9:50 am, September 25, 2019
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ONLY the most highly regarded suppliers of goods and services in the automotive sector win the Car Dealer Power awards handed out by this very magazine – so the fact that The WMS Group has won FOUR such accolades should tell you all you need to know about the company.
It’s an incredible achievement and points to consistently high standards of product provision and customer service over a period of several years.
The WMS Group thinks of itself as the automotive industry’s best-kept secret but it seems as though word is reaching more and more people!
For more than 15 years, the company has been providing extended warranty cover and other motoring products to over 3,500 dealerships across the UK.
Everything The WMS Group does is geared towards helping you to attract and retain customers, increase workshop revenue and maximise profitability.
And even though many parts of the automotive industry are suffering from a severe case of Brexit-related jitters, it seems as though The WMS Group is determined to ‘keep calm and carry on’ – by providing peace of mind for thousands of car buyers and a valuable extra income stream for dealers.
‘Things are going really well,’ managing director John Colinswood told us when we caught up with him recently. ‘We’ve grown considerably over the past 12 months and we’ve expanded continuously over the past 10 years or so, too.’
Asked what the secret of the firm’s success was, Colinswood said: ‘Customer service. We look after our customers, who are the dealers, and their customers too. It’s simple, really – we do what we say we’re going to do. We pay within 24 hours.
‘If an invoice comes in today, there will be a cheque in the post tonight. We don’t have a lot of forms to fill in, it’s all done over the telephone with our fully qualified motor engineers.
‘They all know what they are talking about and we can very quickly establish whether something is covered or not. If it is, we can authorise it and get the customer back on the road pretty much immediately. It’s that sort of service that is separating us from the others, I think.’
The WMS Group offers different levels of cover for customers’ vehicles. Colinswood told us: ‘The dealer tends to choose what level of cover is suitable for the type of stock they are selling. We do a range from almost bumper-to-bumper cover to restricted items on vehicles that are older – obviously, the older a vehicle, the less cover you can provide.’
For a new dealer looking to get on board with The WMS Group, the process couldn’t be easier. An account manager, useful training and eye-catching point-of sale material can all be provided very quickly.
New IT infrastructure
And in the online-first era, The WMS Group certainly hasn’t been left behind. A fantastic ‘Dealer Zone’ on its website has just been added and is proving to be a boon to partners old and new. You can register policies there, find out how to make a claim, access POS materials and much more besides. Colinswood is justifiably proud of the new functionality.
‘Yes, we’ve revamped our website and invested in a whole new IT infrastructure,’ he told us. ‘We have spent about £500,000 upgrading our systems. We’ve got nice, new, slick systems which are better than before.’
One thing that Colinswood is convinced of is that a warranty is not something that’s ‘nice to have’ for a customer, it’s absolutely vital.
‘The way to look at it is this – can somebody, in the middle of the month stand a £3,000 repair bill? That’s what brings it home to a lot of people – they would be in dire straits faced with that situation.’
That’s why dealers shouldn’t be shy about raising the topic of warranties early on in the sales process.
‘A warranty isn’t a superficial add-on, it’s essential,’ he told us. ‘There’s a definite need for it, and by providing a warranty a dealer is giving the customer what they want. I feel dealers sometimes get concerned about giving the customer too much information, but they are actually protecting that customer’s investment, making sure they are not in financial trouble in 18 months’ time.
‘The biggest concern for most buyers is this – have I bought a lemon? In most cases, they don’t really know the dealer, they don’t necessarily know the car, so a good, solid warranty is the element of the deal that can convince them to go ahead. And you can’t work with a better provider than us.’
With four Car Dealer Power awards under its belt (it might even be five by the time you read this!) and thousands of satisfied dealers and motorists on its books, maybe you should get on board with The WMS Group.
T: 01844 293810
