Re: Deplorable Service from Performance Motors
__iceman__;613363 said:
Wondering aloud. Any input from BMW owners in other countries? I would sure like to find out - do other owners enjoy good service that correlates to the branding? Or is Singapore the only place with such standards and highest margins? Where else in the world would any dealer make a 100k profit from a 535i and still pull out such a service level? I don't think so right? In the US this 100k profit alone can already pay for 2 whole cars at list price. So in other countries, suffice to say that they work off much lower margins of a few k or maybe 10k+ per car, unlike that of several times profit in SG. How is it that these other dealers can afford to give decent service levels and PML can't? Is it that overheads in SG are more expensive than USA or Europe? And another thing is...
Other countries in the west:
Much much lower population density in area
sell lower volumes of cars per month
each car fetches a profit of few k? (how much can it be since 30-60k will buy you entire car?)
= still afford to give very decent service levels
SINGAPORE
Highest population density - hence captive, accessible audience for marketing efforts - give free tissue and 2 million ppl line up.
BMW is always best selling in terms of sheer volume of cars sold per month
Each car carries obscene profits of... 30k to 100+k?
= can afford to give service levels that get laughed at compared to lesser brands, and the BMW community just simply talk, and feel such way about it. Let alone class leading service within the country, and much further removed - a service level that other countries take as a benchmark?
I simply don't understand - where is the missing link?
Well the only think I can think of is the that BMW Asia which is overlooking PML are complacent and useless too.
Have you seen how other heads like BMW NA and BMW Europe is run? If you read other forums, you can see that the dealerships and their objectives are well in line with what that their representative office like BMW NA or BMW Europe wants which is inturn what BMW Ag expects. They set pre-defined levels of sales to be met, service quality to be met, after-sales follow-up, customer retention policies, etc. And they have huge penalties for standards that cannot be maintained at minimum. This makes alot of dealers in such countries more efficient and customer oriented because whether they are in business or not depends on the customers loyalty to their particular dealership. In Singapore we have only 1 pathetic dealer which is PML and they are cowling behind BMW Asia. Anyone and anybody with PML's setup can get good sales. Its not rocket science. Cars sells for itself pretty much. It's not as though they market the cars locally so well that they get sales. BMW Asia must be foolish if they think PML is able to sell so many cars to customers because anyone with the same setup can achieve the same, possibly more because they are won't be PML. Because there is 0 customer retention, everyone is taking the PI route now. I also heard PML complained many peope were PI BMWs and they informed dealers of other countries strictly not to comply with orders put in from here. As with the world today, there is always a way around it as with a friend who recently PIed a 550i full-spec from UK for only 350k with current COE prices. At that same price buys you a closely priced 535i + an eternally wretched after-sales for 3 years with it under PML.
It takes 2 to clap so the problem is inherently BOTH parties. Double standards if you ask me cause they know the cars sell here well + there is only 1 such dealer. Imagine if a much better run and neutral BMW Asia decides to have 2 instead of 1 dealer and awards a new tender, I am very confident PML will be shit out of the list. So in part, BMW Asia is also in bed with PML. Try imagining if PML were to be run by say BMW US or Europe, I guarantee that they will close within 6 months or I circumsize again.
In such places run professionally by BMW NA or Europe, having good sales is not good enough. It has to be backed by proper management of customers and after-service. That's what keeps the dealerships in business there. And trust me, they treat every customer as thought its their last one left. The problem with BMW Asia is that they don't have such high standards. They are complacent that cars are selling and they have good numbers. Everything else below that doesn't matter. Not the case with the other BMW representative offices that are well-managed and run by professionals. Sometimes it makes me feel that Singapore is a place for those below-averaged calibred BMW employees to be dumped in. BEcause clearly, that's how it is seeing how the things is run. YOu can't stop but to imagine. And when you have monkeys leading monkeys, it become a zoo. Exactly like how corresponding after-sales cannot be even remotely kept up with the high volume of BMW cars on the road. Pandemonium and a severe depression of service quality. That's what it is now. Things will only get worse if this continues.
The problem in Singapore is that most of the people here just complain but in the end, nothing happens. Can't blame most of us because we don't have accompanying consumer rights here as extensive as like in the US or Europe. If we had such rights, neither the current team in BMW Asia and/or the entity PML will be around. All of them will be fired or sent back like gestapo refugees.
We can only hope that the new MD of BMW Asia does something useful here and changes things around. Changes for the better are always welcome instead of deadwood. Speaking of which, there are many. PML's new notation should be Piss My Life since they are definitely heading the right way with customers at this point in time.
