Good Morning Michael –
Though I have thoroughly enjoyed my experience as a customer with Ford India. However, in this last five years of my association with Ford India and it’s agency/service provider “Harpreet Ford” I see a tremendous down fall in the area of imperatives for “Value of customer satisfaction and commitment” towards the Service delivery (ESPECIALLY the negative practices has been seen in the last year or so).
Just to quote the recent issue of October 3’ 2009 date that I have faced with Harpreet Ford – Motinagar, New Delhi, when given my vehicle (Ford Ikon- Reg # : DL 4CR 7124) for servicing at their Workshop. The car was kept at the Body shop/Workshop for almost 10 days to carry out the most body and complete service job. And as against I have been charged approx Rs. 36000.00 for the work they have done.
I’m happy with the body shop work that has been carried out of my car. However, the service job was absolutely unjustified and pathetic for the value and assurance promised to us for the quality of job work that has been undertaken by Harpreet Ford workshop team. There was high degree of negligence and ignorance shown by the team in handling the job that has been specified by us while they prepared the job card over the phone. It is expected that the Workshop engineer and supervisor are qualified/skilled enough to identify the actual condition of the vehicle while the service job has been carried out. Also, they should brought to customer notice in case of any need for part replacement and should ensure all mechanical parts are in right condition before the vehicle was released from workshop and handed over to the customer (me). Unfortunately this was not the case here, and exactly the second day the FAN Belt came out and fan pump/rings got broken while I was driving on the road on Saturday-10/10 during the night hour. All I want to bring to your notice that wear and tear of any parts do not occur in a single day and such break down or possible accidental incidents can be avoided if the service engineers/staff at the workshop would handle the jobs carefully and efficiently.
With this regard I and my husband (Pinaky Purkayastha) called Mr. N.K. Bhatnagar (Workshop Service Manager) on Sunday -10/11, morning to register a complaint about this issue. In his response the gentleman was very reluctant to listen and accept the fact that there was a slip by his team in the servicing of the car, which was resulted a major breakdown of the car within two days of driving after it got service a week ago. Above all the most unfortunate thing was the comment passed by Mr. Bhatnagar being a senior official of workshop. He said that it is not his responsibility if the car happens to be brake down or met with an accident due to any mechanical fault after it has been handed over to customer (me). After we made a several request, he sent a mobile van to inspect the vehicle at my residence location in JanakPuri, New Delhi on Sunday evening 7pm. The person accompanied with the mobile Service Van have adviced that parts as “Water Pump, Rings have broken and Fan Belt that came out needs to be replaced immediately. In order to do that work he wanted the car to be towed by a crane to the workshop on Tuesday-10/13 morning. As per plan they have towed the car and sent to their (HF-Motinagar) workshop on Tuesday morning at 9am.
But, this time again the issue was not being attended to resolve the mechanical fault existed in the vehicle. And the car was handed over to me after they kept it for 9 hours at the workshop just making some minor repair to the damaged parts. They have charged us approx Rs.4, 000.00 (Labor charge) for the same. Just to confirm you after I drove the car and found the same Fan belt sound as it was there before when I have given my car for service at the first time. So, this is quite evident that these guys did not make any effort to resolve the problem completely. And, I’m confident that the mechanical failure will reoccur again in near future would cause a greater problem for us.
Just for your knowledge, this is becoming a practice by the company service station to make sure that customer comes back and time & again get charged heavily for the same problem every time.
As the frustration level crossing it’s limit now, I would like to highlight, this is the second time we have came across such an incident with Harpreet Ford in last 6 months. The last time around a senior official of “Harpreet Ford” Gurgaon was involved in misbehavior and non transparency for insurance claim activity along with Insurance Agency Rep, with whom I have got my car insured.
This kind o[censored]nethical attitude and responses from the officials of an organization like “Harpreet Ford” (which has been attributed a high degree of quality of service and integrity over a period of time) is unacceptable and highly unappreciated. This would certainly cause a negative impact on “Ford India” initiative to maintain/retain it’s customer value chain. Given the fact should we now consider that with growing customer base in India, “Ford India” and it’s agencies like “Harpreet Ford” have lost touch of imperativeness for customer value and satisfaction.
I look forward to hear from you at your earliest convenience, with an anticipation of a resolution to such problems in future engagements.
Please do contact me on the below number in case you need any further clarification.
Have a great day!
Best Regards,
Aarti Purkayastha
[protected]
[protected]@ford.com
md.[protected]@dealerconnection.in (Mr. Ashok Sachdev)