Chapter Five
How does my technician arrive at my costs?
There are three types of repair charges:
1. Overcharged, (generally infuriates you if you know about it)
2. Undercharged (auto repair shop goes out of business, no one benefits)
3. Charged what it's worth. (everyone benefits)
Where I come from (western states), the average shop charges are $65 " $95 for a FLAT RATE hour. A flat rate hour is an estimated time frame for every repair that occurs on your car. It is put together to protect you the consumer, and for the technician to estimate how long it may take to repair your car. All shops should have this in the form of a web information service. The web system gives more up"to date coverage, and takes less time for a technician to look up information than years past, by using a manual or changing CD’s. Ask your technician to explain this on your next car repair, so you can better understand what it looks like, and how it works. For good basic coverage, a technician is looking at $195 per month, but as you have heard before "Wait there’s more" this is not enough for a higher end technician; he will spend another estimated $125"$250 a month for additional coverage where technicians share their knowledge with each other on the hard to fix problems (Total cost per month $320" $445). Ask your technician to explain this on your next car repair, so you can understand better what it looks like, and how it works.
A web based system shows that a 2009 Maxima with a 3.5L engine requires 3.3 hours to replace the spark plugs. At an average of $80 per flat rate hour that totals $264. You may think a spark plug is a spark plug, but that’s not the case anymore. The spark plugs for this car cost over $20, multiply that by six, and you have a total of $120 for the spark plugs. These plugs are Iridium Long Life spark plugs, required by the manufacturer to do the job properly. Total for labor and plugs is $384 for what used to cost you $39.95 years ago on a much less expensive car. The best ad I saw years ago was "We fix $39.95 Tune" ups." Keep in mind this technician should also do a diagnosis which costs you an additional $69.95 to $89.95 if done properly. If he tunes up your car and puts the plugs into an engine with a dead cylinder or other major issues, like a bad injector or coil pack, he just wasted your hard earned $384 dollars. Along with not checking other items like your air filter, PCV valve, belts, coil packs and scan data (not just pulling a code).
THE FUTURE AUTO REPAIR SHOP
The automotive industry has changed and continues to change rapidly as technology advances every day. If your technician continues at the rate he is going, he will be out of business soon. If you do not believe this, look around where you live and notice how many new homes have gone up, how many fast food places, cell phone stores, convenience stores, bagel shops, supermarkets, banks and so on. Now compare that to how many new auto repair shops you have seen go up. This should scare you! In ALL supply and demand situations, the costs accelerate. The major reason costs will continue to rise in the auto repair industry is that training, tools and equipment increase yearly, along with more specialty tools needed than ever before to repair cars in this 21st century. Every year between 300"400 new models appear, currently there are 3,497 to over 4,000 out there right now that your technician has to know how to work on if he wants to stay in business today. As a automotive technician, it’s hard to stay abreast of everything. This is where the right information system with training and equipment come in.
Many shops are missing the boat if they say "I won’t do air conditioning or I won’t do computer diagnosis" the fact remains that they won’t be able to hold on much longer if they don’t. If they cannot fix today’s cars, how will they fix tomorrow's? It has been stated the future auto technician will become more of an automotive engineer. Let me give you a scenario. I take my car to a local guy for a service. He completes it and I’m satisfied, the next time I need some computer work or air conditioning work he states he doesn’t do it, but in a friendly gesture says, "Joe down the street can take care of that for you." So I go to Joe and he does a wonderful job and in talking to him, I find out he performs the same service my last guy did. Who do you suppose I will visit next time? Is it important for me to get it all done at one place? What will happen to the other guy? What will happen to Joe's pricing when the other guy goes out of business?
WHERE WILL TOMORROW’S TECHNICIAN COME FROM?
On August 29, 2012 Chris Wood yard of USA Today stated: LOS ANGELES " Jonathan Hernandez figures if he is going to drive, he had better know how to fix cars. And he's well on his way to earning his degree in auto repair from Los Angeles Trade Technical College. But the 23"year" old does not intend to put his community college credential to use as a career. He plans instead to become a tattoo artist. "I can do a tattoo in three hours and make $300," explains Hernandez, who says he isn't tattooed himself. Such are the challenges for auto dealers and repair shops looking to recruit the repair technicians of tomorrow. A generation who grew up playing Xbox games instead of rebuilding carburetors doesn't seem to have the same fascination with auto repair as earlier generations who grew up as shade" tree mechanics.
There is already competition among auto dealers in many parts of the nation to hire or retain good technicians. The bigger worry is whether there will be enough younger workers in a few years as a wave of mid career mechanics hits retirement age.
"We're finding that we're going to run short of technicians in the very near future," says Rich Orbain, manager for General Motors' Service Technical College. "It's already getting very difficult to get young people interested in this as a career."
Auto" repair educators say they are fighting misconceptions about the profession. They point out that fixing cars has gone high" tech. A laptop computer is becoming as important a repair tool as a set of socket wrenches. And, in a world of job uncertainty, auto repair remains a career largely impervious to being outsourced abroad.
The nation's demand for auto mechanics is expected to have grown about 17% from 2010 to 2020, adding 124,800 jobs for a total of 848,200, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports. Auto technicians overall earned an average of $35,790, but 10% earned more than $59,590, in 2010, the most recent year for which the BLS has data. While high school graduates can land basic maintenance jobs such as changing engine oil, the real need will be for more highly trained technicians. It's those at the top of the profession that the industry is most concerned about losing, the master mechanics who don't just read troubleshooting data off a computer screen, but rather put their education and experience to use to interpret clues and pinpoint a problem.
Faced with the complexities of today's cars, master mechanics are being asked to deal with issues that would have required an engineering degree in the past. That problem is being compounded by the multiple new power train technologies hitting the market, including hybrids, electrics and advanced clean" diesel engines.
"You have paralegals and paramedics. You're getting to the point in (auto repair) that you are going to have para" engineers," says Frank Diertl, general manager of engineering services for Mercedes" Benz in the U.S.
While in the past, fixing cars was more about mechanical aptitude, electronics and computer" controlled systems rule today. A typical car may have 20 or more microprocessors working together, each running software with thousands of lines of code to control vital systems, whether it's anti" lock brakes or the infotainment system.
Many auto technicians are embracing how the job is evolving toward high" tech. A survey of 5,000 auto technicians conducted by consultant Carlisle & Co. on behalf of six automakers found that the second" biggest reason the technicians chose the profession was that they like working with technology " named by four out of 10. The only bigger reason, at six out of 10, remains having grown up working on cars. (Participants could give multiple answers). But the same survey also pointed up the challenge: Top mechanics are getting older. Mechanics at the dealerships of General Motors, Ford Motor and Chrysler Group had an average age in the low 40s. "They are going to have to replace them more quickly," says Carlisle partner Harry Hollenberg. The looming shortage is lost neither on automakers nor on educators " both are working to drum up enthusiasm for careers in auto repair. But it isn't easy.
Kids who couldn't wait to get their driver's licenses now often are blasé. They would rather talk to their friends through Facebook or other social media than drive over to meet them. In 1980, 87% of 19"year" olds had gotten driver's licenses, according to a study released in July by the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute. By 2010, that figure had dropped to 70%. "Automobiles were our social network," says Tony Molla, vice president the National Institute for Automotive Service Excellence, an outfit commonly called ASE, which certifies auto technicians. "Today's kids are using more electronics to do the same thing." Of course, the more deep" seated problem that many of them also are not versed in math and science hurts recruitment, since those skills can be vital now in fixing cars.
High schools cutting programs doesn't help, as well, that more high school districts have whacked budgets for auto repair programs, a key source of recruits. Supporting the programs has become more expensive because of the test equipment now involved. "They are making hard decisions about what they can do," says Molla. Molla says some schools have had to limit enrollment in auto repair and specialized courses. "In some areas, there are more kids applying than they have seats for them," he says.
AAA says it reaches out to 900 vocational schools across the country to encourage stronger programs and more students. "Students are still interested, but you have to go out and actively pursue them at the high schools," says Mike Garblik, professor of automotive technology at Sinclair Community College in Dayton, Ohio. "They are being pulled in so many different directions. There are so many opportunities."
Jobs are practically guaranteed, Garblik reaches out to a wider student population, trying to make sure that students interested in information technology careers are aware of how much the auto industry now depends on computers. He has another lure: a nearly 100% job placement rate.
Out at Los Angeles Trade Technical College, known to everyone as just "Trade Tech," Automotive Department Chairman Rudy Serrato also reports finding jobs for most of his graduates. And despite the misconceptions about the "grease monkey" image, "You can make good money," he says.
Serrato is a 1972 graduate of the program he now runs " and he hasn't lost any enthusiasm for the subject. Launching into teaching a summer class on heating and air conditioning in cars, he notes the thrill of troubleshooting. "It's the challenge of fixing something someone else can't fix," he says. And that's where the skill comes in. Sure, a car's computer may spit out a "trouble code" to report what system is malfunctioning. But that's not enough. "It's a matter of how to diagnose that trouble code," says Jose Ramirez, an instructor. "You have to play around with it." He adds that he tells the students "anyone can replace a part. I teach them how to troubleshoot. That's where the money is," he says.
Student Hernandez says he is impressed at how the job employs physics and other skills. "You really have to use your brain," he says.
Other students, such as Jazmin Bravo, 19, of Bell, Calif., seem up to the challenge. Even though she doesn't yet drive, Bravo says she entered the program because "I love classic cars," especially 1960s models. Some students end up talking about a car as if it were a robot from another planet that they can understand. "It can talk to you and tell you what ails it," says Felipe Morataya, 32, of Los Angeles. "You can reason with it to tell you the problem."
The most common question I get asked by repair shops is "Can you find me a good technician?" On several occasions I have been offered $300 to $500.
I witnessed a technician get fired one day, and thought, no problem, his replacement will probably be in place by next week. But after eight weeks of the business running ads, and spending thousands of dollars, with no luck, they rehired the technician that was fired. Are auto repair shops hard up for technicians? I would say so. How many times do you hear of people getting rehired after they get fired? As I meet with shops owners I am finding out that this is their # 1 concern.
We must all share some responsibility in helping the future technician or it's going to be crippling to our wallet, but as stated for years in our industry "you can pay me now, or you pay me later" at a much higher cost I might add.
A sign I saw in a small town repair shop: “To my past due accounts when you die, please let me be one of your pallbearers. I have carried you this far, and I might as well finish the job!”