Digital Dealer - October 2017 - 42

COMMUNICATIONS

By Sandi Jerome
Owner,
Sandi Jerome
Computer Consulting

APRIL 21-23, 2015 * TAMPA, FL
APRIL 21-23 * TAMPA, FL

Your DMS and Recalls
Last year was a
record year for
recalls; over 50 million
vehicles had recalls with
over 900 different
campaigns. This was the
third year in a row that
recalls topped 50 million
vehicles. Recalls can be
good business for dealers
if they handle them
properly.
What is the best way to
handle a recall? The most
profitable way to perform
a recall is when the vehicle is in stock or already in
your shop.
How is it possible that
you can sell a new vehicle
with a recall? Let's say
that you receive a new
vehicle and open up a PDI
repair order. Most DMS
systems do a background
vehicle inquiry to get the
vehicle service history and
check for open recalls.
During the process,
some DMS systems like
AutoSoft display the recall
and ask if you want to
import the campaign into
your repair order. Other
DMS systems like DealerStar automatically add
campaigns to the open
repair order or appointment. What happens if
you receive a new vehicle
that has no open recalls,
but then during the next
few weeks or months, a
campaign is issued?
Some DMS systems
let you enter that campaign and VIN range into
their system and locate
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OCTOBER 2017

vehicles that are affected.
But with our busy service
departments, this step is
often neglected and the
sales department delivers
a new vehicle with an
open campaign.
Many manufacturers
punish dealers by withholding their rebate funds
or other actions. Some
DMS systems out there
are helping dealers with
this problem by running
background vehicle
inquires of the vehicle inventory file each night and
red-flagging in stock units
that have open recalls.
In addition, when a new
or used vehicle is added
to stock or a deal created, another background
inquiry is done and a
warning is issued in the
deal that there is an open
campaign.

D I G I TA L D E A L E R . C O M

By completing the
recall while the vehicle is
still on the lot or in your
shop means more profit.
First of all, your customer
is happy that they don't
have to bring the vehicle
back. Nothing is worse
than buying a brand-new
vehicle and a few weeks
later getting a recall
notice. For the dealership,
you don't have to give
an upset customer a free
rental vehicle. With careful
planning of your recalls on
in-stock vehicles, you can
order the parts on stock
orders instead of emergency orders saving money on freight and the cost.
The service department
can easily schedule these
in-stock repairs around
their daily schedule and
dispatch to the best techs
rather than having to

pick a lesser qualified or
more expensive tech to
meet a promised time. Of
course, it is always easier
to repair a vehicle that
is sitting on the lot than
processing a customer's
vehicle through your
shop. How can you miss
a recall on a vehicle that
is in your shop? Often the
repair order is created
by a third-party product
or weeks in advance by
an advisor or scheduler.
At that time, the vehicle
history might be requested of the factory, but it
isn't done again when the
repairs begin weeks later.
By running an inquiry
each night of all in-stock
vehicles and open repair
orders, your DMS can flag
those missed recalls.
If you are finding that
you sold or serviced
vehicles with open recalls,
then you might want to
study the process in your
DMS and discover some
of the tools available to
make discovering a recall
before a vehicle leaves
your shop or lot possible.
These changes can increase profit and improve
customer satisfaction.
SANDI JEROME is the
owner of Sandi Jerome
Computer Consulting. Sandi
founded DealerStar, a webbased DMS. She is a former
CFO, System Administrator,
Fixed Operations Manager,
and Controller with over
30 years of experience in
the auto industry. EMAIL:
sandi@sandijerome.com
http://www.DIGITALDEALER.COM
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Digital Dealer - October 2017
