THOUGHT LEADER
Electric School Bus Consumer Education
Written By Robert T. Pudlewski E
lectric school buses, or ESBs, are still a relatively new technology. Although early adopters have paved the way, many school bus operators are unaware or just learning about the operating
characteristics of passenger fleet electric vehicles. Misconceptions about ESBs are still common. Howev- er, there is no doubt that electric vehicles will change the way we provide student transportation and the average school bus operator will need help and time to under- stand what is changing and what will stay the same. Early adopters of electric vehicles generally understood
what they were doing, understanding some of the chal- lenges prior to purchase. Grants incentivized the move. During the Green Bus Summit held at the recent STN EXPO Reno, a number of attendees, both early adopters and potential buyers, raised concerns re- lated to implementation and training while discussing new groundbreak- ing ESB technology in their school bus operations. Their concerns were relative to customer service, training and implementation. The best customer experiences occur when the customer is at the center of the experience. Top sup- pliers keep the customer satisfied by creating a holistic approach to the entirety of the experience. This means, ensuring the customer’s voice is heard throughout the inter- action, providing timely follow-up and confirming future problem resolution and ensuring satisfac- tion with the entire school bus EV procurement and implementation process. Underscoring the importance of the whole customer
on significant customer conversations and imme- diately address any issues they witness.
• Both customer and supplier should create and save call logs and review them later to identify trends. (I always cringed when I told I was the only one to have a request or a problem like this.)
• Pinpoint areas that are the focus of the customer’s attention to help target improved results.
• Create a customer feedback process to enable improvements-based comments and suggestions of all parties involved. This has the potential to enhance customer retention by allowing you to better meet customer needs and address issues before they get worse.
“Suppliers, being
risk-averse in nature, understandably are being very
• Suppliers should use customer satisfaction sur- veys to understand their perspectives and get an idea of what can be improved. • Suppliers should not make the mistake of implementing changes in response to customer feedback without following up on the results. Suppliers, being risk-averse in
conservative in how they create new ESB organization structures and implement skilled resources, incentive models, and KPIs … .”
experience in ESB implementation by OEMs and dealers (suppliers) cannot be overstated. From my previous experience as a procurement
officer of a large school bus operation, I can offer some suggestions of ways to improve supplier and customer purchase experience, which is sales, service and war- ranty of any new technology. Customers and suppliers should consider the following points. • OEMs and their dealers (supplier) should track and analyze every customer interaction to look for ways to improve sales, service and warranty processes. • Supplier product/category managers should sit in
32 School Transportation News • SEPTEMBER 2023
nature, understandably are being very conservative in how they create new ESB organization structures and implement skilled resources, incen- tive models, and KPIs to measure their product success. They have become data-driven organizations investing huge amounts of resourc- es in technologies to connect and track products, collect data and efficiently analyze massive amounts
of operational and service data, using IT technologies and predictive analytics. Suppliers that embrace customer involvement in this
process will be the winners, while others will struggle to stay relevant. In fact, the ones that can successfully adapt to their customer’s needs will be able to gain significant competitive advantage and market share, while helping the customer overcome the many anxieties associated with new technology. ●
Pudlewski is the retired vice president of procurement and maintenance for Laidlaw. He is a member of the National School Transportation Association Hall of Fame.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68
