Absolutely. The front desk can be a bottleneck. When advisors are overloaded time is lost between inspection and approval, which means missed part deadlines, jobs slip from today into tomorrow, and it snowballs from there.
It's not hard to see how production suffers in this scenario. What are some ways to help?
1. Support staff. Offload some of the busy work - so advisors can focus on the the client. Vehicle arrival photos, QC checks, loaner cars, etc.
2. Parts staff. A good parts person can save advisors a lot of time on the phone. A great parts person might even be able to help prepare estimates.
3. Order parts proactively. This becomes a judgement call. But if a parts deadline is about to be missed, order the part you will probably need later today before getting the client's approval. If you misjudged and the client declines work deal with the returns. With time you will be right more than you will be wrong, and this will keep jobs from slipping into the next day.
Great questions Joe and I will be interested in hearing feedback from shops who have mastered this one. We're still in grade school...
Gerald
Gerald Martin's post in Are Service Advisor Too Swamped These Days was marked as the answer