Employees

[Kenny]

Here is the problem I am facing in my shop. I have 2 techs that are father and son. The dad is paid 18 per hour and has only been doing the least possible lately and has complained about not making enough money. I would like to tell him he is lazy and that he don't deserve a raise. They both have a attitude problem when asked a question or blame the service writer for the car not being done. They seem to think that if they are working on a car that that's the job for the day and they shouldn't be bothered with walk ins or asked to look at another car. I am at my wits end with this and don't really know how to handle this with out cutting my own throat. I have ads out and been looking for replacements but no one worth calling back yet. Any ideas or suggestions would help.

[xrac]

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[mspecperformance]

Here is the problem I am facing in my shop. I have 2 techs that are father and son. The dad is paid 18 per hour and has only been doing the least possible lately and has complained about not making enough money. I would like to tell him he is lazy and that he don't deserve a raise. They both have a attitude problem when asked a question or blame the service writer for the car not being done. They seem to think that if they are working on a car that that's the job for the day and they shouldn't be bothered with walk ins or asked to look at another car. I am at my wits end with this and don't really know how to handle this with out cutting my own throat. I have ads out and been looking for replacements but no one worth calling back yet. Any ideas or suggestions would help.

 

 

I assume you have your techs on salary? If they are making flat rate there is absolutely no reason why they wouldn't want to work harder since there is a direct correlation to their pay. If they are on salary maybe you might want to switch it up to flat rate. Obviously there would be huge management and pricing infrastructure changes if you are currently not pushing 40+ hours a week per/tech.

 

Unfortunately it seems that your problem with 2 techs is that they are a package deal. If you get rid of 1, you have to get rid of both.

[Kenny]

I was thinking of going flat rate but I am not sure of what shop software to go with.

[mspecperformance]

what shop software are you currently using.

[bstewart]

IMO, I don't feel that flat rate is the best option to do "pay for production".

1. During slow times, your employees don't get a good paycheque. This can be very stressful and lower their efficiency even more.

2. It can also be stressful for workers because some jobs simply take full book time or longer, while some jobs can be finished in much less then book time. If an individual gets a string of "bad" jobs, they might get frustrated and feel that there is favoritism occurring.

3. It encourages workers to finish jobs faster just to get them out the door, with less regard to mistakes or doing a thorough job.

 

I feel that "hourly plus efficiency bonus" is a far better method to achieving "pay for production".

1. Your workers know what their hourly base pay is on (very) slow weeks, which can and do happen.

2. Because their pay isn't 100% based on production, it reduces the fighting over who gets the "easy" jobs.

3. Because it's hourly plus bonus, there is less incentive for your workers to rush jobs out, reducing the chance of mistakes and comebacks.

 

You can also make your bonus contingent on having 0 comebacks that week.

 

http://www.ratchetandwrench.com/RatchetWrench/June-2014/Finding-a-Better-Payment-Model/

http://www.ratchetandwrench.com/RatchetWrench/April-2014/Selecting-a-Technician-Pay-Plan/

http://www.autosphere.ca/carcarebusiness/2014/05/21/review-entire-shop-wages/

There's tons more resources available showing you how to set up an hourly + bonus pay structure.

[Mario]

Flat rate is unethical in an independent in my opinion. Way to many makes and models being serviced, plus the vehicles are generally much older then what the dealer sees.

 

Talk to him maybe it's a shop problem, maybe it's his problem. See if you can straighten the ship.

[mspecperformance]

hourly + efficiency is what I was really getting at. Straight flat rate is definitely a good way to starve a tech if you don't have enough consistent work and/or they aren't proficient at all cars that come through your shop.

 

If your shop is capable of flagging 40+ hours a week per tech, you can certainly guarantee them a certain amount of hours regardless of production (30,35,40?) and then give them a bonus for more hours logged. On the flip side there certainly should be a good policy on come back work so that your techs work hard to avoid that type of situation.