2009 July, 18th

Phil Butler

In the ongoing saga of every day people dealing with the German Mercedes dealer Mercedes-Benz Hess GmbH, one thing has become clear, misunderstanding is not simply a language issue. Our effort to seek a fair and appropriate resolution to what should be a simple PR/business exercise, is not being received well. Our first two stories conveyed to our readers a situation where a company, and one of its clients (that would be us) were set at odds against one another because of one thing, poor customer service. Among other things, we are wondering if the economic depression has not had something to do with Hess’ seemingly unreasonable tone in this situation. Are they so hurt by low sales that a penny’s worth of class is so costly? So, here is the latest update as to the disposition of this business/client relationship.

This misunderstanding is more about ethics and attitude, than it is about any confusion due to translating languages. As foreigners to this great country, we have had the opportunity to see much in the way of correct and incorrect attitudes towards people of different nationalities, but in this case our differences may be more ethical or humane, than ethnocentric or geo-centric in nature.

Recap of Parts One and Two of the Saga

To recap for our readers, we purchased a used A Class 190 Elegance from one of Germany’s most revered Mercedes dealerships, Hess Mercedes of Trier. From the onset, the vehicle exhibited several seemingly insignificant mechanical issues which culminated in one of these (a trans-axle problem) making the vehicle effectively useless after only about 4000 kilometers. If this were not bad enough, our initial encounter (as directed by Hess employees) led to perhaps the worst possible customer service confrontation imaginable, considering we are dealing with Mercedes Benz.

Aside all the cumulative issues surrounding these events, the primary difficulty in dealing with Hess has been what appears to be an middle or upper management attitude, which is either blatantly elitist, or down right arrogant. This is one of those situations where a customer rightfully expects a level of service based on the brand, and the reputation and the intrinsic business value of a company, but which is unfortunately non existent in reality. Sorry to be so circuitous, but in the end we are talking about excellence here. Let me fill the reader in as to the latest developments, and perhaps also describe what a “superb” resolution to this might have been.

UK customer testimonial - Is Germany different?

Diplomacy and the “Go To Man”

As predicted in the our first article, our electro/mechanical problem is supposedly not covered under our current warranty. Our current Hess point of contact person, the expert and friendly Herr Holst, called back yesterday to relate Hess’ current position as to our claims. No doubt Herr Holst is what is commonly referred to as a “go to man” in the States, someone with exceptional people and practical skills in communicating (maybe even admittedly so based on our conversations). This “not covered” aspect was obviously expected, as was Hess’ rather Machiavellian counter proposal, which I will outline below. But, for some context as to our actual expectations, and just why this who affair has gotten out of proportion from our perspective, the following quote from the main Mercedes Benz site in the UK (chosen obviously for an English version to represent Europe) is just one of the Mercedes advertised testimonials about their level of service.

“Since we purchased our vehicle we have found all aspects of owning a Mercedes everything we hoped it would be, and we are both happy with our choice. Thank you.” Mr & Mrs Grinham, Hastings

Professing excellence with hand selected testimonials is one thing, but as we have discovered with Hess Trier, putting top customer service in show leather is quite another. We are not the only people complaining about individuals at Karl Marx Strasse, or Mercedes in general, I know.

Customer’s Desired Resolution

Initially we approached Hess with the idea of trading this vehicle in on another model, and of course, paying any difference in the relative values. We, of course, expected a pretty positive trade value, but in no way assumed that our 8500 Euro expenditure would be fully recouped, even in a trade. Given the attitude of Hess’s Karl Marx Strasse team, we revised our position because of the lack of trust in any future dealings brought on by their, shall we say “rude and arrogant” posture toward us. Then, this is what we asked for (or expect) as a resolution to this situation, based on our comfort with this vehicle, and in no small part due to our gleaned perception of future service from this dealership.

• An apology from the Hess employees at Karl Marx Strasse for their “less than professional” attitude
• Buy back the A190 at a calculated value which allows both parties a fair, and equitable monetary solution

The reader should know that under German law there is a provision for just this, once a dealer has tried 3 times to correct such a mechanical situation. The dealer, in effect, calculates a value based on the original sales price, minus .25 Euro per mile, and perhaps any needed (non warranty) repair so that an equitable monetary solution can be arrived at. Of course, from their perspective, they have not had 3 chances to fix the one problem. We will address this later on.

Looking for a solution in line with the elegance of the CL600, we got..

Hess Resolution

Herr Holst relayed the following points on Hess’ position in the aforementioned phone conversation. According to Herr Holst, the part which failed and caused the “fault” situation, is not under any warranty. According to him, and with his admittedly limited understanding of the mechanics of the vehicle, this “non-electrical” part is something that wears out, or is an item in the drive train which falls into a category similar to tires or brakes. His lack of familiarity with the part, combined with a little of a language issue, does not at the time offer much in the way of an explanation as to how this could be so.

As a mechanic, former test driver, and automotive laboratory technician, my familiarity with drive train operation is fairly excellent compared to the average customer I know, and this has me wondering what kind of part would not be covered. On inquiry, Herr Holst agreed to fax us the part numbers on Monday, so that we might assess this new situation. From an expert point of view, and without more in depth knowledge, I cannot foresee Mercedes or anyone putting a “periodic service” part in between the transmission shift lever (presumably beneath the console) and the drive axle. This is a matter for a follow up obviously, but given that our “problem” is not supposedly a warranty one, here is what Hess offered by way of a resolution.

The cost to repair the fault is 550 Euro plus tax.

• We pay 250 Euro and Hess pays the additional 300 Euro
• Hess’ used car aspect cleans the vehicle inside and out
• Hess fills up the fuel tank

It must be said that, as mentioned before, Herr Holst knows his job and is good at it. Besides speaking perfect English, he has obvious experience in dealing with customer complaints. That being said, he is also in an unenviable situation, in between his superiors and some increasingly upset customers. As alluded to earlier however, I cannot imagine Mercedes Benz putting a “weak link”, so to speak, inside the control to drive train interface, which would from a service technician point of view even, be a nightmare. Even is there is such a part, it should be listed in a periodic maintenance schedule at the least, and if this is true, Hess may have been obligated to change it at the pre-sale service interval.

What we got,. well we still don't even have a spare!

Other Mitigating Circumstances and Transparency

After talking with Herr Holst I was compelled to talk with Mercedes headquarters in Stuttgart, but unfortunately the late hour of his call meant that contacting anyone there would be difficult. So, I remembered a huge Mercedes dealership from the time I lived in Atlanta, Georgia, through which I might gain some insight into this “mystical” part the dealer was referring to.

I called RBM of Atlanta and talked to their service adviser, Don McKay. McKay was more than happy to answer any questions I had, but since the A Class models were never imported into the US, his knowledge of the systems was limited. In the end however, McKay seemed a little amazed that any such “part” might exist, given his experience with similar systems, suggesting (as I suspected initially) that the failed part would have to be electrical in nature for it to communicate with the ECM (or computer) which controls onboard systems. In short, a relay or chip has to send this signal, or else reflect a failure of a mechanical part (which should be part of the drive train) that has failed. His resolution was to give me the corporate phone number for Mercedes International, which I will call on Monday.

Doing some research online, I could not discover the scheduled maintenance increments for what is termed a “Autotronic“, or continuously variable transmission, which is presume, the one in question. One of the only conceivable parts which could fail as a matter of mileage/wear could be the steel thrust belt, which is at the heart of the torque transference for the unit. In much the same way that a timing belt needs to be changed at a variable, this part could in fact require changing at a point in time. Other than this, I see no other friction related part which could be considered “expendable”, and unless I miss my guess, this part should have a recommended service interval. If it does, even then, if it failed before a relatively high mileage interval, it should be covered.

Another interesting aspect of all this is that though we have an extraordinary SEO aspect for our business, and of course social media and networking capability, these articles were written more as a log of these events. As fate would have it, and really outside our intent, Hess Mercedes evidently has a relatively low Google rank for their pages. What this means in short is that all these stories we are writing for consumer interest, and to document these events, are outweighing even the home pages for Hess in rank value. This is a good thing in as far as people looking for reviews of Hess, and more than likely Mercedes in Germany as a whole eventually, will find the whole story and make their own determinations.

Screenshot showing Hess Mercedes site beneath service stories

As for Hess, and probably Mercedes Germany in general, a positive resolution to all this is something of a brand awareness necessity. We cannot say we are sorry that this situation has come about, from the perspective of a dissatisfied customer, though we do not wish to in any way insinuate anything other than the fact that certain individuals might have acted in what one might call “an inappropirate fashion” with regard to professional customer service. From a “new age” media point of view, this happenstance goes along with everything we have consulted or advised companies about all along:

“In essence, the Internet, while not progression to the point as an educational tool for which it was designed, has reinvented the ways in which traditional businesses engage their customers. In Web 2.0 terms, what companies are experiencing in ever increasing numbers of instances is “a conversational” B2C paradigm shift. For any business to assume they can escape this new form of interaction, is either archaic, or in the end, an unwise business perspective.” Phil Butler – On the value of understanding new media

Excellence In Resolving Conflict

As I promised, a better resolution to this seemingly small disagreement could have easily been reached with just a little more excellence exhibited on the part of Karl Marx Strasse Hess representatives. So the reader knows again, when we were sent there, on arrival, the showroom had one customer in it. The Hess employees were numberous, and in retrospect the only ones of those who seemed overly burdened were the cleaning ladies sweeping the huge showroom, really. If we had been treated with respect, and listened to (it should be noted that Mihaela speaks fluent German, and they said they spoke English), then Hess would probably have made even more money out of the deal by letting us trade up. Not only that, but the articles atop Google’s indexes for Hess Trier would now applaud the dealer for what anyone would expect is “Mercedes’ brand” of excellence. The end of this story might yet reveal such a “win-win” result too, but this is not in our control.

I remember hearing this legend once, which dealt with another world renowned auto manufacturer, Rolls Royce. In the story a Rolls Royce owner hits something in the road, and breaks an axle on his car and calls his service representative. Shortly thereafter, the man is met by an impeccably dressed man from Rolls. He offers every convenience to the car’s owner and has the car taken to the shop. Two days later, the man meets the same representative on his doorstep only to see his car parked in the driveway. He naturally asks the gentleman how much the bill is, because he was at fault. To whit, the well dressed man says; “There is no charge.” Astonished, the car’s owner says; “How can that be, I broke the axle?” Straight faced, the man replies with heavy accent; “You are mistaken sir, Rolls Royce axles do not break.”

New Age Media and Brand Excellence

The moral of the story is obvious, and does not presuppose that we expect any such degree of service. However, given the circumstances, and the notoriety to which this situation is destined to receive, one would think any business would see the ramifications. We do not know if Hess is even aware of any of this, but we feel certain someone there has an inkling. There is the point of “precedent” to be considered, but in the end, good PR and business dictates proper action. The 550 Euro is irrelevant at this point really. It is not that we can afford undue expense any more than the next average entity, but in our business you are what you stand for. This is not nearly as much about us, as it is about all people. In a new age, where everyone has a potentially gravitous voice via the Internet, everyone in business needs to treat people as if they were the last customer on Earth. The traditional mentality might perceive this to be a money losing proposition, of course. But, in the end raised levels of quality all along the spectrum, can only lead to even more business.

Tomorrow, I will write another article about a comparative situation where our other car (and its dealership), a Ford Ka, was supported by a much more professional team of people at the dealership here in Schweich. One would think that a small dealership might not have the resources to compete with Mercedes, but that perception would be wrong on many accounts. For now though, we hope that someone at Hess is thinking about the correct solution to not only this situation, but similar ones where a better outcome could have been achieved. Herr Adolph Hess Jr., the owner of this dealership, may or may not even know of this, but we intend to contact him in any case. I know from a business owner’s standpoint, that I would want to at least address the principal issues myself. His company can take any number of courses of action in all this, but there is only one which will lead to both positive brand awareness, and to a progressive way of thinking about customer relations.

• 2009/09/09 -- Mercedes S Class On Sale In China, But How About Mercedes Service?
• 2009/07/22 -- Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Swim 2010, Hess Mercedes, the E Class, and Customer Service
• 2009/07/17 -- Mercedes-Benz Hess GmbH Customer Support Test, Part Two
• 2009/08/10 -- Roman Wagner’s Service After The Sale, Does Consumer Value Ever End?
• 2009/07/19 -- Germany’s Mercedes-Benz Hess, Part Four, Ford Ka Versus Mercedes A190
• 2010/01/05 -- NBC’s New Domain for its @BreakingNews Twitter Stream
• 2009/12/10 -- Jobs at Mercedes-Benz Singelfingen Are Safe, Daimler Says

About the Author

Phil Butler is editor-in-chief of Everything PR and senior partner at Pamil Visions PR. He’s a widely cited authority on beta startups, search engines and public relations issues, and he has covered tech news since 2004. Phil wrote in the past for ReadWriteWeb, Mashable, Profy, SitePoint, Search Engine Journal, AltSearchEngines. Follow Phil on Twitter or send him an email at phil [at] pamil-visions [dot] com.

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