Why big car companies need Banawe shops
CAR companies love to brag about the five-star service and genuine parts that you can only get from their authorized dealerships and service centers. They encourage car owners to have their vehicles serviced only at official dealerships to ensure proper maintenance and repair. They even warn car owners that having their car serviced at non-authorized shops will void the vehicle’s warranty. Fair enough. Then you see the video that’s been making the rounds of social media. It’s a dash cam video of what appears to be a dealership employee teaching another person how to drive inside the service area of what was claimed to be the Fairview dealership and service center of a leading car brand. What makes the video disturbing is that the footage was taken from the dash cam of a vehicle that was brought in for servicing.
Obviously, when you bring your car in for servicing, you don’t expect the people from the dealership using your car for driving lessons—or for any other reason aside, of course, from road testing. But judging from the audiotaped conversations inside the car, it was an outright driving lesson for someone who was already having a challenging time just maneuvering the vehicle among the cars parked inside the service shop. The comments from the owner, whom I haven’t had the chance to talk to, also point to substandard work and even more issues with the car than when it was originally brought in.
So what’s my take on all this?
As I commented to a friend who tagged me when she shared the video, that’s the reason why I prefer to have my car serviced at neighborhood independent shops and gasoline service stations.
But it’s not primarily because of what happened at that Fairview dealership. To be honest, I’ve heard of similar incidents from other brands in the more than 30 years I’ve been working around cars. Believe me, no management will condone such behavior from their sales or service staff. (I’ve heard of a sales executive— from a different brand— who took his customer’s car ostensibly for servicing but decided to use it as his personal car for several days. He would’ve gotten away with it if the owner didn’t see his own car parked at a mall.)
It would also help enlighten car owners that car dealerships are franchised, much like Jollibee or McDonald’s stores. This means that each “casa” might have its own work culture/ ethic, despite all the corporate identity (CI) training that dealership personnel undergo from the head office/distributor/ manufacturer.
And that still doesn’t take into account individual rogue employees. These can be sales executives who can overcharge a customer for whatever fees/accessories/ insurance coverages they may have for their vehicles. These can be service advisors who will recommend/hardsell you with service jobs your car doesn’t really need. These can be mechanics who don’t really replace a part with a brand-new genuine one but instead install non-genuine parts or worse, parts from another customer’s car. It’ll be hard for dealership principals to check on each and every employee—a typical dealership can have anywhere from 100 to 200 employees— let alone the head office, which oversees sometimes more than 50 dealerships with thousands of staff nationwide.
Thankfully, these instances are few and far between—mostly because car companies have computerized and networked inventory and accounting systems that prevent large-scale pilferage or parts-swapping, for instance. Still, anyone resourceful—and dishonest—enough can always find a way to circumvent secured systems.
Which brings me to small independent repair shops like those in Banawe St. in Quezon City and Evangelista St. in Makati as well as some gasoline stations. I say “some” gasoline stations because fewer and fewer of them are engaging in heavier operations (i.e. brake, clutch and suspension repairs) over and above the customary oil change and tune-ups. There are also service shop chains like Servitek and Rapide that give good service and have an impressive stock of parts for practically all brands. (I once found a complete filter kit for my then-15-year-old Volvo at Rapide.)
I prefer these shops mainly because they allow me to watch closely while they work on my car. Of course, having hot oil or grease drip on their shirt (or worse, hair) may not be everyone’s cup of tea. But I’ve always been the hands-on type of guy who inspects old spark plugs and worn suspensions bushings even if it means having to wash my hands afterwards with laundry detergent for more than 15 minutes to get the soot off my hands and from under my fingernails.
Secondly, these independent shops always charge cheaper than dealerships. Of course, you don’t get an airconditioned customers’ lounge with wi-fi and the closest thing to a beverage that a dealership’s Englishspeaking customer service staff can offer you at these small shops is taho from an ambulant vendor.
Thirdly, and this should actually be the second reason, is that you do away with the long lines, long waiting, and extensive paperwork they make you go through at a “casa.” Most dealerships put a number hat on your car (first come, first served) and you wait until a service receptionist/advisor is free to talk to you. Then they checklist your car for the most infinitesimal scratch before letting you sign on the service job order form. On a bad day, all these can take more than an hour, by which time I would have had my car’s oil changed and tires rotated at a gas station. I’m already back on the road and the dealership hasn’t even started on your car yet.
But what about the question of warranties being invalidated because of non-servicing at the “casa?” That’s when I bite the bullet and err
on the safe side—I bring the car to the dealership like a good boy. But I try to befriend the service manager or better yet, the dealer principal, so I can at least watch my car being worked on. Believe me, they don’t always allow it—even if you’re a motoring editor of a major daily. It’s more for safety’s and liability’s sake. A service area is an industrial area and accidents can and do happen.
Now going back to why I said that car companies need small shops like those in Banawe, I stated as much because Banawe is precisely the reason why Toyota is so popular. One of the most compelling reasons for buying a Toyota is ease of maintenance. “Pwede
ipagawa sa Banawe” is a most common reason why buyers choose Toyota.
In contrast, brands like Honda and Subaru are proud to claim that they have successfully controlled the influx of non-genuine parts. That’s a double-edged sword. It’s good for ensuring and maintaining the quality of the cars, the brand image and it’s good for the dealerships. But it’s not necessarily good for car owners who are keeping an eye on their car maintenance bills or those who have held on to their cars for a decade or so and have found that dealerships no longer carry parts for old cars in stock and will need weeks or months to procure the necessary part—and which will inevitably cost an arm and a leg.
So be street smart with your car maintenance. Know when and where to have your car serviced and you’ll enjoy long quality time with your four-wheeled friend— with minimal hassle and at minimal cost.