Content brought to you by Motor Age. To subscribe, click here.
What you will learn:
- Why free comprehensive courtesy checks aren't profitable
- How to create a "good, better, best" inspection program to get technicians paid for their time
- How explaining the importance of vehicle care can create a great customer
The reason we do a courtesy check is to make sure the customer’s vehicle is safe and reliable. What we get out of it is a higher average repair order, busier shops, techs, and front counters. It is good for the customers, and it is good for us.
Courtesy Checks Aren’t What They Used to Be
When I went to get my oil changed and my tires rotated and balanced, a service advisor asked me if I wanted the complimentary courtesy inspection or the comprehensive Digital Vehicle Inspection for $75. My heart started beating faster, and it was a life-changing moment for me. We have always done it for free and here is this guy who wants to charge for it! I went to a different shop like I always do because I enjoy seeing what is new and exciting in our industry.
I asked this tech what the difference was. He responded that the complimentary courtesy inspection was a visual-only inspection, and the Comprehensive Digital Vehicle Inspection went a lot further. Since I was already going to have the tires off during the rotation, they would be taking the brakes apart to whatever level they needed to in order to mic everything while doing a complete brake inspection. He also mentions that if I had anything sticking that they could in fact be freeing items up and it could make my brakes last longer.
In addition, they would put a thermometer in my dash to make sure the temperature went down to where it should be, and the AC compressor was cycling properly. Rest assured though they would not be putting the AC gauges on as that could make the system lose refrigerant and weaken the Schrader valves. He did not go over the entire DVI but truly enhanced it. He ended with that they would tap into my OBD-II system and check to see if any of my computers needed updating just like my phone or computer at home would need to be updated.
I of course said yes, even knowing that I had just had the entire vehicle gone through on my last visit to a repair shop. I had 65K miles on my vehicle. When they got done, and I did not need anything, he still walked me through the very detailed DVI and showed me how great my vehicle was. I walked out of there feeling great even knowing that it did not need any services to begin with.
Implement a good, better, and best program
Does your shop do a pre-purchase inspection? Most shops do, and they charge around an hour to do so. If you had a good, better, and best program, you could charge an hour for the best, half an hour for the better, and free for the good. Have a laminated sheet at your front counter to hand to the customer and ask them which one they would like. Most will choose the better option. Now, your techs are getting paid to do DVIs if they are on a flat rate, or the shop is getting paid if they are already paying the techs to do it.
It makes no sense to be free
With a free courtesy check, the customer is not paying, and neither the tech nor the shop is paying. This way the customer can pick up the tab for their vehicle, it is their responsibility, after all. Think about it this way: back in the day, I would go to a print shop and pick up 5,000 paper courtesy checks, and they would last as long as they did at the cost of $25 to $30 a thousand. No muss, no fuss.
Now think about it from a shop owner’s perspective. First, you must pay for the DVI service every month.
In most cases, you also had to do one or more of the following:
- Upgrade the computer and at least add another monitor.
- Upgrade the Wi-Fi at a huge expense and pay more every month.
- Buy tablets that will have to be upgraded periodically.
- Beat, bludgeon, and coerce the techs to get trained and then use them every time.
With this in mind, you realize it takes the techs longer, and it takes the service writers longer. When you read or say this out loud, it makes no sense to do it for free!!! Seriously, think about it.
We would only perform it no more than twice a year unless they really drive a lot more than average. The customer could then make a truly educated decision about his or her car and whether to keep or replace the car.
When I rolled this out to the 2nd in Command 20 group, the beginning consensus was how can we charge for something that we have been doing for free? One of the new members responded that they had been doing it for quite a while. When they took the shop over from their parents, the number one complaint was that the techs were not getting paid to do DVIs. They went to their parents and asked if they would pay the techs and were told no, so they decided to ask the customer to pay for it.
I don’t like the term bottom feeder, but there are people who will never take care of their vehicle properly. So, if you really try to get them to understand why they need to take care of their vehicle and what is in it for them, we have a higher chance of making a great customer out of them. The aforementioned shop went from a 50 percent conversion rate to a conversion rate of over 90 percent. This happened in a very short period because they made the customer uncomfortable not buying it instead of making the front counter uncomfortable asking for it.
Here's who pays for the courtesy check
The customer should be the one paying, since they bought the car, drive the car, reap the benefits of having the car, and are the ones responsible for it. When did it become the norm to start giving away our time for free to the customers? What other industry does that?
The next part is, why should the techs keep working for us if we are not paying them for their time? If the tech handles three cars a day and it takes half an hour to do a DVI, then fifteen cars at half an hour make nearly eight hours that they worked and did not get paid for it. I don’t know about you but that does not sound like how to make a happy employee. You also realize that it takes the normal tech way longer than that to perform the DVI, right?
If only 50 percent of the customers buy, and they only buy the service option for half an hour, the math is straightforward. Seventy-five dollars x 7.5 cars equals $562.50 a week for each tech in added income for something we should have been charging for all along. So, if you have three techs, then it is an additional $1,687.50 a week in income.
