Well, where do I start,
I swore to myself when I became a member of this club that I would and should not need to respond to any negative jargon or any personal innuendo's or attacks on me or I would just need to excuse myself of the situation and move on.
I started my retail sales career just over 20 years ago and have worked for just 2 car dealers. My first was Burlington VW for just over 10 years, then 8.1 miles away at VW of Langhorne.
In that time, other then an approximate 2 year hiatus as the sales manager of Burlington VW, I have been in the sales dept as a salesperson. My customer satisfaction rating score for these 20 years is 98.67% and I am damn proud of it. I do believe in the fact that you are not going to please everyone you come in contact with, however, I take the mentality that I would like to take that challenge.
I would like to think that I am a different kind rather then the stereotypical salesman many people think and is true about other folks in my profession.
In my career, I have never taken advantage of a single client, even when the opportunity presented itself to me! It is just not in me. I would rather sell 20 cars for the same commission as selling 10 cars as I really enjoy the job that I have chosen in my life.
Believe me when I tell you that I have been hard pressed about this before as the ability as a new car salesman to make a good living these days as the business is going, I have never waivered.
The way I make money in this business is by a quantity of vehicles I can sell and then reaping the rewards of bonuses and VW factory programs designed for the salesman.
Without boring you, once I discount the car and give the factory interest rate to the client, I get paid $125 per car. I then get a quantity bonus from my employer. I then get my largest portion from the VW programs that are offered. I ONLY reap the VW factory awards by having a very high customer satisfaction rating.
I say all this not to get anyone on my side of conversation, just to lay a foundation.
I came on the TDI club just about 10 years ago and joined what was at the time, two other new car dealer salesman that were here on the board. Some of you will remember, Sean(shear)from Wisconsin and Jerry(it's me Jerry) from Alabama. For a couple years, I believe all three of us enjoyed the success of selling VW's to other club members and the friendship many of us members have had together.
Over the next 8 years after that, for one reason or another, I became the resident salesman on the board alone and made it my career to cater to just TDI business. I was selling VW's and forging relationships with folks all around the country and loving every minute of it.
I actually really found out how important(other then the business side of it) how important this club and my dealings were when I was stricken with an illness and was laid up in the hospital for an extended period of time. Between the letters to my hospital room and letters of encouragement here on threads on the club, I actually had many club members from a whole geography of the US come to see me in the hospital.
For all of you, I thank you for that.
Now I would like to get back to my post here and why I am writing to you.
Approx 6 months ago, I was referred by another club member to the OP that started this thread.
As I always do the first time anyone on the club asks anything from me, I always go back into their history on the club to get a feel for them and what their needs or desires may be.
When I did this for the OP, it was a bit of curiosity as she seemed to be all over the map with her posts and resolutions.
No big deal, I am a car salesman and I need to sell cars so I took it upon myself to move forward. We met and talked and I then realized that she infact has a few personal illness problems and that she just may have not been coming over understandibly in her posts.
She informed me that she had been taken advantage of automotively in the past and I informed her that would not happen with me.
Folks, let me tell you, I could have taken a big advantage over her in our car deal to get her out of her Passat deal and I did not. I generally liked her and told her she had someone on her side.
Here is where the tricky part comes in, and the part I despise doing, however, feel that I have to instead of not responding to this.
Mei Mei does have a valid point about me telling her that I did not need her help personally and I just need to sell cars.
See, she came in last week and told me she really did not like the DSG trans in her 2014 Passat and so I naturally sat down with her to discuss getting a 2015 model with the manual shift again.
I laid out a couple details for her and to try and keep the payments close to her 2014 deal, we could go with 2.9% financing for 72 months or find possibly a close rate to that and grab $750 in dealer cash on 2015 Passat's if we not go thru VW Credit.
She then left for the day and made an appointment with me for Monday, the 20th to come in and get the wood grain finish taken care of.
I was home from the hospital just a couple days and I received a pm here on the club asking me why I was holding back on her when she saw a rate of 1.9% thru VW credit. I then answered her back in a pm stating that I did not hold back on her.
Mei Mei then called me at approx 10:30 in the am and I retuned her call just a bit after lunch on the appointed Monday. She and I were having some phone issues as she was in the car and everytime she spoke, it would break up and I just could not get her to stop talking in a brief to state this, I raised my voice and stated to her to just let me talk. I then stated to her that I do not need her personal help with Duke Univ or any other entities, I just need to get back to selling cars.
I apologies if I raised my voice, however, I do not apologize about my comments.
I was not saying directly to her that all I cared about was selling her a car. I have been on this club with members and talked them out of buying cars when they explained their situations to me.
I just could not sit back and take this on the chin. I have already been dealt with at work and do not need it here as well. I can take constructive criticism, however, no one os going to put me down and talk openly about my health issues.
Chris