Halfords Bike Monkeys

[drcarlos]

well i found the problem after looking at the fsa site. one of the plastic spacers come covers was misssing from the left hand side. i have also round a halfords employee who seems to know his stuff as he spotted the problem without me pointing it out . he is changing it now while i get breakfast and post this from my phone.

carl

 

[jimmylad]

hi all,(edit.)

dont want to sound funny but it does suprise me that people go in to the shop and expect the same service as a boutique-bike shop selling boutique names as van nicholas, litespeed, foes and ellsworth.

what were you expecting to get? the same service as you would from a core bike shop?!?!

if you go to aldi you get stuff at a bargin, if you go to harrords you get great service! next time dont be so cheap and go to a real bike shop. lol.
hope you got your bike fixed though.

safe travels

 

[Andy B]

He had to buy from Halfords as it was on the cycle scheme & that's where his company had set it up (all on page one of the thread)

Why shouldn't you get the same level of service from one of the UK's largest bike stores? They sell some fairly high end bikes as well as low end tat, much the same as your average LBS, so why should the level of service vary from the LBS?

Because they only care about getting a sale & making money, whereas a good LBS will care about customer service & having decently trained staff (as well as making money)

 

[hoegaardenadds1]

its a catch 22 though, if we gave every customer who comes into halfords the same level of service as an lbs we couldn't serve all the people that came in as our footfall is MUCH higher than that of an lbs. also you dont get the bike snob factor that you get in some lbs shops.

 

[hoegaardenadds1]

here's a question
there are two people working on the department, and you have four customers waiting to buy a bike. how would you deal with the situation?

some rules.

1. you have no more staff to call on

2. you cant ask the customer to call back later

 

[Andy B]

here's a question
there are two people working on the department, and you have four customers waiting to buy a bike. how would you deal with the situation?

some rules.

1. you have no more staff to call on

2. you cant ask the customer to call back later

OK, here's how we did it in our shop with 1 or 2 staff & more customers than staff...

Note who came in 1st, 2nd, 3rd etc...

say Hello, ask if they need any help.

If they do give then a few ideas to mull over & politely say that you have to attend to the next customer & then go to customer #2 & repeat the process, by the time customer #1 has mulled over the options you gave them you should have finished with customer #4 and be able to help customer #1 with any further questions.

All you have to do is be polite, and manage your time well. Never lost a sale doing this. Even with 6 customers & 1 member of staff (me)

Simples

 

[Russell]

So, fundamentally, the thrust of the thread is this...

Bought a bike from Halfords, picked it up on Friday afternoon. I noticed a problem (which they had missed) and by 10am Saturday, they had fixed it for me.

Bloody Halfords! :roll:

 

[hoegaardenadds1]

ok what if your foot fall is 2500 over a week with 3 full time members of staff?

assuming that not all 2500 are customers (i.e family groups, couples etc) it works out on average we convert 30% of customers into sales.

that is aprox 800 'sales'. each employee works 37.75 hours so that mean he can spend aprox 9 minutes per sale.

this doesn't take into account answering phones, actually building the bikes(for customers and displays) putting on promotions, all repair work.

obviously this is averaged out over a week, so we have busier and quieter times.

i am sure all staff would love to spend an hour with each customer, but with the pressures we are under it is just not feasible.

 

[Andy B]

ok what if your foot fall is 2500 over a week with 3 full time members of staff?

assuming that not all 2500 are customers (i.e family groups, couples etc) it works out on average we convert 30% of customers into sales.

that is aprox 800 'sales'. each employee works 37.75 hours so that mean he can spend aprox 9 minutes per sale.

this doesn't take into account answering phones, actually building the bikes(for customers and displays) putting on promotions, all repair work.

obviously this is averaged out over a week, so we have busier and quieter times.

i am sure all staff would love to spend an hour with each customer, but with the pressures we are under it is just not feasible.

Which is why Halfords usually suck, just not enough staff to cope with demand, the business is to focussed on sales figures, not customer service.

If the management actually pulled their heads out of their rear ends & thought more about good customer service then they would make more money & not have a weekly 'Halfords sucks...' thread on several forums

I feel for any proper biker who works for Halfords as you don't get a chance to show what you can do for a customer.

Some of the lads in my local store are very knowledgeable, but their customer service skills leave a lot to be desired.

 

[hoegaardenadds1]

andy, could you email that exact statement to our customer services department you would make my day! thats pretty much how most of us feel. unfortunately its not our store managers fault really. they have seen their wage budgets cut by 2/3rds at least. this also means they are forced to use the cheapest staff to cover a shift, which can lead to poorly motivated 'monkeys'