ECHERBST

That will happen on occasion if someone breaks down and needs a car unplanned. In that case just send them over to enterprise for a rental if they need it. Generally the better customers are fine with that or will make do. The ones that complain about not have a free loaner I will take not then most likely part ways with them after that service or assess if they are with the trouble.

Having loaner cars is a large expense but they defiantly are worth having. I have 3 of them currently. I usually just do two year leases on equinoxes as I lease many cars and usually can get a very good deals on them. I have 2024 Equinox EV that I did a two year lease on and just did a one pay that cost $1900 for 2 years. So like free. Insurance is costly on them- around 200 bucks a month each. But I do mostly higher end vehicles- Euro / exotic etc. so my average RO is well over 2K. The best part of having them is never having to worry about getting stuff done and I can schedule customers as I see fit and keep the week rolling. I would not want to put customers in older cars as taking care of those would just be too time consuming etc. So my advice is that it will generate you way more money than the cost of having them and will keep good customers forever. But putting a bad customer in one would be a mistake. I am at the point in my business where I vet my customers and just turn away the problem child loser cars. If the customer does not value me and my time I just tell them they are not my customer base. Time is the hardest think for any shop to manage and wasted time is lost revenue.