Fixed Ops Journal - October 2019 - F24

FIXED OPS JOURNAL

SECOND LOOK

Qvale Auto Group executive Paul
Jensen personally handles pleas from
customers who need help instantly.

STILL CRAZY

MARK ELIAS

Nearly a decade later, Paul's still on call 24/7 for service emergencies



MARK ELIAS

foj@autonews.com

ORAL SPRINGS, Fla. - In 2010,
Paul Jensen, the operations director
of two Audi dealerships in the Fort
Lauderdale, Fla., area, had an inspiration: creating a dedicated telephone hotline
for the stores' service customers who needed
help coping with roadside emergencies.
Jensen wanted to make sure those customers would get high-level attention at any hour
of the day or night, seven days a week. So he
resolved that he would staff the hotline himself, to respond to collisions, breakdowns, flat
tires, keys locked inside vehicles and other
owner problems.
He pitched the idea to the stores' dealer
principal, Bruce Qvale. As Jensen remembers
it, Qvale gave him the go-ahead but warned:
"You're insane - it's not going to last."
It did, though. Nearly a decade later, the Audi dealerships' hotline continues to operate

PAGE 24

OCTOBER 2019

This is the first article in an occasional
series revisiting best practices in dealership
fixed operations previously reported by
Automotive News.

"You need someone
willing to answer the
phone blindly in the
middle of the night. Very
few people are willing to
do that for a job."
PAUL JENSEN, Qvale Auto Group

around the clock. And Jensen, 64 and now director of dealership operations for the
14-store Qvale Auto Group, still provides the
reassuring voice at the other end during the 50
or so hotline calls he fields each month.
"I am it," Jensen told Fixed Ops Journal.
"When the calls come in, I answer them with,
'You've reached the Audi Coral Springs or Audi
Fort Lauderdale hotline. How can I help you?' "
Jensen says Qvale's Audi dealership in Lakeland, Fla., has set up its own hotline. He adds
that he's unaware of any other dealerships
that have adopted the practice, saying: "You
need someone willing to answer the phone

blindly in the middle of the night. Very few
people are willing to do that for a job."

Troubleshooter
As he did when Automotive News first reported on the hotline in 2014, Jensen gives the
dealerships' sales and service customers business cards that include the hotline's 800
phone number. Call center operators who answer hotline inquiries connect with Jensen
even "if I am on vacation, out of town or out of
pocket." He wants to be available at all times
because, he says, "Most people who call in the
middle of the night are in trouble."
"When my phone goes off, I get up and out
of bed," Jensen says. "My wife gets aggravated
by it, but I do what needs to be done. I've told
people we will send roadside assistance to
them to retrieve the car, and for them to call
Uber to get a ride home." The dealership reimburses that expense.
Jensen says he has taken calls from Audi
owners who have just been in crashes. If such
customers don't need immediate medical attention, he directs them to the dealerships' list
see HOTLINE, next page

Fixed Ops Journal - October 2019

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