complains to MB UK ... hell they will just refer it back to the Dealer.
Many critisize their Main Dealers even calling them Stealers ... regarding mine, in the past that would have been offensively unjustifued with mine.. they were Great!
Hopefully I am wrong, but call it a gut feel ...
Whereas in the past, the old highly technical manager; would have instantly latched onto my logic of asking the technician to read the last 3 Mobilo breakdown reports ( supplied) and the 5 Star reports ... and my summary notes highlighting what the Mobilo tech said were the key indicators i.e. piggy back off the work done and 7 hours! of time [= £] taken looking at an intermittent fault. And maybe just sort the bad earth out ... and if it works job done!
But this one said something like “ well of course we will have to do our own diagnostics, and take it from there.”
And definitely didnt seem to take on board my counter of “I would normally completely agree, but in this instance, as proved by the first 2 breakdown reports, where no current faults could be found. It would seem logical to apply the recommended fix diagnosed at the one time the fault did show up (especially as its exceptionally cheap, and the alternative possibility is imo relatively expensive £1,061 plus hours of labour).
The previous chap would have said something reasonble like “that seems like a good plan, but you realise if we dont do a fully comprehensive check, we cant guarrantee we have definitely got the issue 100% sorted. However as long as you realise this, in light of the intermittent nature of the fault ; it might be sensible to go that route initially, and then if it comes back permenantly we can zone in on the true fault.”
All I could say was “I really dont want a lot of time spent chasing an intermittant fault, if its not manifesting itself at the moment. As I realise you could rack up £1,000 of fruitless diagnostics ... charges ...ending up with a ‘Sorry but we couldnt find anything wrong’ !”
OK in fairness he did not challenge anything specifically, or say anything wrong, but I just got the gut feeling, this new manager just wanted the rich and stupid customers , who gave them a carte blanche authorisation to do anything.
Hopefully the trio of really bright technical sub managers get involved.
I hope he was just busy, and I dont get stung.
As for getting help to replace the defective battery that passes the RAC battery test.
He actually said “ I am not sure there is warranty on a battery .. I will have to check into this!”
**** me .. did he really say that?
This smells of a purely commercial guy, who got the job based on a great interview sales pitch of “ I will radically improve the bottom line of the Repair Workshop”.
So I don't see much help forthcoming there.
Note: in the past even if the battery could start the car, and had the acceptable min. volts; Mobilo engineers could take the sim card out of the Midtronics Battery tester and put it into the Star Xentry kit? And look at the cells and the ampage under load. They no longer can or allowed to do that.
If the Volts are OK and the car starts, the battery “breakdown issue” is deemed resolved. The fact that under load it goes legs up! Is irrelevant ... that is pushed to your next impending breakdown. I see this as fundamental!
The RAC sees it as great. Good First time fix stats, frees up the breakdown guy quicker for the next call, and they get paid again for your next guarranted breakdown.
Call me stupid, but my Gut feeling is I should have pushed the old dear to MBS ! Lol
Lets hope I am pleasantly surprised, as the only other localish Dealer near me has already fully endorsed the New Mercedes Concept of Customer Service, namely by applying these rules:-
1. Front absolutely any interaction with the customer with a cretinatious “Call Handler Service “Manager” Agent. Who isnt even qualified to manage himself taking a leak.
2. NEVER EVER EVER let the customer talk to a good Technician.
3. Always do untold amounts of Star Diagnostics , which they are then unable to interept correctly.
4. Where ever possible, always replace any expensive module, until you hit the jackpot!
5. If possible, dont actual fix the problem totally, so you can screw him over again on the return.
6. Never do anything for free, even if its justified to do so.
7. Dont worry if the Customer complains to MB UK ... hell they will just refer it back to the Dealer.
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