automotive technician

sales associate

finance manager

service advisor

detailer

AutoCanada

Managers here are for short clueless and fill your mind with false promises just to get the job done. They don't support their staff and have zero communication. The chaos that they create and confusion among service advisors and techs is horrible. When you raise concerns to them at meetings they come up with this nice sales pitch to make it seem convincing but in reality it's not. The dysfuntion between service advisors, techs and the part department is unbelievable. They rarely communicate with each other and when they do it's through a messaging system or email. They can't walk 10 feet to ask each other a simple question.
They would like to see you work consistently with zero breaks until you are completely burned out of your mind. You consistently work hard for your money with little to no rewards. I found the work culture there to be toxic. The majority of the employees would treat other employees disrespectfully. Some employees would be seen or heard slamming doors, throwing things across the room or even using vulgar language in the lobby area while customers where in the waiting area.
The pay is not that great. Not competitive with the current market. Managers will come in and change the payment schemes to make your work harder for your money. I found that you are just another number in this company. Easy to replace. Get someone cheaper to do the job type deal.
The turnover ratio is extremely high. You see new employees monthly. People let go, fire or they quit due to new management. There is a perfectly good reason as to why the turnover ratio is so high. They choose to treat there employees bad! Take it from me. 

Have lost all good car people over last several years. Turned into the fast food industry of auto dealerships with low pay, high turnover, corporate culture in a personality and salesmanship industry. Management at dealer level have no autonomy to make decisions unless they conform to corporate mandates that are motivated to make the most with least amount of capital. IT services is a joke and nothing gets done with constant, weekly issues that cripple ability to function. Hiring process is controlled and navigated by corporate and takes forever, even when finally given approval to hire much needed staff. All support staff have been terminated and eliminated and work load increased while pay has been decreased. Massive turnover across entire company, both corporate and within dealerships. Auto Canada is literally the laughing stock of the industry. If you want to learn how to destroy culture, morale, ingenuity and fun (dealerships are typically amazing and fun environment with great people and personalities) with industry low wages and benefits, by all means join one of the Auto Canada dealerships. If you want to be a corporate shill and advance quickly to management with zero people or culture skills, be a paper and numbers pusher, by all means, join and drink the Auto Canada Kool-Aid.

On the help desk we supported over 7000 computers and 4700 employees across the country.  Usually it was a very friendly environment.  It's a thankless job but if you've ever been in IT for any length of time you get used to that.
  Management is pretty good most of the time, I got along well with all of my managers.
  The most enjoyable aspect of the job for me was interacting with my coworkers.  I became close friends with a few of them and we would sometimes go for lunch or hang out after work.
  The hardest part of the job was dealing with the really obnoxious and "entitled" clients.  Most of my clients were very pleasant to work with but there were times when a certain person from a certain store would call and frustrate the heck out of all of us.  Fortunately I handle those types of situations well.
  Recently the culture has shifted away from the family-centered style of business to a "numbers/results" type business.  We had a change of leadership and lost what I would call the heart of our company.  Since then our direction shifted and we noticed a lot of changes, both to policy and staff.
  My biggest takeaway from this job was learning the value of building relationships and giving respect to everyone everywhere.  I learned a lot of new skills and honed on some natural abilities as well, but the skills that will take me the farthest to where I want to go is definitely improving my leadership, which I was able to develop here.

A typical workday consists of multiple IT issues that you don't have direct influence on or authorization to fix (spend $). Days to weeks for a resolution, even on crippling issues. 

I believe I learned how to navigate multiple completely out of touch personalities. I recognized burnt out employees and even corporate leadership with low morale that had given up. 

My direct manager was a monster of a human being, leaching valuable time from me while they repeated the plainly obvious with belittlement and sarcasm. Often burning up 2 hours of my day ranting and nitpicking leaking faucets and papers on desks. 

Culture? Open contempt for the company and its "values" 

The hardest part of the job was doing my own full time job plus another persons 30 hour a week position along with missing another person that would have been a third full time position. Second hardest thing was convincing people to work there with laughable wage offerings compared to independant competition.

The best part of my job was building some amazing staff members from the ground up and making sure they knew the shortcomings in delivering a good experience were not a result of their abilities. 

Very high turnover observed across multiple departments. Didn't come across too many people who worked with the company for more than a couple of years. Employees seemed to have really varied skillsets and combined with poor orientation/clear outlines of job expectations, can see why they go through so many people.
Lean benefit program, no RRSP program. The company didn't allow for office employees to work from home when the Alberta government-mandated work from home measures when possible in fall 2020. Some COVID measures were put in place such as limiting the number of people in meeting spaces and providing sanitary wipes, but AHS was called in on inspection/complaints a few times and some senior management was still noticed not wearing masks after those instances.
Poor communication on time off and stat holidays. Management would send general emails to employees on the expectation they needed to cover holidays, while other managers would verbally express staff didn't have to. Employees also seemed hesitant to take vacation time off as support systems weren't clear. There is a definite divide noticed between upper management and employees.

Nothing like spending 2.5 years as an employee here, only to be laid off/terminated without cause or any explanation whatsoever and replaced by another co-worker at 8 AM the next morning and they try to hide it. 

Also great to find out through someone else outside the building that upper management knew this was going to happen for awhile and strung me along. I had to go through four people to get my ROE which I received 15 days later. The best part is I had another job offer elsewhere in 2018, and VW convinced me to stay after some negotiating. I could have avoided this situation and could have been working for a better company today.

Thanks.

If they treat employees like this, imagine how they treat your vehicle. Trust me, it's not good

MoreFun Facts: They hid the fact that my department had a bonus structure until I saw other employees in my department get envelopes with their bonus information and asked why I was not included. I also had the pleasure of having my hours changed permanently without my consent when it was supposed to be temporary until someone else was hired. The best part was waiting for the manager to come back from a 2+ hour lunch before I could take mine. Excuses like "emergency haircut" and "I'm too hungover" were a weekly occurrence.

The idea and the framework of a positive corporate culture is there but misses the mark completely in practice. Management motives by berating staff and pressuring them to do things that are considered unacceptable to most automotive groups. When sales are down threats of lost jobs company wide are made in order to try and motivate. The corporate culture is a typical one of climbing the corporate ladder where the top rungs are compensated way beyond their capabilities and the lower rungs are simply expendable and can be replaced.
Management does not communicate with staff and prefers to write them up to ensure there is something to lean on when letting someone go. Giving staff a free lunch here and there while management continues to make more and more money on the backs of the workers who are actually doing the work. 
I would highly recommend steering clear of Auto Canada, they are a company that is only driven by bottom line and nothing more. Job security is only for those that do not consider themselves useful anywhere else. There is a reason the turnover through all levels of the dealership are high, it’s not worth your mental health to be a part of an organization like this. 

Management will happily throw you under the bus at a moments notice.

No mentorship whatsoever.

Management is petty, small mistakes or non issues and they will keep you down for months to even a year.

I didn't recive a single pay raise (aside from after my probation was up) for the entire 2.5 years there.

They will always hire external. You'll be given more work but never a promotion.

Perpetually understaffed, they continue to hire externally for senior roles while leaving junior roles severely understaffed and untrained.

All problems are blamed on junior staff.

I personally witnessed 3 fully new management teams in my department over a year. Within a year over half of my department had turned over.

Other people in the organization will gladly stab you in the back for even minor disagreements, severe ego issues in senior management.

C level goes on and on about worker retention but toxic management continues to stay at the company.

Avoid them like the plague.

Staff is fantastic! from the GM to the sales consultants everyone is pleasant to work with. Very well run dealership with specific processes that are mandatory to follow(which is good because it works). Its owned by the biggest dealer group in Canada so resources are readily available but they are greedy and will kick you to the curb if you don't follow every instruction they give. Corporate is run by a bunch of guys, half of them with no industry experience micromanage everyone including the GM. GM always has to check in with corporate to make any decisions. The pay is always changing , commission structure changes every time corporate finds an opportunity to save money. My pay was changed for the worse a handful of times in 2 years in sales(never for the better). Sales consultants and manager are paid well, finance manager position at 417 nissan is the lowest in the province ( starts at 11%).

This company is now a shell of what it once was. Corporate cuts majorly effecting employee retention and morale all at the cost of trying not to tank their stock prices. 

I worked in a dealership that increased profits year over year only to see top performers and 10+ year employees have their wages cut by up to 40%, remove their job perks such as demo vehicles, and last and not least… They took away Christmas parties they are so cheap!!!

Autocan has removed all authority from management directly in the dealerships along with the individual styles of the managers who were producing record profits. 

There is some amazing teams struggling to try and stay together but sadly, its gotten bad enough its not possible for a lot of us.  I was one of 4 people to choose to leave my amazing team this week alone to move to employers who appreciate their staffs hard work. 

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Automotive technician 215 salaries reported	$39.62 per hour
Sales associate 263 salaries reported	$89,283 per year
Finance manager 118 salaries reported	$129,640 per year
Service advisor 148 salaries reported	$71,645 per year
Detailer 102 salaries reported	$20.28 per hour

Working at AutoCanada: company overview and reviews

AutoCanada

AutoCanada ratings

Popular jobs at AutoCanada

Salary satisfaction

Job seeker tools

Employer Tools

Browse

Stay Connected