Citygate hail the success of going digital with RTC

Citygate Automotive Ltd hail the success of going digital with REALtime Communications

In July 2021, Simon Poole Commercial Director of Citygate Automotive agreed to continue their work with REALtime Communications and embrace the move to a fully digital aftersales journey.

As an existing REALtime Communications customer they already benefitted from the use of a number of our digital solutions, however the change to fully digital has seen their SEAT, Skoda and Volkswagen sites all increase their technician and service advisor productivity, improve inter team communications and deliver a better customer experience – delivering additional revenue from service and upsell in the process.

But what does going digital mean?

Going digital is a process implemented by REALtime Communications, where we utilise our REALaftersales and REALaftesales+ solutions to remove all paper from your aftersales teams, creating digital job cards and providing tools for the Service Advisors and Technicians to use that allow instant updates to the job card – meaning everyone has visibility of where the customers vehicle is in the journey from Booking, Check In, Workshop and Collection.

It also allows manufacturer Warranty claims to be managed digitally too. REALtime Communications completed the approval process for digital warranty with Volkswagen Group UK – meeting their brand standards. This means we have a fully approved digital warranty process ensuring that the dealers will meet the OEM standard and support warranty compliance.

So how did it work?

RTC spent time with Citygate’s Group Development Supervisor Peggy Rawden to first understand and map out the customer journey today, and then identify where new digital processes could be implemented instead – speeding up the process and delivering better results in the process.

Peggy gave us some insight to how the setup and implementation was completed by the RTC team:

“The team at RTC were really supportive and worked hard to understand how we worked today, and how we wanted to work in the future. Once the framework was in place, they made recommendations to us based on the process.

This included, removing the paper job card completely and implementing a digital storage solution, this complemented the existing solutions we have in place from REALtime Communications that connects workshop management directly to our technicians and gives both the service advisors and technicians tools that allowed them to streamline their processes – all this is directly integrated with the DMS so no double keying, which is a great time saver for us alone.”

“We saw the benefits across our Group straight away, with positive feedback being received from the Brand Managers through to Technicians – everyone found their day-to-day activities better and easier to manage, and service revenues and productivity are all improving as result – needless to say it’s a hit with team!”

Speaking to Matt Bianchini – Aftersales Manager Citygate Volkswagen High Wycombe he commented on how easy the new process was once implemented.

“Using mobile devices and tablets for everything made our lives so much easier, as soon as the customer was checked in, everything was live. We could see the customer in workshop management and the technicians could see what work was due, all in the software.

Removing the paper meant that we cut out a lot on unnecessary handling of documents and moving between teams such as workshop control and the service desk. It made it all so much easier to manage and our teams benefited as a result.

We found that it gave management much more transparency and ensured that process we kept to thanks to the check list processes.

Going fully digital further supported the existing functionality of upsell and identification of additional service work already in place through the REALtime Communications platform, thanks to the online authorisation process adding everything to the job card instantly.

Through our process today customers see integrated video and media, highlighting the additional work required and can then authorise online meaning we can get on with the job straight away and not wait for customer call backs, which historically caused delays”

Tracey Potts, RTC Client Services Director was delighted with the outcome of the implementation:

“Our team were really pleased to be working with a retailer group that was happy to go all in on the digital journey with us, as an early adopter they helped us to refine our processes and make it even better now for additional site launches and other groups wishing to go on the same journey.

We would like to give a massive thank you to Peggy for her support specifically, acting as the RTC main point of contact she has been fantastic in supporting our team rolling out the solution. We are looking forward to doing more with Citygate as we launch more and more new features that will help them gain even more benefits from the REALaftersales and REALaftersales+ product ranges.”

For more information on RTC products and service please contact us.

Real Time Communications (RTC) is a digitalisation specialist, working with UK dealerships to deliver complete, seamlessly integrated solutions for sales and aftersales. With 20 years’ experience developing and deploying software, RTC is proven as an expert in digital transformation and a growth partner for dealerships in a fast-changing industry. More than 700 franchised dealers now use RTC tools.

RTC’s technologies allow systems, processes, and communication channels to integrate and share data in real time, leading to revenue opportunities, efficiency savings and sustainable benefits. With a full-service approach, RTC is committed to helping dealerships adopt a customer-centric model, meeting motorists’ demands with a personalised experience.

Citygate Automotive Limited are retailers of new and used Volkswagen passenger cars, Volkswagen commercial vehicles, SKODA, SEAT and Kia in London, Greater London, Middlesex, Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire, and Berkshire. They are also authorised repairers and conduct services for Volkswagen, SKODA, SEAT and Kia brands.