Sharp'S

We don't do much for diesel work around here but we love our Jeep and other off road work. We have spurts where every bay and every hole on the lot is filled with a Jeep and then there's weeks where we have nothing but Escorts, Grand Am and anything Mitsubishi. A lot of the Jeep people around here are DIY so it's hard to build the niche. Plus this entire county has been seriously unemployed for years now and custom tube doors and lift kits aren't necessity. Our regulars spend several hundred per visit though and the economy here is picking up so there is hope. In the meantime we're collecting equipment and hoarding Jeep parts and making bread and butter off the electrical jobs nobody in town wants to mess with.

Is it just us or are the people they send always on "limited incomes" with cars from the early 90's that fall apart as soon as you pop the hood?

I am going to have to remember this one!

I was sure we were Doctors and Mad Scientists.... Corona didn't look outside the box and see past the current technology or they would have evolved that typewriter into what we know today.

We pay an hourly rate and a production bonus for each hour of production. If our tech is standing around on his smart phone all day he's only getting the minimum hourly rate which most people would jump at the chance for that job. But if he's not hitting at least 60% production rate for the week he won't be here long. We had Mitchell for shop management and I wasn't impressed. Started using Alldata in December and I regret ever switching.

This can be a serious headache in some situations. We've had several jobs that had days of diagnostics and research. They turned out to pay only 4 or 5 hours as we couldn't see charging these people thousands of dollars. These have made some of our best repeat customers though. On the other hand we've got a regular dealer who sends us only the tough jobs and nearly every time, we're able to bill every hour spent to get the repair done. There's only been a couple of jobs we had to turn away and tell the customer the car just isn't worth the can of worms this one repair is going to open up. I tend to estimate high. Assume the worst case scenario and add a disclosure to the estimate that we cannot guarantee. If the customer still insists to move forward we'll take the job on. This has really been our only saving grace but it took those two worst case scenarios to come to this method of handling diagnostics. Anymore we have more headache in this area from the people who think they are going to come in for free diagnostics, that we'll tell them what 's wrong and they can then attempt DIY repairs. I send them to AutoZone. ~Heather

My husband has had his hands on cars for a good twenty years. Several years ago it started to become more than just a hobby and he was quickly outgrowing our home garage. We're now in our third year in our 5 bay shop. He's the primary technician and we have one other technician as well. I myself run the office. I have an accounting and payroll background but can use some help in the automotive industry side of things. Looking forward to learning some things and hopefully I can offer some help as well. ~Heather