vbtoytech

$41 increase in labor rate got a $0 increase in tech pay. They are hiring all tech school kids, we are training them for free, and making less money while the dealership is billing more. See how long we stay.

We have 1 advisor who actually checks tread depth, wipers, and warning lights on the walk around. He makes the highest sales at our dealership and it is nice to have tires and wipers sold or declined before beginning service.

Individual computer and 2 lifts for your masters.

I have an offer for $6 more an hour at an independent with no air conditioning. No thanks. I didn't get a degree and master certified to be miserable all day. That said, heat affects some more than others.

The dealerships I have worked for have 3 standards for rehire: was proper notice given when they resigned, do we want them back, and can they still pass all of the screening -drug, motor vehicle, background. I agree a no rehire policy is a bad policy. You at least know what you are getting with a rehire - this is a pretty key element. That person may have not been popular around the shop however, so among the techs it may not be popular - but you sign the checks as the owner.

Indeed it does.

My dealership has been doing a lot of re-hiring as they are desperate for technicians. It sours the atmosphere, as these guys were gone for a reason.

The dealership removed all of our productivity bonuses and made it more attractive for a lot of the techs to take jobs at dealerships closer to home. We are on an individual pay plan and have no "diagnostic specialist" or anyone to help us in a bind. Tech line wants you to fix the car before you call them. Binds happen a lot, under warranty, and especially with new technologies - voice command, wi-fi, etc.

Beyond specializing on makes and models, I find it difficult to work on pre OBDII cars in general. I wasn't around back then.

We had the older style BG machine that had to be looped into the radiator hose. It was a better flush but more time consuming. We have this now.

At the dealership, our pay plan is based solely on our certification. Unfortunately, there is nothing past master. So, no matter how good you are or how long you have been working, the pay rate is set. Half the techs have left and I am on my way.

I am concerned about the liability when a car comes in for calibration. We are using a printed paper target at the dealership. Would like to have something like the Bosch setup, but they will never buy it.

I started out as a technician in Virginia and I was a VSP licensed Safety Inspector for 3 years. The program has a lot of problems as you mentioned. Some places will put a sticker on anything. When you reject a sticker the customer is mad. When you require a repair for a sticker, that is almost always your best sales tool ever. I always felt good about making the roads safer. The price for an inspection is below what it costs to pay most technicians, but that was generally gained back in repairs to pass. I took issue with the dealership method of inspections. There was only 1 inspector on a team, who wrote stickers for everyone on the team, for cars he never looked at. That was a job requirement if you were an inspector, despite it being completely against the law. I left that job and later found out there are entire dealerships with only 1 or 2 inspectors writing stickers for more than 50 inspections in a day. The state police support varies by location. In Virginia Beach, our station assigned trooper was trying to bust us and shut us down. In Newport News, our trooper was actually trying to improve vehicle safety and would back us. Now working as a technician in Tennessee, I see a large loss of sales for legitimate safety related repairs due to there being no safety inspection requirement. I see many vehicles that would fail the Virginia inspection and I am horrified when I can do nothing about it. Whether or not the safety inspection has an impact on safety involves statistics I do not have, but I can say with certainty that while i was a Virginia Safety Inspector I rejected and repaired many unsafe vehicles and felt good about it.

Lexus dealership - Robinair machine is required equipment. We didn't use it for over a year. FWIW - I don't have first hand experience, but I was told that the evac/recharge procedure takes substantially longer than a 134 machine.