What the two-day programme covers
Day 1: Clarify Needs, Match Options and Explain Recommendations
1. The Aftersales Customer Journey
Map the customer experience from booking to vehicle collection. Identify where inconsistent information, unclear estimates or missed handoffs affect trust.
Practice activity: Review an anonymised service visit and rebuild the handoffs around a clear, shared understanding of the customer’s needs.
2. Welcome, Clarify and Build Trust
Begin the service interaction by listening to the customer’s concern. Ask about vehicle use, timing and priorities, then explain the next diagnostic or service step.
Practice activity: Rehearse the first two minutes of a service appointment, with feedback on listening, clarity and expectation setting.
3. Identify Verified Needs and Relevant Options
Connect approved technical findings and vehicle information to customer priorities. Decide whether to recommend a service or part, defer work, seek further input or make no additional recommendation.
Practice activity: Work through service and parts cases and explain the evidence behind each recommendation, deferral or referral.
4. Present the Recommendation and Estimate
Explain what the work involves, why it is relevant, what it costs and what requires confirmation. Separate required and optional work, and check understanding before requesting authorisation.
Practice activity: Present an approved estimate and respond to a customer’s clarification questions, with feedback on accuracy, balance and plain language.
Day 2: Handle Questions, Agree Action and Coordinate the Team
Opening practice: One Customer, Three Roles
Revisit the sequence of welcoming, clarifying, checking needs, matching options and explaining recommendations. Compare what the customer hears from service, parts and administration colleagues.
Practice activity: Complete the same customer case across three roles and identify where handoffs need greater clarity.
5. Handle Cost, Timing and Trust Questions
Respond to concerns about cost, urgency, warranty, alternatives, stock and repair time. Practise acknowledging, exploring, responding and checking understanding, using approved information.
Practice activity: Complete timed role plays using customer-question cards, including situations that require technical, stock or warranty confirmation.
6. Agree Authorisation and the Next Service Action
Confirm whether the customer wishes to authorise work, defer a recommendation, request a further check, order a part or take no additional action. Make the agreed cost, timing and follow-up clear.
Practice activity: Conduct an authorisation conversation and hand the case to a back-end colleague for a record and follow-up review.
7. Create an Integrated Aftersales Improvement Plan
Bring the skills together in a role-specific 30-day plan. Agree a shared handoff standard and select behaviour and result measures for manager review.
Practice activity: Develop a team recommendation standard and a personal improvement plan covering one customer conversation, one handoff and one metric.
