As a proud garage owner, one might have a preconceived notion that we know a lot about vehicles and our customers’ experiences with different makes and models. On average, an auto garage encounters more than 10 different types of vehicles every day, either for tire repairs or wheel inspection, and sometimes more complex issues.
A quality inspection identifies defects in the vehicles. For a small business, hiring an expert for the inspection process means more billable hours. An inspection done adequately means business can reach their bottom-line benefits. However, sometimes you may be spending more on the inspection process than generating revenue. Any hidden inefficiency can cost you time and money.
In this blog, you will identify how the inspection process might be hurting your business and ways to control the inspection process cost-effectively if it’s a concern for your business.
How to Identify if the Inspection Process is Costing More
A missed repair or more time consumption is a clear indication of an inefficient inspection process. If such is the case in your garage, then look out for these issues:
Missed Opportunities
One might lose potential revenue if technicians miss the proper repair and inspection opportunity. It can happen due to multiple reasons like a lack of concern, being tired or overworked, and even a lack of the right expertise.
So if a customer visits for an oil change, and you miss checking the coolant, it’s a missed opportunity to inspect the serpentine belt. The customer may eventually get it replaced elsewhere because you failed to do so.
It also creates trust issues with customers, and they might leave a bad review.
Inconsistent Process
Every technician has their way of inspecting the vehicle. If this happens, then you’ve a serious problem. While one might perform an inspection in depth for tire tread depth or suspension, the other technician might rush through the process.
An inconsistent process will decrease the inspection quality and increase the cost.
No Visual Proof
If you are not already using digital vehicle inspection software, your inspection process is outdated. Customers are skeptical about an undocumented repair or inspection. But if you are using a vehicle inspection tool you have the visual proof of the said issue and the repair that needs to be done.
You can easily capture and share photos of leaking parts and record videos from all angles too, if the engine is making noise.
Slow Inspection Process
Is inspection taking longer than expected due to a broken workflow? If so, you need to take a closer look at the process. If a technician is spending 40 minutes on a paper-based inspection, customers waiting will get frustrated.
Setting a standard practice at different stages of the vehicle issue can help speed up the inspection process.
How to Save Costs With the Inspection Process
In the absence or lack of a proper system and workflows, regular operations might fail. But as a business owner, you can follow up with these techniques to ensure the inspection process stays efficient:
Even a single missed inspection can create a ripple effect that drains revenue, erodes trust, and damages your reputation.
Here are the top ways a poor or inconsistent inspection process can cost your garage money:
- Increased comebacks ─ Faulty or missed inspections lead to return visits, rework, and reduced technician efficiency.
- Lower customer retention ─ Missed problems or poor communication damage trust, causing customers to look elsewhere.
- Negative reviews ─ Dissatisfied clients often leave damaging online feedback, which can hurt your local SEO visibility.
- Wasted labor hours ─ Manual documentation and inefficient workflows consume technician time that could be billable.
- Missed upsells ─ Hidden or uninspected issues mean lost opportunities to recommend legitimate repairs or services.
Pro tip ─ Streamlining inspections and integrating visual documentation significantly reduces these risks while improving upsell success.
Use Advanced Tools
Manual processes and paperwork are time-consuming. To reduce the cost, invest once in an advanced software like digital inspection software to ensure you have the visibility you need for inspection, and keep a record of it as well.
Not only does it help in reducing misdiagnosed issues, but it also ensures to save time and labor costs are saved with maximum output. It helps to stabilize the inspection cost for garage owners.
Automate Reporting
When creating reports, even a seasoned technician can make mistakes. It can end up hurting customers’ trust and your revenue. Automation, on the other hand, offers self-support so that each task becomes easier to manage with minimized human error. When using inspection software, you can generate automated reports as well. It will be efficient and accurate with detailed data utilization.
Set a Standard Protocol
Streamline the inspection process by carefully considering the services you offer. Also asses how effective the inspection tools are and which ones need upgradation.
It is important to highlight the gap in practices and tool utilization before setting a standard protocol for regular inspections to come back.
Offer Inspection Packages
Not every customer is looking for an in-depth diagnostic. Therefore, you can offer multi-layered inspection options like basic, premium, and advanced to match the requirements of the customer.
This way, you are not overcommitting to the customer and also saving the time of your workforce while they complete other tasks.
Transform Your Inspection Process
Identifying and analyzing the issues within the inspection process is important to cut costs. The focal point is to implement a system that enables you to generate automated processes and streamlined inspection practices with the right set of software and other equipment.