Flat-rate system becoming a dinosaur?

[Doug]

Everyone's thoughts, please.

As the years go by I have the feeling that the flat-rate pay system is becoming archaic. The cars are getting awfully complex which makes assigning a flat-rate time unrealistic or at least very difficult (oh, sure. It's easy for the factory to do it, right ?!). Also, with the ever increasing shift to CSI and quality work there is a built-in conflict.

We ask our techs to be very productive, pay them extra for "beating the time", etc and then sometimes wonder why quality suffers.

Who has experimented with alternatives and how do you keep a balance bewtween production volume and quality ?

I am considering revised pays plans with much heavier emphasis on "Fix it Right" but don't want productivity to fall in the hopper, either.

[darrenfein]

I have always thought this was a great question. How does one make this change in a shop that has 20 year veterans and still maintain high CSI and high volume.
More specifically if you pay them off of some sort of manufacturers CSI scorecard, how do you make it specific to the tech. For example: the technician fixes the car correctly, but the survey is bad because of parts delay, rude advisor or cashier or just plain upset customer. How do you justify not paying the tech fully for his work if the customer isn't satisfied?
Don't get me wrong, I think it's a good idea. Specifically, I like the idea of knowing what my expense is going to be for the month and that any dollars generated past that are all profit (assuming the technician is the same or more productive than he is now on flat rate)
I know this sounds wishy washy, but I've never seen a good example of it.

Thanks for raising the question again.

[robc]

I've related service department pay plan questions to the current expert forum with Jeff Sacks.



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** Rob, Editor WD&S **
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