What part of painting a bumperwith different materials don’t you understand? Stop the  double-speak.”
    – Arizona shop owner Bob Isham, questioning last August Information Service’s initial refusal to change its estimating system to acknowledge that flexible parts are not painted in a continuous process with the same materials used on the rest of the car; CCC later that fall announced it was changing its system.

Gratuity arrangement unacceptable
“In September, Autocraft discovered the gratuity arrangement with its former employee and Autocraft fired him. Two days later, Autocraft was pulled from the Auto Club’s IRP program. Palmer’s termination followed shortly after our complaint was filed with AAA. And then, within a few days, Autocraft was reinstated on the IRP program.”
    – L. Douglas Brown, attorney for Autocraft of Torrance (California), speaking about Gil Palmer’s firing as manager of the Auto Club of Southern California’s Immediate Repair Program (IRP) direct repair program amid allegations he extorted gratuities from one or more shops, a story that eventually made it into the Los Angeles Times.

    “It’s making the other carriers step up.”
    – Gil Grieve, owner of Concours Body Shop in Reno, Nevada, speaking last March about how State Farm’s new “Select Service” requirement of “best pricing offered” was leading some shops to stop offering discounts to other insurers.

    “We didn’t do a huge amount of volume with State Farm anyway, so it was relatively easy to say no thank you. We went from maybe eight cars a month to maybe four cars a month. Not a huge loss. But because of the loss we would have had in order to extend the discounts to all eight of those cars – and we weren’t confident that count would increase – I think we’re in a better position. And the shops around here that stayed on (Select Service) don’t seem to be exploding with volume like everyone thought they would.”
    – Curt Nixon, the third-generation president of L Monty Body Shop in South El Monte, California, about his decision to not participate in State Farm’s Select Service program.

George Avery

   “It’s really built with two things in mind: That the repairers can still buy from whom they want. And two, we’re not going to get into their profit margin…We understand how important that is to the repairer.”
    – George Avery, a State Farm claims consultant, announcing a test this fall requiring shops in its “Select Service” program in two markets to order parts electronically.

“I don’t think this is it. This is not the end. We’re looking at rental. We’re looking at towing. We’re looking at ways to make you efficient because…of the customer that we share. I want to make it a positive experience. That positive experience, we believe, can be achieved, by getting into what is really making it inefficient.”
    – State Farm’s Avery, speaking in late October about the launch of its parts program.
    
    “But during the last two years, I have seen my dream turn into a nightmare. Insurance carriers have leveraged their economy of scale to implement concession- based DRP contracts, and forced collision repair businesses to offer the cheapest and quickest repair possible, many times sacrificing quality, safe repairs. Insurance carrier concession-based DRP contracts now list pages and pages of requirements that are imposed on us. And when I refer to concessions I don't mean only labor discounts, part discounts, paint caps, and zero mark-ups on sublet items, but also and more importantly, I refer to concessions on the quality, integrity, and safety of repairs.”
    – Todd Fox, in an open letter to the industry upon his closure in late October of his 18-location collision repair business because, he said, of his unwise choice to participate in concession-laden direct repair programs.

    “ASA requests the EPA to consider tightening the final regulation to ensure that any exception…to the spray booth requirement exclude ‘miniature spray guns’ or similar technologies. Those persons or business entities using ‘miniature spray guns’ should be required to have a spray booth.”
    – Bob Redding, Washington, D.C., representative for the Automotive Service Association (ASA), in a letter this fall generally supporting a proposed EPA regulation that would require collision repair shops to use HVLP spray equipment, approved spray booths or prep stations, enclosed gun cleaners, and certified paint technicians.

Across the pond

David Newton-Ross

“When the government sat down and looked at how an estimate for repair was done, they couldn’t understand it. ’Why isn’t it $90 (per actual hour) instead of $30 times three (book time hours)?’ It’s a crazy system.”
   – David Newton-Ross, a collision repair trade publication editor in Australia, speaking of that country’s government-mandated shift to “new times and rates,” designed to eliminate the “funny times, funny rates” system of shop charges.

    “Insurance companies are really focused on building their brand. So when the moment of truth occurs, the auto accident…the insurance company wants to do everything they possibly can to hug that customer during the repair process so the customer will have a higher propensity to renew his or her insurance policy. So they’re not spending these (advertising) dollars and just letting their customers go off to any shop they choose. If they can direct them to a high-quality, professional, high-integrity repairer, they prefer to do that.”
    – Matt Ohrnstein, the former CEO of Caliber Collision Centers who now serves as managing director of Symphony Advisors, a California-based consulting firm, speaking of auto insurer industry’s record-setting advertising spending.

    “It’s long overdue that the women in this industry had a professional forum to get together to develop ideas, build camaraderie, get to know one another and walk away with a new sense of confidence and awareness that they’re not ‘the only one.”
    – Gigi Walker, a California shop owner and secretary of the Women’s Industry Network (WIN), which held a two-day conference last spring.

    “We’re not really sure how long it took it to address it, but the bottom line is for (that) period of time, which was at minimum 90 days, the repair industry had to deal with the (labor) time that was in that system and unfortunately lost a lot of money. We feel those are the types of things that need to be disclosed to the industry, both when they are uncovered and when they get resolved.”
    – Lou DiLisio, coordinator of the CIC Database Taskforce, speaking of a “pretty significant error” the Taskforce found in one estimating database.

Compiled by John Yoswick, a freelance writer based in Portland, Oregon, who has been writing about the automotive industry since 1988. He can be contacted by email at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it