You’ve probably heard the story about the newly married guy who watches his young wife prepare a ham for their Christmas dinner, carefully cutting a slice off each end of the ham before putting it in the oven. When he asked her why she did this, she said she wasn’t sure, but that is how her mom taught her.
So the young wife calls her mom and asked the same question. Her mom also doesn’t know, but says that is how her own mother had showed her. So the woman calls her grandmother and asks her why they slice off the ends of the ham before putting it in the oven.
“I don’t know why you or your mother do it,” the grandmother responds, “but I did it because my oven wasn’t big enough.”
That story comes to mind every time I hear about an insurance company using some old rule or edict that might have made sense at some point, but now is just absolutely stupid.
A case in point: Insurance companies that penalize shops for having too many lines on their estimates or for listing as line items on an estimate procedures that are included in other line items.
Such rules may have had some logical basis at one point, but now they’re the equivalent of that young woman needless cutting off the ends of the ham.
Insurers using such stupid rules clearly don’t understand how tools like ALLDATA, Mitchell International’s RepairCenter TechAdvisor or CCC ONE Repair Methods work to provide collision repairers with important OEM repair information. These tools analyze the words on the estimate, and when they find certain verbiage, they provide the estimator with whatever the auto manufacturer offers in terms of repair information related to those items on the estimate.
So if you leave certain lines off the estimate because some insurer has a rule about not listing included items, or because some insurer is going to penalize you because your estimate has too many lines, those third-party tools may not provide you with vital information you need to fix that car properly.
Here are some examples. Let’s say you’re working on a 2008 Nissan Versa and you need to remove and reinstall (R&I) the trim panel to replace the quarter panel. That’s an included operation. But if you don’t list it on the estimate because of some insurer’s stupid rule, the system might not provide you with the bulletin that indicates that trim panel is non-reusable and must be replaced. (see graphic)
Or maybe you’re replacing a frame rail on a 2003 Ford Focus and you need to R&I the suspension to do that. If, in order to reduce estimate line items because of some insurer’s stupid rule, you put down only “R&I suspension” instead of “R&I control arm,” “R&I strut,” and all the other line items required to do that, you may not get important information from Ford. In this case, that information includes the fact that two of the bolts are torque-to-yield and thus must be replaced with new bolts, nuts and washers. (see graphic)
If our goal as shops and insurers is to make sure that vehicles are fixed safely and properly, this is vital information we need as collision repairers. These systems can’t get us this information if we’re following stupid rules that limit what line items we’re including on the estimate.
It’s time to stop needlessly cutting the ends off the ham. We need these systems to analyze a complete estimate so we have the vital repair information we need.
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