Mercedes aims to please

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RichardM

MB Enthusiast
Joined
Jan 29, 2003
Messages
2,490
Location
Essex
Car
2011 CLS350 CDI
Just been reading this on the WhatCar website.

I hope MB do get their act together.

Mercedes has vowed to become the number one marque for customer satisfaction by 2006, knocking Lexus off its perch.

Professor Jurgen Hubbert, the Mercedes board member responsible for developing the manufacturer’s line-up over the past 18 years, told What Car? today that the brand was determined to meet customers’ high expectations.

Mercedes has not fared as well as its big rival Lexus in recent customer satisfaction ratings, such as the JD Power Survey. But Hubbert said this was because Mercedes buyers were quicker to complain if faults arose: ‘Customers who have bought a Mercedes expect more – and rightly so.’

Joachim Eberhardt, outgoing president of DaimlerChrysler in the UK, said the company was aiming to steal the top position from Lexus as early as 2006.

Key to the turnaround will be a thorough overhaul of the dealer network with better and more efficient service. Besides offering express 35-minute servicing, which is already available on a limited scale, Mercedes plans to offer next-day servicing across the country by September.

Mercedes is also investigating one-off servicing charges like Mini’s tlc package and BMW’s Concours scheme.
 
MB will find it difficult to topple Lexus from the JD Powell survey unless MB trained their employees to tell less white lies. They should teach them to listen and deal with their customers instead of trying to avoid them.

To give you an example, my husband called the dealership and ask to speak to the salesman who had sold him the new car. The receptionist told him that the salesman was currently dealing with another customer. My husband then drove to the dealership and was told by the receptionist that the salesman hadn't come to work yet. My husband proceeded to tell her that she just told him over the phone that he was dealing with a customer. There was stunned silence. My husband then asked to speak to the customer care person. The receptionist told him that they don't know where he is. My husband pointed towards the pillar and said he is standing behind it (he had spotted him hiding there earlier on). The customer care person had no choice but to come forward. He basically said that my husband had signed the document which said that everything was fine with the car and as far as he was concerned that was that. He said that the parts that need sorting out will have to be paid by my husband. The guy in the parts department suggested that my husband speak to the salesman who had sold him the car if he doesn't want to pay for the parts. When my husband eventually got hold of the salesman (over a week later as he was on holiday), the salesman was very good. He sorted out all the problems without my husband having to pay for the parts.

So, unless scenario like the above changes, MB has a difficult job getting the number 1 spot in the JD Powell survey.

Regards,
swl
 
I am new to MB ownership and so far I have had a fairly mixed experience, and overall I feel that MB dealers need to do more to ensure customer satisfaction, particularly their service departments. I have concerns with the ones I have had experience with.

When we were looking for an MB, we first went to the local Greenoaks in Bracknell to see what they had on the forecourt. I don't know why - maybe because we were younger (early 30s) and I was not dressed too smartly, but the sales guy really didnt seem at all interested in selling us a car. he was rather offhand and seemed reluctant to unlock any of the cars let alone offer a test drive. he also said that with our budget, we would not really be able to buy the model we were looking for which was absolute bollocks as I had seen a few on the MB website at that price.

We then decided to look at other dealers and via the MB website I found a few cars at MB Epsom I looked the look of and so we made the trek over there. Wow what a difference in attitude. The whole atmosphere of the place was friendly and the sales guy was very happy to take us out on a test drive. We took a two cars out and he was with us for at least a couple of hours. We later settled on a car and bought a nice 2000 C320 with 20000 miles on the clock.

Since owning the car, I have had a few niggles though. First of all I noticed that the bonnet had been resprayed at some point and was a poor colour match. MB epsom were very good here and arranged for it to be resprayed FOC. Now I have an excellent paint job on the front end with no stone chips on the front of the car as they resprayed over the front wings as well to give a good colour match. So far so good.

Now for the bad things

MB epsom ordered a spare key for us as one set was lost. 6 weeks later we are still waiting for the blade to arrive. Apparently they have not received the blade from Germany yet.

MB epsom did a service when we bought the car and unfortunately they overfilled it with oil causing a warning light to come on on our first long trip. We took it to the nearest MB garage (MB Stratford) and they took out some oil. Unfortunately, they too out too much so that half a mile down the road the low oil warning came on. I ended up going to the nearest halfords and buying some mobil 1 and topping it up myself.

The drivers electric window is playing up and so I took it back to MB epsom for repair. They replaced the window motor and regulator and gave the car a good clean as well. Unfortunately when I picked it up I noticed that a small area of paintwork had been damaged on the rear bumper in a circular pattern – probably by some kind of electric buffing tool. Totally careless. Grrrr.

Last week the drivers electric window broke again while we were on holiday. MB epsom obviously had not fixed the problem. A call to mobilo life brought a technician from MB sheffield to get the window wound up so that we could drive home. When he took the door card off both he and I were totally shocked to find that the foam sound absorption layer that is attached to the door had been ripped to pieces to get at the window motor etc. instead of being carefully peeled off. It is now in about 5 pieces just hanging off the door and has not been reattached properly. In addition some of the door card plastic lugs uses to attach to the door had been snapped off so that it wont go back on snugly. I complained to MB epsom and they said thay are going to ‘look into it’ yeah right.

I have now lost faith in MB epsom to do a good job and have booked the car into another dealer to see if they can fix the window properly this time.

In conclusion then, this is not the kind of experience we were expecting from MB. The car is not really the problem here - it is a great car. However it is being let down by what I percieve to be careless workmanship and poor attention to detail. I hope I will be able to find a good dealer that I can trust to do a good job in future - preferably before my warranty runs out!

It looks like MB has a lot of work to do to catch up with Lexus

Robbo
 
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Talking of MB Epsom reminded me of this event which happened a month ago. A friend had traded in his W202 for a W203. MB Epsom offered to deliver the car to my friend's workplace. The offer was declined because my friend said he would be too busy to check the car properly. He said he would collect on Sunday when he is not working. That was agreed. 4 days before the collection date, my friend was told that there's been a mistake. There won't be a car for him to collect because the car is actually for another customer. The salesman told him that he will call him in a few days' time. The date passed and still no phone call. My friend had to chase the salesman up because the insurance on his old car was due to expire; the insurance was being transferred to the new car. My friend was told he could collect his car on the following Sunday. When he turned up that Sunday with his wife and children, they spent 2 hours at the dealership looking for the car!! Finally, one of the MB personnel told them that the car is probably locked up in the secured area and none of them have the keys. I laughed when I heard this story but it wasn't very funny as far as my friend is concerned. He had to phone the insurance company and change the details yet again. The car was finally delivered 2 days' later.

Regards,
swl
 
Oops! Re: "I laughed when I heard this story..."

Didn't mean to give the impression that I was laughing at my friend's misfortune. What I meant to say is that I find it amusing that a few grownups searching high and low for something as big as a car. Like my friend I find it rather unsatisfactory the service that MB Epsom have provided.

Regards,
swl
 
I'm gob smacked. This is terrible service from such a so called prestige make.
 
When we purchased my wifes A Class, we went to our local dealer in Aylesbury. We couldn't find the A Class anywhere and upon asking, was told they were in the small show room next door with the commercial vehicles. What made it worse was there were no sales people in the commercial showroom at weekends !?!?!

So we went to Milton Keynes where the A Class stood proudly between a CL and an SL. We were treated well, and purchased the car.

However, when it came to servicing they were not so good. After a years ownership it was dropped in for a service at MK for the day while my wife went shopping. As well as the service we had, in advance, complained the 1st and 2 nd gear kept stumbling, would they check it. When my wife collected the car, ( after shopping for six hours - they were not rushed ) they said everything had been done. Clearly this was not the case as the wipers were still sticking and we had asked for this to be sorted, and he car was still struggling in 1st and 2nd. The very next day, the gear box failed and left my wife and ( at the time 1 year old son ) stranded. We have not been back since.

I now use an Independent who worked for MB GreenOaks for twenty years - Great Service.

The problem seems to be that the current cars break more easily, yet MB are getting worse at putting them back together.....God help us....
 
Originally posted by Michael
When we purchased my wifes A Class, we went to our local dealer in Aylesbury. We couldn't find the A Class anywhere and upon asking, was told they were in the small show room next door with the commercial vehicles. What made it worse was there were no sales people in the commercial showroom at weekends !?!?!

So we went to Milton Keynes where the A Class stood proudly between a CL and an SL. We were treated well, and purchased the car.

However, when it came to servicing they were not so good. After a years ownership it was dropped in for a service at MK for the day while my wife went shopping. As well as the service we had, in advance, complained the 1st and 2 nd gear kept stumbling, would they check it. When my wife collected the car, ( after shopping for six hours - they were not rushed ) they said everything had been done. Clearly this was not the case as the wipers were still sticking and we had asked for this to be sorted, and he car was still struggling in 1st and 2nd. The very next day, the gear box failed and left my wife and ( at the time 1 year old son ) stranded. We have not been back since.

I now use an Independent who worked for MB GreenOaks for twenty years - Great Service.

The problem seems to be that the current cars break more easily, yet MB are getting worse at putting them back together.....God help us....

Would you mind sharing the details of the independent you use? I favour independents, but travel to Croydon where I used to live for servicing.

Aylesbury and MK are local to me so it sounds like you are around my way.....
 
The latest repair of my electric window lasted four days before going wrong today:(

The cars is going back in on Thursday. This is the dealers final chance. If it breaks again (which would be for the fourth time) I will be writing a letter of complaint to MB HQ asking for an explanation for the poor reliability of their cars and why their dealers are unable to fix what should be relatively straightforward problems.

Cheers, Robbo

btw, does anyone know the address of MBUK headquarters, and who I should be writing to?
 
When I had problems with my wheels, this is who I wrote to (Mr Eberhardt is the MD).

Mr Joachim Eberhardt
DaimlerChrysler UK Ltd
Delaware Drive
Tongwell
Milton Keynes
MK15 8BA

Tel: 01908 245000
Fax: 01908 664351

I did receive a nice reply from Miss Emma Jones (didn't help though :( ).

Cheers

Andrew
 
Thanks for the Information Andrew,

Hopefully I won't need it, but well see.

Cheers, Robbo
 
Originally posted by GrahamC230K
Would you mind sharing the details of the independent you use? I favour independents, but travel to Croydon where I used to live for servicing.

Aylesbury and MK are local to me so it sounds like you are around my way.....

Oh, I don't know. He's getting a bit too busy for my liking these days......;)

OK :

07712 045633

01296 620420

His name is Chris Gray, based in Wendover. Tell him you got his number from me and you'll not regret giving him a try.

All the best,
Michael.
 
I use MB of Blackpool. My car is not what you would call new and MB dont really want to "play" with it. They were honest about this and I respected their policy. But, and its a big but, they advised me where to go for a repair. I later asked them why they did this, seing as how they would lose some profit from my visit. Their answer was once again honest. "One day you may wish to purchase a new car and we would like to be in a position to offer you the chance to consider us for it". When I need spares I do go there as Graham (spares manager) and Kevin (customer care Manager) are always helpfull, even to the extent of advising me of the best way to go about a particular repair. I do understand their policy, so many new cars that the mechanics have been trained. So many past models that probably were made before the said mechanics were born! I have NO fear going there and find my visits an enjoyable experience.
 

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