I rent from Dollar for 4 reasons
- often 30 to 50% cheaper than Hertz and other majors
- 3 out of 4 times, they upgrade me
- the cars always seem new - less than 3K on them
- pretty generous Southwest frequent flyer credits for short rentals
But every time I do rent from them I wonder why.
They have a check-out process which could easily be automated - considering they do it thousands of times each hour. Instead, they print contracts out only after you show (about 20% of the time they will have pre-printed it awaiting your signature) and make you initial/sign in 4 places. Then as you drive out you have to sign another form after visually checking the car for dings and dents.
Hertz on the other hand, as I described here, has your signature on file (at least for regular customers) so prints your contract before you arrive and places it in your designated car. All you have to do is show your license and contract as you drive out. No signatures, no visual checks. Do their cars not get dinged? The cost of making customers sign for each instance just does not provide tangible enough benefits.
It costs Dollar 5-15 minutes of employee time for each transaction.
Worse, it costs their preferred customers 20-30 minutes and their less
frequent customers 30-60 minutes depending on the lines. In a competitive world, that means a number of customers never come back after such an experience.
Technology can dramatically improve customer service - by
dramatically reducing the "face time" your employees need to have with
your customer.
Dollar would do well to perform angioplasty of the manual steps and the paperwork. They have so many other positive things going, but the check out process is just shabby...
LinkedOut!
My nephew sends me an invite to join his LinkedIn network. My nephew! He who knows every phone number and email I own!!
Just busting his chops, but seriously I get so many invites from LinkedIn and when I do accept them (every few weeks I feel guilty and sign in), 98% of them have NOTHING to tell me. It's just another notch on their belt. I have 4 contacts who have 500+ connections each!
I try to emulate Peggy Taylor - I try hard to respond to every email and phone and Skype and TypePad message I get. If you need to reach me, my contact info is in the profile. Open door.
I know lots of people love LinkedIn, but if you need to reach me, please just reach out to me directly ...cheers
Update: I just got a LinkedIn invite from good friend Chris Selland - it says "You had BETTER accept this!"
July 25, 2006 in Industry Commentary | Permalink | Comments (7) | TrackBack (1)