Customer Notes enhancement

Introduction

Dealerships require the ability to track important information about their customers and vehicles. Be it the storage location for seasonal tires, a customer's special request such as not to move the seat, or other information that is pertinent to the customer and their relationship with the dealership. This information needs to be readily available to the user to help guide and enhance the appointment process or service visit to ensure user and customer satisfaction.

Previously with the Service Workflow Suite applications, a dealer could not easily capture and share this customer-specific information. As a result, dealership users would need to check the DMS for any notes that may exist.

With this release, centralized 'Customer Notes' can be captured in and shared across Advisor Check-In, Service Dashboard and Appointment Manager. Customer Notes entered in any of these Service Workflow Suite applications can be read, added and updated in the other listed applications.

By retaining and sharing Customer Notes, dealership staff such as BDC Agents and Service Advisors can anticipate the customer's needs and provide a more individual experience.

 

General points

The following points apply when working with Customer Notes in any application:

  • There is only one note (i.e. set of text) per customer although it may contain information entered by multiple users from multiple applications.
  • Customer Note text is free-form and un-edited, to a maximum of 1000 characters.
  • A user can update or delete the text in existing Customer Notes using any application, regardless of the original entry point or author.
  • Notes are not specific to an appointment or service visit.
  • Customer Notes belong to the customer and not the vehicle. They are not transferred when the vehicle is transferred to another customer.
  • If a customer has multiple vehicles, the same Customer Notes will appear for all vehicles. Tip: In the case of multiple vehicles, make it clear in the Customer Note which vehicle a specific comment refers to, such as the location of seasonal tires.
  • Customer Notes include the user name and timestamp of the most recent update.
  • New/updated text will appear the next time a user opens the notes for that customer from any of the applications for any of the customer's vehicles.
  • Customer Notes are not pulled from the DMS nor do they update the DMS.

 

Appointment Manager - Customer Notes

Customer Notes can be viewed, added or updated when setting up or editing an appointment. A new "Notes" icon has been added to the bottom of the Client & Vehicle page:

= No Customer Notes yet = Existing Customer Notes for review

Click the icon to open and work with the notes for this customer.

Enter new notes or update the existing text, then click "Save".

New or updated notes are only saved to the customer database when the appointment is completed. If you do not confirm the appointment, the new or updated notes will not be saved.

Note: Comments entered in Appointment Manager on the Summary page or with a service line are appointment-specific. They only appear with the appointment and are not related to the Customer Notes described in these Release Notes.

Advisor Check-In - Customer Notes

Customer Notes can also be viewed, added or updated when completing the pre-write. A new "Notes" icon has been added to the bottom of the Customer page:

= No Customer Notes yet = Existing Customer Notes for review

Enter new notes or update the existing text, then click "Save".

New or updated Customer Notes are only saved to the customer database when the pre-write is completed (i.e. the RO is pushed). If you do not complete the write-up, the new or updated notes will not be saved.

Note: Comments entered in Advisor Check-In on the Assign RO page or with a service line are service-specific. They only appear with the RO and are not related to the Customer Notes described in these Release Notes.

Service Dashboard - Customer Notes

Customer Notes can also be viewed, added or updated from the service lane in Service Dashboard. A new Notes tab has been added to the expanded service lane.

= Existing Customer Notes for review

Enter new notes or update the existing text, then click "Save & Close" to immediately save new or updated Customer Notes to the customer database and return to the General tab.

Note: Any notes entered on the Service Visit page of Service Dashboard (using the button) are service-specific. They only appear on the Service Visit page for this service lane and are not related to the Customer Notes described in these Release Notes.

 

Bug fixes

  • Fixed an issue in Appointment Manager which prevented a user from unlocking a locked time slot as the lock icon disappeared.
  • Fixed an issue in Service Dashboard where the 'In shop' time on the service lane when using a PC was not matching the 'In shop time' for the same service lane when using an iPad (using Safari).
  • Fixed an issue in Service Dashboard where a user could not open the service lane window.
  • Fixed an issue in Service Dashboard where the service lane was showing the first characters of the VIN instead of the last characters when using an iPad.
  • Fixed an issue in Service Dashboard where a service lane created by a Tire Profiles arrival was not being correctly set to Arrived status.
  • Fixed an issue in Service Dashboard when manually pushing an appointment to the vehicle queue. The time on the Arrived gate in the service lane was being set to Eastern and not local time.
  • Fixed an issue in Service Dashboard which caused the "Create Invoice" button to be unresponsive.
  • Fixed an issue in Advisor Check-In which caused the Diagnostic Worksheet button to be unresponsive on an iOS device.