I often feel the workshop in a dealership is not as valued as much as it should be!
I remember years ago I was working as a mechanic for a large dealership. One day the owner came down and asked me to investigate why the workshop was not making any money even though we all looked pretty busy.
Now I love this sort of challenge and I really went to town looking at everything from admin to mechanic ratios to labour efficiency. However the biggest surprise to them was that the Workshop was in fact making money, it was just that the accounting systems were not reporting the internal work correctly. For example a mechanic could spend hours working on sales vehicles but because the internal transactions were not being reported accurately it showed that Sales were making artificially high profits and the Workshop (and Parts) making artificially low profits. Once we had a system with accurate figures to work with it was easy to make decisions to improve not only the Workshop but business efficiency everywhere.
A few years later, after we had started our own dealership, we started looking for the 'ultimate' computer software to make this sort of thing easier. We tested countless computerised systems but they were either too long winded, or could not efficiently handle what we needed to do. We decided that the only way we were going to get everything we wanted was to design a system ourselves.
Our first system was called 'Business Manager' and it was a massive success (especially in the UK motorcycle industry where it has been the market leading dealer system for over 20 years).
However with a changing industry, new technologies and the feedback from hundreds of our dealers we felt we could do even better, and for the last 8 years we have been quietly designing the very latest generation of Dealer Management System called 'Evopos'. The workshop features in Evopos are exceptionally easy to use and brings dealer reporting to whole new level.
The workshop often used to be the last department to be fully computerised. One reason was that it was hard to get a computerised diary that was as easy to update and access as a manual diary. Another reason is that it was just too difficult or time-consuming to log engineer's time (especially on internal work). Evopos solves both these problems brilliantly. And because we are getting the full picture we are able manage and improve the workshop much more effectively.
For example because we know the proficiency, efficiency and productivity ratios for each engineer, we can reward good performance and also highlight when an engineer may need additional training (eg: if taking longer times on electrical jobs).
Evopos also helps in other areas, for example it helps ensure parts are not missed off the invoice and it helps controls sundries and consumables. Your customers will appreciate features like the automatic SMS or email reminder when their job is ready or parts are in. And with the automated 'story' generation, a detailed description can be created in a few key presses which can help enormously with the accepting of labour charges.
So give the workshop it's fair due. It can be a great profit centre and it is where many customers are won or lost.
