Volkswagen Australia adds spark to its buying experience

Ahead of its long-awaited EV rollout – starting with the Volkswagen ID.4 and ID.5 electric SUVs in mid-2024 and the ID. Buzz people-mover and ID. Buzz Cargo commercial van in late 2024 – Volkswagen Australia is promising to make the car-buying process a more enjoyable and informed experience with new online configurator features, improved vehicle delivery tracking and a range of EV-related aftersales support.

“The EV shift is now from early adoption into early mass market, and with this comes quite a different customer, a different needs stage… who are more daunted by change from ICE to BEV. [We want them] to have real peace of mind all along,” said Volkswagen Australia’s general manager of marketing and product, Ralph Beckmann.

“We will have the entire Volkswagen network ready to sell and service our whole BEV range in 2024 in addition to infrastructure in the dealership, where we will have at least one public-facing charge point, effectively accelerating the public charging infrastructure in Australia.”

Volkswagen wouldn’t reveal the cost of this infrastructure or how much each dealer would have to contribute, but Beckmann said “all of our dealer partners are on board” and added that the type of charger (AC wallbox or DC fast-charger, for example) and number (some dealers will have more than one) will vary across the network.

Beckman said that Volkswagen would also overhaul its purchase process from the very first typical customer-facing point – its public website – with the rollout of the Seamless ID Web Buying Experience next year.

“In the usual configurator environment the customer can select the grade, the colours and available options, and then in one seamless experience we are bolting on the offer of finance, capped price service plans and accessories – probably what you’d expect from a brand,” he said.

Beckman admitted much of this concept was not new, but the much finer attention to detail is.

“This will not set the world on fire, but this is where we take a step back; we want to make sure we go in with a strong proposition, with strong partners that help us fulfil our promise of a worry-free transition.”

To that end, the online presence of Volkswagen’s upcoming battery-electric ID models will become more sophisticated from next year.

“In the same one-stop environment will be the option to select a charger for your home – the installation of that will be made exclusively to Volkswagen owners – the public charge benefits as well as exclusive rates for home energy plans and additionally financial incentives for any solar installations on top of any state-based incentives,” said Beckmann.

“We are in final negotiations with some Australia-based brands to help us along the way of this journey.”

Part of the online advances is the AR Wallbox Experience, which allows ID customers to use augmented reality to estimate the location and size of wallbox charger they want fitted at home. Using their phone, they can see if the space they had in mind will be appropriate for a wallbox and can also send a photo to ensure there’s no confusion when it comes time for installation.

Finally, Volkswagen is updating its vehicle delivery tracking process from early 2024, to address overly conservative customer delivery time estimates.

“The shipping part has been somewhat difficult. As a result of that we’ve had to give some very conservative estimates, sometimes much longer than it actually takes for a customer to receive their car,” he said.

“That’s been solved and in an industry first we now have full integration with the Hoegh shipping company. We’re working on a similar integration with Villenius, but 90 per cent of our shipping [to Australia] is with Hoegh.

“A customer can at any point of time see where the vessel is, that is carrying your car to Australia, updated in real-time hourly. This will be launched in quarter one, not just for ID cars exclusively but across the range”.

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