The bigger story lies in the complaints. Communication-related issues have risen from 42% of negative service reviews in 2023 to 48% in Q2 2025. The pattern is clear: every summer, when service lanes are busiest, communication failures surge.

These seasonal spikes are not temporary. Each summer pushes the baseline higher. Even if complaints drop in the off-season, they rarely fall back to previous lows.

For dealerships, the message is clear that communication is both the most influential and the most unstable aspect of service experience. Widewail’s reporting makes it possible to track your dealership’s communication performance week-in-week-out, such that you know when problems are brewing early and can quantify if changes to process, technology, or training are having a real impact on the customer experience.

This type of reporting is exactly what dealers need to help prove the impact of new initiatives, with specific improvement numbers that can tell a clear before-and-after story.

The top 5 drivers of fixed-ops customer experience can be found on page 3

As you can see, yearly negativity spikes roughly map to peak driving months in July and August. *Note the top chart covers 5 years on the X axis, while the bottom chart is only one.

What is Widewail's "X Factor?"

According to George Jones of Haselwood Automotive Group in Washington:

“With Widewail, the X factor was the attention to detail across the board, from the speed and quality of responses, to how the dashboard is put together, to the reporting and content they provide for the dealer body at large. That’s what separates them.”

Read the case study.

See you next week - Jake, Marketing @Widewail

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