Well, while every one knows that the customer is not always right, not having the attitude that the customer is not always right will run away business.
The customer is why you are there, if the customer is not there neither are you. You have to know when to give in and when not to.
When I was the service sales manager for the Olds dealership we were very busy, a typical Monday morning during the Summer meant taking in
150 or so vehicles. I had 6 service advisers doing nothing but writing repair orders from 7:00 am till about 1:30 in the afternoon. A typical week was 400+ vehicles going through our service department. We were in down town Houston and 80% of our business was big fleet business, oil companies, banks, etc. We provided great service and certainly charged a premium for our services. Using the OLDS warranty labor manual for our flag time we charged up to $70 per hour, 33 years ago.For our customers that brought in their personal vehicles that may have had an issue with a repair or what ever they thought they were paying for I had a special way of letting the customer be right if they were not happy. My service adviser would bring the customer to me, explain the situation and I would immediately apologist, right or wrong, and hand the customer my business card with a note on the back. The note stated that the customer got a 10% discount on his next visit when he presented my card and there was absolutely no limit to the dollar amount of repairs. They were always happy because they felt that some one cared and extended a token of appreciation for the situation.
We also had a separate department that followed up on every service customer with in one week. Every customer was asked 10 question about his or her experience. Our satisfaction rating was never under 95%. I will add that I and the service advisers could double our pay checks as long as the customer rating did not go below 92% That was a feat considering 400 new customer each week.