alfredauto

Look at the shop, its a $1m facility easily. Operating expenses have to be $100k a month. No way $550k a year is cutting it. I wonder how many people leave there for $10. Maybe the shop does $500k and slots revenue adds another $2m. Lol

There's only one station that comes in clearly at my shop, so that's what we get to listen to. Country. I'm not a huge country music fan but that's what life dealt us. I don't allow cell phones at work so playlists are out, nobody is exempt from the rule even me. Its the airwaves or nothing. When given too many choices disagreements can happen. I used to work at a place with 5 other techs, each with their own radio. I'll estimate that I spent 20% of my day turning down the other guys' radios so I could hear mine. The other guys did the same to me. Guys would almost get into fist fights. This went on for years. The boss didnt care whatsoever.

Mitchell integrates with nextpart - the dealer link. I can look up dealer parts, transfer them with my matrix, and order in a few seconds! No mistakes. Same with autozone Napa advance and parts plus. Part #s and cost transfer, labor time transfers, parts get orderedf. its a good system.

In the south the wheel bearings probably last for years. Lol you guys are missing out

The problem I have is human compassion disrupts the profit. I like my customers, they provide me with a good living. If I quote a job properly and get the OK it is very difficult for me to call back when we break off a bolt and ask for more money. Its necessary to bill for the extra time, but I don't like doing it. Especially when I know the customers income barely covers groceries.

Thanks guys I feel better now. Lol. Things are turning around so like my daughters say "whatevs" I paid out way too much but that's the nature of the business. The garage side of the business bailed out the used car dept so we're still doing ok but I'm the responsible party so I guess I gotta write myself up today. Yearly we are up from last year so I can't complain. It forced me to look at the big picture, like getting stuck in traffic on a long road trip. It sucks when your sitting still or sent on a long detour, but once moving again in the right direction its mostly forgotten.

If the internet is down and we don't have access to identifix and mitchell, basically trying to diagnose a car without a service manual, we get the internet fixed. I still have about 50 old school 12" thick service manuals, the last time i opened one was 1994. I am glad those days are gone. I've worked at shops where the boss was too cheap to provide any service manuals or information. I quit like every other good tech. No information = no accurate repairing that's just the way it is. I have a manual for my 1963 tractor. Learn by doing is a recipe for mistakes. I understand your thoughts on kids that can't figure it out, but they are actually smarter than us old guys that keep getting a bigger hammer. 😇

And in the end its all the same as it ever was. Min wage goes up 100%, next thing is your Big Mac goes up 100%, gallon of gas doubles, my labor rate goes up, grocery bill doubles, and ultimately any saved up cash is worth 1/2. The people making minimum wage are still going to be poor, sorry to dissapoint.

Honestly, if I had to go back to work for someone I'd hide my ASE card and just do brakes starters alternators and 4 cyl tune ups at a chain store for flat rate. Sorry boss I'm not too good with diagnosis. Sorry boss I don't know how to fix anything, but I'm real good at part changing. If I can bill 300% doing gravy, and assuming theres a steady stream of gravy (and there is) why bother doing anything even remotely hard? Let the other guy be the hero. Now in my shop I don't do just gravy. I wish I could, but I can't afford to send long time customers to my competitors. There are some things I don't do - I have enough work where I don't have to do head gaskets, and I don't like doing them. I know how, but experience taught me that an engine that was full of milky oil isn't really that good even after the gasket is fixed.

I understand your thinking, $/bay or $/lift is a standard used by many, and I see you are not satisfied with $/tech accounting, so adjust your definition of bay. One bay in your situation is 40' wide containing 2 lifts. Its a very efficient system, we run 3 bays/lifts per tech. Cars go in/up/down/out if there's a holdup we move to the next lift. Unless a guy is doing tires he can't get much over 70% per lift. Waiting for parts, waiting for approval, swing and miss takes up time. You've come full circle, guys are doing 140% with 2 lifts. Try giving your best guy 3 lifts you might be getting 210% out of him even though you are "losing" 90% on lift productivity. You might find the less efficient the lift becomes the more efficient the man becomes.

Flat rate up here makes real men out of technicians! I've been in the rust belt my whole life, there's no surprises. Any exhaust work means all new hardware, alignments require the torch, my CP717 air chisel is used every day without exception. The junkyard is full of 2005 model year cars that rotted out. 10 years is all a car can take up here if not washed off religiously. I buy subframes from southern junkyards, they can't give them away locally. We probably change 2 a month.

95% of our problems are from customer supplied parts/diagnosis. I don't automatically disqualify them as a customer, but I try hard to dissuade them. We all know that when they waste their money they aren't going to be happy or courteous. What they want to do is gamble our time to save themselves money. I didn't say they are willing to gamble their money. When reality hits its ugly and I would rather do nothing than deal with this type of person.

What do you guys do about technician cash tips? My policy is if I give away a service to a customer to gain their business, like no charge for popping in a bulb or checking their fluids or shoveling snow out of their bumper I don't expect them to pay and I refuse any offering. The customer usually will go out and thank the tech, and based on body language i can assume they are throwing the tech some cash at that point. Should the tech put that into the general fund? Should he be allowed to just keep it? I kind of ignore it. After all I refused the money, and I gained the P.R. benefits. On the other hand I pay the rent. Just trying to see what you guys do.

You'll have to look at where the problem is originating from. Techs working too slow? Techs missing valuable needed recommendations? Techs not wanting to recommend more difficult work? Or is the service advisor not selling the recommended work? Maybe its just the nature of the jobs you are doing. If your aro of $230 nets $200 profit from diags and your ro count is high that's not too shabby.

I pay bonus based on total gross sales, tax included. Its easier for the tech to see how much he's going to get. If he's sweating on a $2500 job he knows he's going to get a reward at the end of the month. Bonuses based on profit opens up a bad can of worms including officer salaries, marketing, depreciation, donations, and a host of other things employees don't think should reduce their bonus. Basically if he works hard he earns an extra paycheck every month.

BEST is a good acronym, I follow the system without even realizing it. For example when I quote exhaust I charge standard markup on parts and offer free install. That gets my price competitive. Same with quick struts. Buy 2 get free installation. If I had my way we would do BEST work all day and never work on an engine. I haven't had a car yet that I struggled to put a muffler on.

Western NY is Alaska of the east. 40 below zero, 8 or 9 months of winter. Cloudy 300 days a year. At least the land is cheap. I like it.

Andres nailed it, if the system doesn't work for everyone without exception its not a good system. Don't feel bad if you don't have a perfect system, not many do. National chains spend millions on systems that require excess employees, excess training, middle managers everywhere, but they work and can be duplicated easily over and over again. Only you can decide if its right for you. I go with half systems that are much cheaper, but half the time I'm running in circles.

I'll reiterate that converting your customers to buy your tires vs tire rack will put more money in your pocket for the same work, and no extra $ to the consumer. If you can't beat tire rack prices find a new wholesaler.

The bottom line on all of this is to get the customer in the door. That can be achieved without giving a price on the phone or scaring them away with diag charges for everything. Be smooth, get the people in, sell what's needed and get paid for your time. Honestly I don't like to talk money at all with customers. I want them to trust me, feel confident in my shop, and want me to solve their car problems. As a courtesy and comply with the law I get approval for the $$$. If I can get a customer to accept me as their go to guy the money isn't an issue. For sure, calling me for a price on anything but a tire will end in no price. Think about your marketing, I advertise the lowest price on tires. Of course I quote tires over the phone along with the value added freebies. I dont advertise oil changes or service deals, so no need to talk phone money.

We put them on all the time. I don't like to. No free rotations, no free flat repairs, no warranty help. When people have me put on tire rack tires and want me to call tire rack for a warranty the answer is no.

New York sets the inspection price. $21 safety/emission, $6 trailer. The bad deal is on trailers with brakes, for $6 we are required to pull a wheel. After the authorization fee and the sticker we are left with $3. to pay a guy to do it. Overall inspections bring in work so I'm not complaining, but making money on the state inspection itself is a losing proposition.

Its hard to say without all the facts. The elderly woman might have been eating cat food to survive on $400 a month social security for all we know, and her 25 year old car was her lifeline to get firewood up to the house. The mechanic probably felt bad that she can't afford to drive and gave her a sticker out of kindness. Who knows, maybe he is the type that slaps a sticker on everything for cash or beer bribes. Any state inspector knows that every car on the road can pass inspection today and break tomorrow after jumping a ditch or whatever. I'm really surprised his ins. Co didn't shut this down immediately, maybe he saved money in the wrong area.

Remember that most garage door companies are independent franchises, so trust the guy not the name. I had some doors put in and the workers botched the job. Obviously I called and the owner sent the guys back to fix their mistakes a few days later. Then I got a bill for the service call. He wouldn't budge on the service call bill, even though it was on his new install a week old.

I give paid time off. Its better for everyone. Sometimes working is a problem solver though. Say I have a disagreement with my wife, if I just let it go and leave it until after work I usually can see I was wrong by the time I get home. That being said when I went through a divorce with custody issues and all that fun stuff about 15 years ago I was a terrible employee. I should have been fired.