[COVER] STORY
An Exercise in Resilience:
From Slim Pickings to Stuffed Shops Is it worse to have empty bays…or an overwhelming amount of work? That’s the question that many shops in the Commonwealth have been asking lately as they struggle to keep up with all the cars in need of repairs. After months of attempting to stay busy amidst low repair volumes, the tables have turned – nearly everyone has a full plate, and now they have to figure out how to digest the overabundance of repairs bogging down their facilities. “Our current work in progress is nearly double what we normally carry in traditional circumstances,” says Matthew Ciaschini (Full Tilt Auto Body & Collision; West Hatfield). “This is not to be misconstrued with taking in twice as much work as normal. We’re swamped due to roll-over work from previous weeks, caused by many factors, which leads to an overall work-inprogress (WIP) number that is double our normal inventory, and it continues in perpetuity.” Factory Collision & Restoration’s (Weymouth) current situation is similar. “Compared to last year, our workload has doubled,” according to Rob DelGallo. “We suspect that it’s due to the amount of shops that have closed or gone out of business, whether that’s because of worker shortages, lease changes or just the older shop owners throwing in the towel. Our other lines of work increased as well, but our shop never really slowed down, though we had techs out for various reasons.” According to a recent CRASH Network study, the national average scheduling backlog increased from 1.7 weeks prepandemic to 2.6 weeks in the third quarter of 2021, while the shops reporting no backlog decreased from 57 percent to five percent! “For the past four months, we’ve been busier than we’ve ever been. All four locations are scheduling repairs four weeks out after the initial estimates, which is about two weeks longer than typical, and we haven’t even entered the busy winter season yet,” observes Bobby Cobb (Today’s Collision; Chelsea, Danvers, Malden and Stoneham). “We attribute the higher workload 30 February 2022
New England Automotive Report
to multiple causes: fewer shops in our area since early 2020, customers choosing to repair vehicles instead of replacing them, traffic returning to our region which increases the likelihood of accidents and OEM certifications. Shops certified by manufacturers are more likely to see an increase in work because we have the proper training and equipment to repair these advanced vehicles.” While some shops are bustling, other facilities are more consistent, though there are a few caveats to that. “Our front office and everyone who performs customerfacing tasks is very busy right now with upfront evaluations, identifying the right customers and answering questions,” notes Josh Fuller (Fuller Auto Body & Collision Center; Auburn). “On the production side, we’re as busy as we can be. We can only repair as many cars as our biggest bottleneck allows, and not surprisingly, our biggest obstruction at the moment is parts sourcing; we won’t even put a car in production until we can verify that we have the majority of required parts on hand. Understanding the type of repair needed and who the insurance company is allows us to manage our process more efficiently as well. We’re being extremely selective about what we put on the floor, and for the first time ever, we’re rejecting work that doesn’t fit into our niche. With our reduced bandwidth and resources, we can’t afford idle time or anything that prevents us from being less than super efficient.” Shop efficiency is a vital component to meeting customer and insurer expectations (and always a challenge), but factors outside repairers’ control restrict their ability to do that. When insurers write insufficient initial estimates – as they frequently do – it inhibits the shop’s ability to order all needed parts up front, further delaying the repair and also increasing the administrative expenses associated with the job. Since writing a thorough, accurate estimate at the beginning of the process would alleviate burdensome tasks and reduce frustrations on all sides of the repair equation, insurers’ repeated failure to do so begs the question:
