BharatBenz, the Indian trucking brand of Daimler India Commercial Vehicles (DICV), promised to spark a revolution in the Indian truck market. And so it did, in its own style. Racing to the fourth spot in monthly sales within a year of entering the market, BharatBenz has delivered on its promises on all fronts. Establishing a new truck brand in a market as challenging as India is not an easy task, but the Indian wing of the global leader Daimler seems to have got its strategy right. DICV’s approach towards aftersales support has been a unique one, much to the delight of its customers who are worry-free about maintaining their vehicles.
A DICV spokesperson shares details of the manner in which Daimler is providing aftersales support to keep customers happy.
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Aftersales support – on top priority
Daimler India Commercial Vehicles places prime importance for after-sales, so much that there was an after-sales network well established before even sales of the product had begun. Our philosophy is to provide the customer with state-of-the-art after-sales service that ensures not just easy reach but pro-active service. DICV’s branded aftersales unit ‘Proserv’ is designed to help BharatBenz Truck owners save time, money and resource.
In India, truck usage patterns are different as loads are not fixed and hence this presents a variety of challenges. While one cannot design a vehicle for every application, we can do certain things to reduce the efforts later.
‘Pro-Active’ approach
Customers will enjoy the benefits of a fully ‘Pro-Active’ service that ensures his trucks provide maximum productivity. We have strong aggregates and globally proven engines, so we have extended the maintenance interval of BharatBenz trucks to 50,000 km and its multiples resulting in fewer visits to the workshop and increasing uptime of the vehicles.
Moreover, the focus is on to ensure that aggregates such as engines, gearboxes and transmissions don’t need any overhaul for the first 4 to 5 years. This translates into 90 percent of vehicles passing 600,000km and thus gives more resale value to customers. Ramesh says, “We are confident about this because this is proven in test and track with customers having completed 300,000km without any issue.”
On the After-sales front, the dealership has a 24×7 enabled workshop. It is manned by qualified & Daimler trained engineers/technicians and equipped with high productivity tools, advanced guided diagnostics & Mobile Service vans. The dealerships also provide a host of value-added services viz., Cashless Zero-depreciation Insurance, Full Maintenance Contracts, Extended Warranty, 24×7 Roadside Assistance, Vehicle tracking systems, Driver Training and Express & On-site Service.
Training levels
We have extensive training programmes, for example mechanics have to undergo 3 levels of training classified as basic, advanced and expert. So far, we have trained over 1,700 mechanics for medium and heavy duty trucks at our Oragadam training facility. Also, Every Dealership has an online technical information platform called Aftersales Central (ASCENT) which is touch enabled, animated, multi-lingual single interface system that provides information on all aggregates used in BharatBenz trucks.
Strong dealer points
At present, we have 73 dealerships across India function with sales, service and parts that cover 85% of the addressable market. In terms of dealership appearances, Every BharatBenz dealership has the same architectural build and layout as well as identical workflow patterns so that customers feel at home anywhere in the country.
BharatBenz has enabled the dealer partners to offer services at any given point in time. For instance, we have a mobile service workshop which involves an investment of Rs. 25 lakh including the vehicle price. Each dealership is equipped with genuine parts, lubes, float aggregates and tools that can handle most breakdowns. These workshops are connected with customer support via GPS so that customers can be reached in four hours.
We have mapped our dealer network with the entire highway network in the country, where no location is farther than 250 kms from one another and the response time to any break down is possible within four hours. We have also achieved a record of 84% for putting vehicles back on road.
Ready for the long-haul
BharatBenz follows consultative selling approach. Our experienced and skilled sales technicians understand the needs of the customer and offer them the right product and right kind of service. Customers are highly qualified and understand the operating economics of their vehicles. We offer our customers efficient annual maintenance service modules that enable them to focus on the business.
As of today, DICV has launched 14 models that involve 7500 part numbers; with 8-10 model additions this could go up to 12,500. Our after-sales model is both scalable and sustainable. We have already been handling the parts and services of MB Actros since 2010. These trucks operate in tough demanding positions and maintenance is a challenging affair. We can handle the volumes and will systematically ramp up services. The BharatBenz trucks have been built to tackle Indian conditions and have gone through arduous testing.