25 November 2024

My daughter’s car is two months from its next MOT and annual service, and seeing as she’s at uni right now and her car isn’t, everything automotive falls to me. Rather helpfully, my local franchised retailer, who we use because they’re convenient, well-priced and friendly, sent me a reminder email with a link to an online booking page.

I’m one of those people who, if something is easy enough, prefers just to get it sorted there and then, so that when that thing is actually due, I don’t have to panic about it.

As an example, I have, in the past, been known to book my next service at the point of paying for the current service.

But in this case I just clicked the ‘book now’ link in the email.

This is where the first problem happened. The website took me to a different brand to the one I have. I double-checked and found that the email link looked correct – with the correct brand in the URL, but there must have been a redirect in place.

No matter, I just navigated back to the correct page.

This was where the second issue appeared. The online booking form would only allow me to pick a date up to one month in advance.

Now falling outside the ‘easy to do’ criteria, I gave up and got back to more urgent things and I just hope that I’ll get a reminder email in about a month’s time with the correct link.

The message here is that with so many different systems in operation within a retailer, the need to make sure everything is in harmony is more important than ever.

In this case, I’m guessing the system sending the automated marketing email hadn’t been checked that it would point customers to the correct place, the website hadn’t been checked for anomalous redirects, and the booking system hadn’t been checked that it would allow what was being promoted.

In this case, the retailer hasn’t lost me as a customer, but I’d guess some people won’t be as loyal.

Tristan Young

Editorial director

Auto Retail Network

Tags: Agency Agreements, MariaGrazia Davino, Stellantis, ZEV Mandate