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The hardest part of starting up is starting out
How to Help Your Laid-Off Automotive Employees Manage Unemployment
Social distancing is the end of in-person auto auctions, at least for a while. If you are like most auction companies, you have switched to simulcast. An online-only situation and a potentially declining demand for sales (although the numbers aren’t out yet) may have forced a layoff for some of your employees. The same is true for many related specialties, like dealerships, body shops, and large recon MSO’s. Here are some tips to help them through this process.
If you lay off or furlough your employees, they are eligible for unemployment. Some states like Mississippi have ridiculously low caps, barely enough even to buy groceries each week. As an employer, you have no control over what they can receive when they apply for unemployment benefits.
But here’s what you can do:
Don’t block unemployment.
When the state sends out unemployment eligibility documentation, don’t mark the employee as fired for cause, which would keep your unemployment insurance rating low, but would lock the former employee out of a check. It could also save you a wrongful termination suit down the road.
Severance pay if you can afford it.
In Maryland, you can file immediately for benefits and begin receiving a check, but other states have red tape and waiting periods. Your employees will need money now, not later, and severance will help get money in their bank while they get their ducks in a row.
Extend health benefits.
The humanitarian thing to do during this health crisis is to continue paying benefits. You will save the bottom line in reduced salaries and payroll taxes, but be kind and keep the health insurance going at least until the nation is in the clear. Hopefully, it will only be a month or two at most.
Rehire as soon as possible.
When life returns to normal, so too will the business demands. Your former employees are the best suited, best-trained employees for your business because they used to work there. If these employees are still available, not only will they be grateful that you wanted them back, they will probably be even more productive than they were before they were laid off.
Keep an Eye on the Federal Stimulus Package.
As of this writing, the federal stimulus package is still not passed. But if it does, there will be some financial relief for small businesses and some options for you as an employer. It’s too soon to advise on that in a blog other than to suggest that there may be solutions for you forthcoming, and they should be taken into consideration for you and any employees you have to cut from the team.
Offer outplacement or other unique support options.
This will definitely depend on your company’s budget, but there are outsource outplacement companies that you can hire that specialize in the outplacement of displaced employees. These experts help employees polish resumes and work their networks to find employment. This is especially useful if you have no intention of rehiring any of this staff.
Layoffs are simply one of those business decisions that you have to make to ensure the survival of the company. It can be uncharted territory for many business owners, especially in the wake of a new-to-all-of-us global pandemic. Hopefully, these tips will help you handle this rather unpleasant situation.
Will Parts Shortages Increase Your Time To Frontline Ready Following COVID-19 Shutdowns?
OEMs respond to replacement auto parts supply chain questions following the virus peak.
Each day we wake up to a changing situation. What is breaking news this morning is old news by the end of the day. Old news like all the auto factories shutting down seems like really old news even though it just happened last week. What is still new, however, is the conjecture about what the post-outbreak will hold for everybody in every industry. This is especially true for the auto industry and the many industry verticals that support it, such as parts jobbers and the collision industry.
Despite factory shutdowns amid national COVID-19 coronavirus concerns, multiple OEMs continue to assure the industry that replacement parts for body shops aren’t significantly affected. But we must understand that the situation could evolve rapidly and today’s hope could become today’s bad news.
The auctions have been shut down, putting a hold on your inventory buying, but when they reopen in a few weeks or even a couple of months, your purchases will need reconditioning, and that will require new parts. The presumed recession that will follow Covid-19 will bring with it a reduction in new and used car sales. You don’t want parts scarcity to further reduce profit on the vehicles that you do sell. Front line readiness will be where the margins are gained or lost.
What The Domestic OEMs Are Saying:
Ford
Ford announced that it would pause North American production after the Thursday evening shifts until March 30, but spokeswoman Kelli Felker told us Repairer Driven news, “Our parts depots will remain open.”
Chrysler
FCA on Wednesday said it would close “starting progressively from today through the end of March,” but spokeswoman Jodi Tinson on Thursday evening told Repairer Driven News in an email that parts distribution continued despite the shutdown to provide support for dealers and customers who rely on FCA for their repairs and maintenance.
“We are continuing to monitor the situation carefully and are taking all necessary precautions to safeguard the health and welfare of our workforce, including more frequent cleaning and disinfecting of all working areas,” said Tinson last week.
Rumor has it this will not be the case for long.
The Detroit Free Press cited two unnamed sources who reported: “the UAW and General Motors, Ford Motor Co. and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles have agreed to shut down all U.S. parts distribution centers at the end of business Friday.” The facilities would still operate with volunteer workers, according to the newspaper.
GM
GM communications senior manager James Cain said in a statement “while today will be our last day of normal operations for GM Customer Care and Aftersales, GM and the UAW have reached an agreement that will allow us to continue delivering service and repair parts to our dealers and customers, including the police agencies, fire departments and emergency service providers who rely on our vehicles all over the country. The service centers would be run by volunteers.
“These facilities will be staffed by hand-raisers,” he wrote in an email. “We will be working through staffing and scheduling plans to resume operations on Monday.”
Fiat-Chrysler
FCA issued the following statement:
Throughout this challenging period, FCA has been focused on enabling a stable supply of parts to our dealers to help keep our customers on the road. Be they first responders driving ambulances and fire trucks or commercial needs such as delivery and postal services, FCA and its dealers are working to keep all our customers operational. Following an agreement with the UAW, from Monday, March 23, FCA will begin operating our Mopar Parts Distribution Centers (PDC) using hourly-paid volunteers.
As with all our facilities, we have implemented an extensive program of cleaning and social distancing protocols across all our PDCs, and we will continue to operate with the safety of our employees as a priority. Further, for any employee volunteering to work at our PDCs, we will ensure they are all equipped with gloves and masks. FCA and the UAW are proud to continue supporting our customers when they need our help the most.
Tesla
Tesla announced it would cease production in a news release:
“As such, we have decided to temporarily suspend production at our factory in Fremont, from the end of day March 23, which will allow an orderly shutdown. Basic operations will continue in order to support our vehicle and energy service operations and charging infrastructure, as directed by the local, state, and federal authorities. Our factory in New York will temporarily suspend production as well, except for those parts and supplies necessary for service, infrastructure, and critical supply chains. Operations of our other facilities will continue, including Nevada and our service and Supercharging network.”
What the Asian OEMs are saying:
As you can imagine, the Asian OEM’s are suffering from production disruptions. Most have production facilities here in the US, but those are also shutting down.
Honda
Honda said it would stop manufacturing in North America from March 23-30, which would reduce projected production by 40,000 vehicles.
Honda spokesman Chris Martin wrote in an email, “at this time, Honda’s six-day North American new-vehicle production suspension is not expected to affect the availability of Acura or Honda Genuine Replacement Parts”.
Hyundai
An employee at the Hyundai plant in Alabama tested positive for COVID-19, prompting an immediate shutdown. Hyundai said it would reopen when it was deemed safe.
“Currently, the impact on parts availability is very minimal,” Hyundai spokesman Michael Stewart wrote in an email. “We don’t have a supply issue at this time with the exception of some select wire harnesses. There are no significant issues from suppliers from China and Korea either, and the China supply chain is recovering.”
Kia
“No parts shortages are planned or seen at this time,” corporate communications director James Bell wrote in an email.
Mazda
Mazda North America President Jeff Guyton asked, encouraged all employees to work from home through the rest of the month and suspended all business travel.
Any impact on manufacturing in the U.S. or abroad was unclear as Mazda has not put out a statement as of yet.
Mitsubishi
Mitsubishi North America CEO Fred Diaz on Thursday said all Mitsubishi “headquarters and regional team members” were working remotely.”
Mitsubishi communications senior director Jeremy Barnes on Friday described efforts to keep replacement parts distribution centers safe.
“I can tell you that we are doing everything we can to keep our parts distribution centers open while ensuring the safety and well-being of our team members,” Barnes wrote in an email. On a dealership basis, I cannot give you a blanket statement. In some states, all non-essential businesses have been closed. In some of those states, service facilities have been carved out as essential, but not in all. At this time, it’s a moving target, and we – like everyone else in the industry – are working closely with state and local officials to ensure we’re doing what we can to protect everyone, while still providing the crucial service and support our customers need in these uncertain times.”
Nissan
Nissan announced it would suspend U.S. production March 20-April 6. “Areas deemed business-essential will operate with enhanced safety measures.”.
Spokeswoman Lloryn Love-Carter confirmed that parts were considered “business-essential.”
“Our parts distribution centers continue to operate as they are deemed business-essential functions,” she wrote in an email.
Toyota
Toyota said it would stop production in North American March 23-24. On Thursday, it said it wouldn’t restart production until April 6.
In their news release, Toyota stated: “Our service parts depots and vehicle logistics centers will continue to operate.”
Toyota spokesman Victor Vanov sent an email stating, “at this time, we have ample supply of replacement parts available in our pipeline to meet customer needs, and we do not anticipate any impact due to the temporary production halt at our North American facilities.”
Subaru
Subaru issued a statement saying it would close its Indiana plant for a week: “To further ensure the health and safety of associates and to adjust the volume for market demand as a result of COVID-19, Subaru of Indiana Automotive (SIA) is suspending production, March 23-29. All associates will receive full pay during the one-week shutdown.”
Subaru of Indiana communications and external relations manager Craig Koven wrote in an email, “as it relates to the availability of replacement parts, we do not expect the one-week shutdown to have a significant impact.”
European OEMs:
Audi
Audi on Thursday said it would shutter its plants in “Ingolstadt, Neckarsulm, Belgium, Mexico, and Hungary in a controlled manner by the end of this week.”
Audi has yet to issue a statement about its U.S. operations or the status of replacement parts.
BMW
BMW corporate communications manager Phil DiInnani wrote in an email that their Spartanburg, S.C. factory remains in operation.
“As of this morning, Plant Spartanburg continues to be operational, we will keep you updated on any new developments.”
Land Rover Jaguar
Jaguar Land Rover said in a news release that it would cease production “over the course of next week” in the United Kingdom.
“The company’s intention is to resume in the week of 20 April, subject to review of the rapidly-changing circumstances. Currently, Jaguar Land Rover’s manufacturing plants in Brazil and India continue operating. The company’s joint venture plant in China reopened in the week of 24 February, as life begins to get back to normal in the country.”
Mercedes Benz
Mercedes parent company Daimler on Tuesday said it would “suspend the majority of its production in Europe, as well as work in selected administrative departments, for an initial period of two weeks.
“This is a dynamic situation that continues to evolve, and we are closely monitoring developments together with our dealer partners to ensure we are supporting our customers in a safe and responsible manner,” Mercedes said in a statement Wednesday when asked about parts. “In light of this, we will continue to make adjustments to our operations and communicate any relevant changes as needed.”
Porsche
Porsche issued a news release saying it would stop production for at least two weeks.
“As from the coming week, Porsche will suspend production for an initial period of two weeks,” By taking this step, the sports car manufacturer is responding to the significant acceleration in the rate of infection caused by the coronavirus and the resultant measures implemented by the relevant authorities.
“In addition to the primary protection of the workforce, bottlenecks in global supply chains no longer allow orderly production. At the same time, Porsche is preparing for a decline in demand and securing its financial strength with the decisions made. The parent plant in Zuffenhausen and the production location in Leipzig will be closed from Saturday (21 March 2020). These steps have been taken as part of an orderly process and in close cooperation with the works council.”
Volkswagen
Volkswagen announced that it would shut down its Chattanooga, Tenn., plant for a week.
“Effective Saturday, March 21 at 3:45 a.m., Volkswagen Chattanooga will suspend production for one week, with current plans to resume production Sunday, March 29 at 10 p.m. This action is being taken to help ensure the health and safety of our team members as we conduct additional sanitation and cleaning procedures throughout the factory. We will also use this time to assess future production plans and market developments.”
The Volkswagen Group said it would shut down Volkswagen Passenger Cars plants even longer in Europe.
“Initially, production facilities in Wolfsburg, Emden, Dresden, Osnabrück, Zwickau, Bratislava (Slovakia), Pamplona (Spain) and Palmela (Portugal) are affected, as well as the Components plants at Brunswick, Chemnitz, Hanover, Kassel, Salzgitter and SITECH.”
“The Volkswagen Passenger Cars brand is gradually suspending production at its European plants. This will also affect the Volkswagen Group Components plants. This is the brand’s response to the impending rapid decline in demand on the automotive markets. Risks in connection with suppliers’ supply chains are also increasing. This is due to the significantly accelerated rate of infection by coronavirus and the resulting measures taken by the authorities. Initially, the factories are therefore expected to remain closed for two weeks. For the affected German sites, the measures are to apply from the end of the late shift on Thursday.”
Works Council Chairman Bernd Osterloh noted in a statement that “Volkswagen has supply problems.”
Volvo
Volvo said it would shut down U.S. manufacturing in South Carolina as well as operations in Europe.
“The Belgium plant will remain closed until April 5,” Volvo wrote in an email. “The Swedish and US plants will be closed between March 26 and April 14.
“People working in our offices will generally work from home as of March 26, and the working hours will be reduced,” Volvo said these offices were in Sweden and Belgium.
Volvo has not as yet issued any statement about parts supply or supply chain issues except to note that Chinese manufacturing had reopened.
“Earlier this month, Volvo Cars reopened its four manufacturing plants in China after an extended closure period,” Volvo wrote. “Today´s showroom traffic is indicating a return to normal in China’s car market, which is clearly demonstrating the advantages of being a globally balanced company.”
So, as you can see, the ability to get replacement parts is uncertain, with some brands such as Volkswagen having more problems than others with production and parts supply. Use this information when your auction activity resumes.
5 Key Tips For Conquering More Market Share At Your Dealership
Being a successful car dealership is much more than attracting customers, efficiency among your departments, and selling cars. Those are all the basics any dealer can tell you are necessary to run a dealership business. We’re talking about knowing your market, which means understanding who you are marketing to instead of assuming everyone is a customer. That won’t do you any good if you aren’t able to meet their wants and needs.
Here are five tips on how any dealership can conquer their market:
1. Leverage Your Geography: A car dealership based in southern California is going to have a different market than one in northern Vermont. That’s why you want to make sure your inventory accurately reflects the area you are located in. From there, you can create promotional events and sales specifically for that region. For example, a Winter Clearance event on all 4-wheel drive pickups and SUVs would do well in Vermont, but may not make sense in sunny California.
2. Make Sure Sales Knows Your Inventory Inside And Out: In the 1950s, car makers did a great job educating their salesmen on how to sell against the competition. They developed training materials, crib sheets, and other sales aids. This is a lost art these days and is nonexistent with used cars. If your sales team took the time to look up the models in your inventory and study the safety features, performance, and options, they will come across as experts in the models they are selling, build buyer confidence and close more deals. You’ll have a better idea of what your customers want, and as a result, it’ll affect what cars you choose to have on your lot.
3. Study Customer Demographics: By having a better understanding of who the majority of your customers are, you can also determine the right cars to sell. What is the average age of your customers? Are they single professionals or families? By knowing who your customer is, you’re able to make the car buying process less of a transaction and more of an enjoyable experience by perfectly matching a car to your customers based on who they are and what their wants and needs are.
4. Have the Right Cars Ready: Knowing what your customers want will help inform your acquisition decisions, but even acquiring the right vehicle won’t help if you don’t have ready and available when the customer arrives. Your make-ready process needs to be in sync with your sales operation, to ensure the cars you need are ready and available. Keep your reconditioning operation efficient to ensure your cars are frontline-ready when you need them. Management software from companies such as AutoMobile Technologies can help keep your recon employees and vendors focused and fast.
5. Create Customer Loyalty: Dealerships can create customer loyalty in several different ways. Where a lot of dealerships fail in this department is by letting customers go as soon as they drive away in their new car. As a result, there’s a negative stigma surrounding car dealerships assuming a dealer only cares about a customer to get the sale. If you want to conquer your market, show how much you appreciate your customers (including previous ones) by sending emails, service coupons, follow up calls, and more. If a dealership goes out of its way to make a former customer feel valued, they’ll remember and let people know.
Conquering your market as a dealership is not as simple as target advertising and selling an SUV to a couple who are expanding their family. It’s about connecting with the area you serve and creating a relationship with your customers that is far more valuable than any sale. After all, customer loyalty is one of the most useful things any business can have. Although you can’t buy customer loyalty, you can conquer your market and establish a name for yourself in the area you serve. Follow the above tips and stay consistent, and you’ll become the dealership to beat.
4 Big Management Mistakes For Used Car Sales Managers To Avoid
Being a sales manager at a used car dealership is no easy task. It can be even more of a demanding role than a new car sales manager because you have to deal with acquiring the best vehicles from the auction and oversee the reconditioning process. Although management training exists, seldom do we see people beginning their careers as managers. Those who start on the front lines and are management material may discover they quickly move up the ranks into management roles (and management problems). Even seasoned managers can make mistakes. Some are simply out of your control, while others can be more easily avoided.
Here are four management problem areas to avoid at your dealership along with simple solutions:
Problem 1: You want people to like you instead of respect you. Many used car managers who are just beginning want everyone to be on their side, so they’ll be overly friendly instead of realizing boundaries that are there for a reason.
Solution: There is a fine line between being friendly and being friends with everyone. As the manager, you help create a balance between departments, team members, and yourself. It’s important to remember what you have to do, to ensure that the dealership generates revenue. That can be easier with a bit of professional distance between you and those you manage.
Problem 2: You have a sense of entitlement. Just as much as some used car managers make the mistake of being overly friendly, some can be aloof and condescending to their sales team.
Solution: Every part of a dealership, new or used, relies on one another for success. If you interact with them with a know-it-all attitude instead of one of collaborative problem-solving, they aren’t going to want to work hard to be part of the dealership’s goals, including speeding up the reconditioning process, selling your used inventory, acquiring the best cars from auction, etc.
Problem 3: You avoid conflict. Nobody likes conflict, but part of your job description as a sales manager is the ability to resolve disputes, not hide from them.
Solution: The solution here is to identify what may be causing the conflict and how it can be resolved. Also, don’t fix the conflict without coaching your team members on how it can be avoided next time there’s a conflict. Let any conflict be an opportunity to grow as an organization, not for you to clean up the mess and slide it under the carpet.
Problem 4: Poor asset management bottlenecks the reconditioning process. vAuto found that some of the best-performing dealers can recondition their vehicles in 24 hours or less, whereas other dealerships take a week or longer. These high-performance dealerships can typically sell a car within 21 days of being on the lot. Anything more, and your lot gets full of depreciating assets, among other problems.
Solution: Use readily available and easy to deploy software solutions to manage the recon workflow, vehicles, communication, and record-keeping better. Good software, such as ReconMonitor, is designed to optimize your reconditioning process to save you time and money.
Mistakes are normal in any business, no matter what role a person may have. It’s how you find the solutions and work together as a team that will determine the success of your dealership.
4 Essential Rules To Nail Reconditioning Every Time
Your dealership’s recon operation is a profit center, but the amount of that profit depends on the choices you make and the process you administer.
How Vehicle Color Affects Depreciation
According to a recent study from https://www.iseecars.com/ on 1.6 million vehicles that are three-years-old, the car’s paint color has a significant effect on how long it takes to sell and the vehicle’s depreciation. It may come as a big surprise that orange and yellow are the top 2 vehicle colors that depreciate the least after the three years are up. How is it that these vibrant colors, often seen on sport or exotic cars, depreciate the least? After all, they only make up 1.5 percent of the market. Are we missing something, despite their flashy colors?
Simply put, the reason why these two colors are the ‘least depreciated’ is that they are not a color we’d normally see for the daily drivers. Orange and Yellow cars are for those monthly day trips down the Pacific Coast Highway or a day in Beverly Hills. You’d never see a Yellow Bugatti at a grocery store parking lot. If you do, then the owner is clearly loaded and may have a few more like that back at the mansion.
That said, the top 5 colors making the lowest deprecation rates are listed below in no particular order:
- Orange
- Yellow
- Green
- Brown
- Red
As far as the colors that are the most common paint choices and with average depreciation rates, you can probably imagine what made this list. They are:
- Gray
- Blue
- Black
- White
Beige and silver used to be the most in-demand colors back in the 90s and 00s, so they have an even higher depreciation rate than the ones listed above. However, the color that has the worst depreciation rate (just shy of 34%) is also the third-fastest-selling color: gold. Nevertheless, beige vehicles take the longest to sell and are on the market close to two months before they sell.
Vehicle colors are just part of what contributes to the depreciation. It’s only standard that the value of cars lessens over time. Whether you have a yellow Lamborghini or a beige Hyundai, take care of your vehicle, and you’ll be able to have a better value for your car. Make sure you take it to get its regularly scheduled maintenance and don’t neglect any repairs. If you are a dealership, be meticulous in your reconditioning operations, paying attention to paint correction and matching, regardless of the color. Brighter colors may have the lowest depreciation rate, but a well-maintained car will always have more value than a car that is not.
Recon Vendor Management – Multiple Moving Parts and People
For those who manage multiple vehicles through a reconditioning process, like dealerships, fleet managers, auto auctions, and rental companies, employing multiple vendors and employees on top of the administrative duties of running the business can be difficult to manage. There are a lot of steps to getting a vehicle through the make-ready process. To help ease the pains of so many moving targets, AMT developed ReconMonitor™, smart workflow management software for auto reconditioning.
This software is specifically designed to assist in your execution of auto remarketing at maximum speed and efficiency. ReconMonitor improves the ready-for-sale process by giving the user visibility into each of the many steps in the recon process. It also provides a detailed look at how each of the steps and technicians is doing from an efficiency perspective. Let’s look at an example:
Let’s say your dealership acquires a car at auction. The initial inspection indicates that the vehicle needs some mechanical work, PDR, a bumper replacement, paint touch-ups, and of course, photography. Then the next day you acquire 5 to 10 cars through trade-in (wouldn’t that be great), each with its own list of needed repairs. For the recon director or manager within your operation, it can be dizzying tracking numerous vehicles at different stages of the recon process. If your facility employs its own mechanical repair resources in addition to outside vendors for specialties like PDR and other sublet work, keeping track of everything can be stressful and things can slip through the cracks. You not only have administrative tasks to complete but have to manage multiple workflows and stations to make sure the right employees and vendors are matched to the right jobs for the most efficient turn-around.
Capacity management and knowing where each vehicle is in the process becomes complex and the entire process can become bogged down from a single inefficient step. Vendor management in ReconMonitor means the ability to plan, schedule, and evaluate vendors for improved efficiency. For the example above, it would make no sense for the dealer to have the photographer come on a day when a car wasn’t cosmetically ready for its close-up. Knowing where each vehicle sits in the process, and planned time until it is ready for the next stage is a critical ability that will set your business processes apart from any other dealer without this type of visibility and control.
With ReconMonitor, you can watch your vendors and employees complete the designed order of tasks in real time, contact them if needed, make changes where you see fit, and analyze the quality of work. ReconMonitor will also automatically create and distribute vendor work orders, and generate vendor invoices when the completed work is approved, giving you full control.
Dealerships can lose around $35-$50 every day a car is stuck in the reconditioning process. ReconMonitor increases the visibility and control you have over the end-to-end process of reconditioning any vehicle. It’s a great way to get rid of disorganized paper orders and antiquated whiteboards and keep everything in one centralized management solution. With ReconMonitor, your reconditioning process is transformed with vehicles efficiently made frontline-ready in record time.
Advantages Of Management Software For Your Used Car Dealership
- Faster Turn Times
- Improved Vehicle Volume
- Better Coordination
For used car dealerships, management software is an excellent way to increase your efficiency both in the back-office and front-end operations. Having a system in place not only reduces your overall cycle time but also increases your throughput– maximizing profit and minimizing overall costs.
Employing a management software solution for your fixed operations and reconditioning emphasizes your commitment to making your dealership run as effectively as possible, that you care about making tasks more streamlined for your employees, prioritize customer service and sales readiness, and you’re willing to adapt to the newest technologies out there for dealerships.
With management software in place, back-office administrative tasks that used to take hours can be cut down to just a few minutes. It allows all of your departments to be connected and work together, while also improving productivity on all fronts. Instead of relying on one employee or vendor at a time during each stage of vehicle processing, the operation becomes a more team-oriented environment. There’s a clear and organized structure that doesn’t rely on a back-office spreadsheet or whiteboard to get done. If a team member updates a vehicle’s status in the software, all relevant team members have access to the information, instantly, on their desktop or mobile devices. This lets the team know what’s in the pipeline, and lets both your technicians and your sales team plan for when work is coming.
You can see what vehicles are being reconditioned, where they are, the stage they’re in, and who’s working on them. You can also track and anticipate bottlenecks or delays during the reconditioning process, and improve resource planning based on vehicle volume and where they are in the recon process. The goal, of course, is high-quality work at optimal speed. Workflow management software can get your cars from acquisition to front line sales-ready in as little as a few days. Dealerships lose an average of $30-$50 per day when cars are stuck in reconditioning, so each day you can shave off your recon equals more profit per vehicle. And that savings adds up!
Workflow management software will make your used car dealership faster and more efficient both in the back and front-end of operations. You can create and refine your processes to make the back-office, reconditioning, and retail side of things work better together.
Automobile Technologies Can Help
AMT offers software solutions designed to make your used car dealership and reconditioning process as efficient as possible. We also provide you with better visibility and get your vehicles frontline ready in the shortest possible time.
ReconMonitor™ is powerful workflow automation for auto recon, dealerships, and auto remarketing companies that integrates with Dealer Management and Accounting Systems to ensure seamless operations across the enterprise.
Is Reconditioning Software Still Relevant in 2019?
If you’re staring at a desk surrounded by sticky notes and stacks of papers, wake up! It’s 2019! It’s no wonder you’re backlogged when you can’t even find the invoice for yesterday’s customer.
But somehow even with all the hours spent on invoices and paperwork after a long workday, many repair business owners and technicians take more comfort in this chaos rather than adopting a new method. The problem with that comfort zone is it’s virtually impossible nowadays to keep track of the repairs, check-in with your customers, and keep the business coming with increasing revenues. It’s frankly, well, not wise for these SMART repair shops to be using out of date methods for managing a business when even the way a technician approaches a car repair has gone through significant changes over the past few years.
Perhaps the fear of change is because many of these programs have often been designed without the mindset of the typical auto repair shop owner and its technicians. They’re often very complex and require specific training.
This is why AMT created a simple yet powerful software solution that eliminates the paperwork and helps make you more profitable. The software comes with all the features you need to be in command and control of your work, from PDR and hail damage estimating to an invoicing system that seamlessly integrates with your accounting software.
When it comes to reconditioning, the top 4 things that a thriving repair operation needs to keep track of are:
- Estimating the cost of the service
- Managing the front and back-end operations, including overseeing your technicians and making sure everything is running on schedule
- Billing and invoicing
- Serving your customers well = generating more profit
SMART Repair is all about doing the most effective job in the least amount of time to keep a steady money flow. Sticky notes and dry-erase boards may have worked before. But why be running your shop with limits when you can be limitless? AMT’s Automotive Repair Software manages over $139 Million in monthly repairs and estimates across over 23,000 repairs daily!
Go ahead and schedule your demo today!
