Dealerships failing to convert essential work

25 June 2015  

Research into electronic vehicle health checks (eVHC) has revealed franchised dealers are missing opportunities to sell service and parts, giving independents further opportunities.

Training and consultancy firm BTC revealed that the average dealer leaves 57% of its identified work unconverted. The data was generated from BTC’s vehicle health check software, autoVHC, which ranks jobs as ‘red’ (needing urgent attention) and ‘amber’ (needing attention in the medium term). The research, based on a sample of 1,000 dealerships, is a warning to services departments that are not following up on repair work and leaving the independents and rapid fits to benefit from the unsatisfied demand.

Guy Allman, Chief Executive Officer at BTC, commented: “Dealerships are letting too many sales slip away. Our latest research raises a number of questions. How can we increase the number of vehicle health checks being completed? How can we increase the amount of work identified and how can we improve the conversion of red and amber work which combined is just 43%?”

The news shows that independent garages have an opportunity to pick up a large amount of work that passes through the franchise dealer networks. With data suggesting that vehicles over 3.5 years old are lost to dealerships as they enter the aftermarket, taking on essential maintenance that is identified elsewhere and made known to the driver will aid the increase in market share within the independent sector.