Silverstone Leasing has merged its two subsidiary brands in a move to share best practice and drive the customer experience.

Silverstone Leasing’s corporate and personal leasing businesses have now joined forces

Historically, Silverstone Leasing, based in Preston Deanery, Northampton, has dealt with corporate leasing while its sister company, Embrace Leasing, managed the personal leasing and retail side of the business.

The two teams relaunched at the start of 2024 as one entity, putting together the most efficient and effective working methods and processes.

The united front means that customers can now access the Silverstone Leasing team for all enquiries seven days a week. Silverstone said a key factor in the decision was the revelation that nobody else offered human contact at weekends, as uncovered by mystery shoppers.

A soft launch in December 2023 proved the benefits of such an approach.

Managing director Scott Norville said: “Combining everything using the same processes across the board is already proving to work really well. Everything we do, we’ve looked at how can we improve it and approach 2024 in a new way, putting our customer service levels at an all-time high.

“Previously it felt disjointed with two separate teams and our service levels needed to be improved. We weren’t opening at weekends and customers were enquiring while we were closed, meaning we were missing opportunities.

“We decided we needed a presence at the weekend. Now on a Saturday a member of the team is available for four hours from 9am to 1pm on a rota basis, which means we can get back to the customer quickly and be very responsive.

“As well as that, we’ve fine-tuned our processes and added automation to the customer journey to help with idea generation and how we can do things better.”

The new weekend cover has already proven successful with more customers receiving speedier responses and therefore warmer leads.

Norville added: “Customer confidence is slowly improving and that alongside our own improvements is already proving fruitful. Weekends are busy times for enquiries and we are now able to speak to the customer and ascertain what they’re looking for before we send out a quote – and still get the whole process completed quicker.

“I’m proud of the team and their positive attitude to the changes and I hope that our new approach will help us achieve our target of 20% growth this year.”