The parts guy at my dealer is an arrogant tool. I've gone in there and asked for parts that I know for a fact are available and he will tell me they're not or they don't exist. They also didn't call me to let me know parts had come in, and completely forgot to order the apes that I bought.

My sales guy want me to give his dealership a glowing reportcard on the Harley survey, but there is NO WAY I'm giving that parts Dept. a good score.

 

I walk in with my parts book, spew out a couple of numbers and walk away. I learned when I was doing the WG front end conversion on the SB to just tell them I had a WG when they asked, so I didnt hear "that wont fit" Just sell me the F'in parts and hold the commentary. Honestly, now I just buy from Zanotti's. HD dealerships could really benefit from knowing what the hell they're talking about. I was in a local the other day when a customer asked the owner how much an Ultra Classic on the floor weighed....owner says about 650 lbs. Customer says "really thats it?" Yep he replys. Just stupid crap like that drives me nuts. Ultimately they're just salesman or pushing buttons (not all but a majority) We on the other hand are enthusiast.

 

Try buying oftail front end parts for a Dyna. You don'y have to be an enthusiast to be good at the job but you do have to care and that is where most of them fail.

 

I don't know everywhere I go lately, salespeople are friendlier,and more helpful than they ever have been before. Sometimes as an employer you put up w/ stuff when it's hard to find good employees,i.e. when the economy is "hot", now if you don't excell, your employer has a pretty big pool to pick from to replace you right now.

 

I agree...just frustrating for those of us who KNOW exactly what we want and dont need to debate about it. I know that alot of them know what HD wants them to know.I only use the word enthusiast to describe us lunatics who think outside the box a little. BTW I love that softail front end on that thing.

 

so many times i have gone in and asked for a part and they look at me like i have 2 heads, i have to ask them to get the service manual so i can actually point to it for them, i have a hellova story about a petcock but i don't have the finger energy to tell it LOL sometimes ya just can't fix stupid

 

Don't send a bad survey, the salesman could end up losing bonuses because of the parts dept. Used to happen to me at Toyota... Giant BS if you ask me...
Heck I lost 2K in bonus money one month(few years ago I was in the auto industry). A customer damaged their vehicle 2 days after ownership and was battling the dealership insisting on getting a brand new car and would not accept theirs being fixed! They got their survey during this BS of theirs and killed me on the survey!
better to just not send one than complain in a way that makes an innocent employee loose his bonus/commission money.

 

Sometimes you have to hold their hand during the process. I just put footboards on a dyna and ordering the parts was a blast. You have to tell them where to look it up at.

 

Maybe they tell people it won't fit on their bike because they know those same people will return the part and bitch that it doesn't fit when their plan to put it their bike on fails!

 

i don't care for my dealer
the sales guys are d!ckheads.
the service guys are $8 hr straight out of motorsickle school.

The main parts guy is GREAT- good knowledge and will look up anything for me. If I don't buy on that day he prints out all parts I'm interested in so I don't have to look them up again. Will even print pages from the parts book for me.

Once I had to go to another dealer to get parts for an oil change (filter + o-rings). The guy started arguing with me about what I needed??? He asked me what bike I had and I said "2005 FXDI". His reply "What's an FXDI?". I said it's a superglide with fuel injection. He said "I don't think so....never heard of it". I got my parts and left - my 11 year old daughter asked me if the guy was stupid? I said that I was basically speaking his "language" and he didn't understand me .... so yes - he's stupid.