Study: Trust In Dealer Service Departments Remains Surprisingly Strong
Depending on your experience, you may have mixed feelings about your dealer’s service department, but a recent study from J.D. Power showed that owner satisfaction with dealer service departments remains strong in 2025.
The organization ranks dealers on a 1,000-point scale with scores in five primary categories: Service advisors, quality, vehicle pickup, facilities, and service initiation. J.D. Power polled more than 55,000 owners of one- to three-year-old vehicles for the study.
Among luxury brands, Porsche took the top spot with an overall score of 912, while Lexus was second with 900. Cadillac earned a third-place spot with a score of 888, while Acura and Infiniti finished the top five with 885 and 881 scores, respectively. On the mass-market side, Subaru won top honors with an 896. Mini scored 888 and Honda earned an 881. Buick and Mazda rounded out the five best with a tied score of 876.
Interestingly, baby boomers had the highest level of trust in dealer service departments, but younger generations weren’t so sure. Gen X and Millennials were both behind boomers’ level of trust, but Gen Z had the lowest level of trust in dealer services.
Much of owners’ strong satisfaction comes from reduced wait times, which J.D. Power credits to a larger number of available service bays. That said, dealers still struggle with communication, leaving customers with doubts about how the service is progressing. J.D. Power’s director of automotive retail saying, “Limiting that uncertainty goes a long way towards providing a satisfying experience.”
[Images: Porsche, Subaru, Cadillac]
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Chris grew up in, under, and around cars, but took the long way around to becoming an automotive writer. After a career in technology consulting and a trip through business school, Chris began writing about the automotive industry as a way to reconnect with his passion and get behind the wheel of a new car every week. He focuses on taking complex industry stories and making them digestible by any reader. Just don’t expect him to stay away from high-mileage Porsches.
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I have been treated well by my preferred Ford dealer service dept, I'll even mention the name of the place, Jarrett-Scott Ford Plant City FL.
I hate my local Infiniti dealer. They claimed I had a cracked radiator core and needed a new one ($1800). Took it to a friend who is a mechanic and it was just a bad hose clamp. Pressure tested it and it held for the whole day, and I drove it for another 40K miles without an issue. Same dealer claimed he could not replace a bent running board clamp and had to replace the whole assembly @ $1400.
But I think it all depends on the dealership and not the brand, as the other Infiniti dealer a town over put me in touch with the parts distributor so I could buy a new clamp and install it myself without having to pay retail markup. It ended up costing $75 and about 20 mins.