Some years ago, it seemed like we (as a shop and an industry) were making some progress on reducing the insistence that we bring all cars in on a Monday in order to get them out by Friday. I don't know if our experience is unusual, but these days we are encountering even more resistance to moving to "flat scheduling," bringing in (and delivering) a similar number of vehicles each day of the week.
Perhaps not enough shops and insurers have considered (or remembered) the benefits of eliminating the "all-in-on-Monday" scheduling practice. For shops, I think the best analogy I've seen is thinking about a snake eating a rat whole; you can watch as that rat travels down the snake's body.
That's like bringing in a week's worth of cars on Monday. It causes logjam after logjam, first in the office and the parts department, then in the body shop, then in the paint shop, then in the detail department – and then again in the office. Cars end up sitting idle, and you end up with parts for all those vehicles taking up space and requiring repeated handling before they are needed.
With flat scheduling, cars and parts arrive at the shop only when they can immediately move into production. And that production moves more smoothly because each department has a similar amount of work (just what it can handle) throughout the week, rather than being overwhelmed one day and slow the next. At least one study I'm aware of – and the anecdotal experiences of a number of shops as well as our own over my 20 years of shop ownership – confirms that flat scheduling results in improved productivity and lower cycle times.
Insurers, of course, are eager to avoid having to pay for a rental vehicle over a weekend. But too often, I think, they look at the potential added cost on one job without seeing the bigger picture. If a shop using flat scheduling can cut a day or two of cycle time on all claims covered by that insurer, that will more than off-set the added rental expense on a few cars. A study by Collision Resources looked at three shops over a 10-month period and found that flat scheduling netted a two-day decrease in overall cycle time.
When much of this was being discussed within the industry seven or eight years ago, there seemed to be more openness among insurers to the idea. Even today, in some cases local claims staff are open to the idea, particularly if a customer requests to bring in a car mid-week. But sometimes the regional staff of that same insurance company will question why we are doing something the local staff has endorsed.
Insurers have convinced a growing number of customers, too, that they must bring their car in on a Monday. Some are too intimidated to do otherwise, even when we tell them it may be Tuesday before we can get to their car, and it will still be done by Friday if brought in on Tuesday. The insurer ends up with an extra rental car day just because they are convinced they come out ahead by pushing every customer toward Monday.
Where we once had made some progress in moving toward flat scheduling, our shop seems to be back to once again bringing in about 50 percent of the cars on Monday, 20 percent on each Tuesday and Wednesday, and only about 10 percent on Thursday or Friday.
What's been your shop's experience with "flat scheduling?" Have you experienced push-back from insurers, and if so, have you been able to overcome that? Have you seen measurable productivity and cycle time improvements with flat scheduling? Share your experience with me by e-mail and I'll include the best ideas in a future column.
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