The contest played out over a six-month period, and drew over 4,000 participants from Ford dealerships across the country. It consisted of theoretical and practical competitions between teams of six, each comprising two technicians, one service advisor, one Dealer Customer Relationship Centre (DCRC) specialist, one parts specialist and one warranty specialist.

The contest began in May of this year, with all candidates taking a mandatory web-based test, tailor made for each function. Ninety candidates with the highest scores were selected for the second practical round, which took place in July.

This second round, "the flight test", involved 26 Ford-selected mystery customers, who, together with CFMA umpires, visited 26 dealerships in Northeastern and Western districts under the guise of regular customers. The mystery customers tried all the services provided by each dealership, and scored the service advisor and technician teams based on their experiences. The remaining 64 dealerships went through a regular hands-on test.  

"We believe the flight test is an effective way to investigate and evaluate the dealer service teams when they are at work. By doing this, we will be able to improve our dealers' technical and service competencies because each dealership will learn where they fell short and know exactly where to improve," said CFMA CSO Director Laurent Charpentier. 

The final round of the All-In-One Service Contest was carried out in September. Teams from the 20 highest-scoring dealerships were invited to CFMA headquarters in Chongqing. After taking a theoretical exam, the teams were tasked with a practical test.

The test began with a service advisor welcoming a customer and signing off the Repair Order. The customer's vehicle was then transferred to technicians for servicing. If the customer wasn't fully satisfied with the process, he or she was introduced to a DCRC specialist who helped find a solution to the problem. Parallel to this, a parts specialist picked up parts for repair and placed an order to CFMA, while the warranty clerk monitored the repair process and completed the warranty claim.

During this round, each contestant was scored individually. All scores were collated at the end of the round to give the team its total score. The winning individuals from each category were awarded RMB 10,000 (USD 1,450) and the winning team from the Nanjing Forland dealership received a trophy and RMB 30,000 (USD 4,400).  

"This activity is of great value to our dealers because they can share experiences and improve their service efficiency. This is also a great way to gain higher customer satisfaction through a fun learning process," said Charpentier.