A body shop labor rate survey website hosted by International Research Incorporated (IRI) is online at https://bodyshopratesurvey.com.
Like this article? Sign up to receive our weekly news blasts here.According to IRI, the website is designed share with collision repair shops the latest rates being charged in various regions of the United States. Adds IRI, it reportedly is not linked to or supported by any insurance company, trade association or special interests. Additionally, IRI reports that individual shop surveys will not be distributed.
Funding for the site comes from sponsors on the web pages. Also, users can pay an annual fee of $189 for access to the database for one year.
"Technology has made it possible for this information to be gathered, calculated and available to every collision repair center, insurance company, consumer, lawmaker and insurance commissioner in the country at a very low cost, allowing them to be done annually," says IRI spokesperson David Brown, in a statement. "Trade associations no longer need to raise thousands of dollars to conduct surveys, and individual shops won't spend hours of their precious time conducting surveys only to be told, 'You're the only shop in the area with those results.' Our website makes the entire survey process very transparent, which we believe is a good thing for all the stakeholders."
According to IRI, its goals are four-fold:
- Enable collision repair centers to enter their rates annually with ease
- Maintain confidentiality of individual surveys
- Ensure accuracy of results with ease of access, while ensuring relevance to each individual market
- Offer the results for the lowest cost possible.
"The data can be sorted by geographic location (range finder) and shop size (retail sales in dollars),” Brown said in a statement. “The results are also displayed in retail (door) rates and discounted (DRP/fleet) rates so the users will have a realistic prevailing range to work with. The site even has a blog which allows users to communicate their thoughts about the site and ideas about how this new tool could be utilized the best."
For more information visit https://bodyshopratesurvey.com.
