The hottest topic in the industry appears to be the ambivalence to conduct a pre- or post-scan and the current position by the OEs. Certainly a case can be made that scans are a necessary procedure on specific vehicles for specific damage. The position that every vehicle requires a pre and post scan seems to breech the parameters of common sense. A key-scratched vehicle, PDR hail damage, overspray damage or minor parking lot dents would appear to stretch the concept that "every vehicle needs to be scanned."
Have vehicles been incorrectly repaired for 20 years? The industry’s position 5 years ago and earlier was that once the car was ready for delivery, all systems were checked for functionality and if any warning lights were on, a scan would be done with the aftermarket shop scan tool. The problem would be found and fixed prior to delivering the vehicle to the customer. If the shop did not have the appropriate scan tool, the vehicle would be sent to the dealer for repair. If other fault codes were identified, they would only be addressed if they related to the current accident.
So the only time scanning was addressed was as a post-scan if there was an indication that some functionality on the vehicle was not operating properly and was accident-related. It is likely that some critical functionality was missed. And with these sophisticated systems on the vehicle today, it should not be risked to miss a fault code that could render a dystonic cruise system inoperable. So a complete scan on every vehicle operating system seems necessary at least for late-model vehicles.
With more than 250 million registered private passenger motor vehicles on the road today and an average age of the vehicle at 11.6 years, only 10 percent of the vehicles on the road today have these sophisticated systems. Yet, OEs want every vehicle scanned.
Can a common-sense approach to scanning be done similar to what was done in the early 1980s when the unibody hit the collision repair market?
In the 1980s, we were told that every vehicle needed to be mounted and measured to assure the unibody structure was not damaged. The industry has worked through that scenario using common sense and determined three deciding factors that define the need to mount and measure: Location — high, medium or low; Direction — front to rear, side, front or rear; and Severity — light, medium or severe.
Why not apply the same common-sense approach to pre- and post-scans? Add make, model and options to the equation. (Problem solved if all information providers used build data for VIN decoding.) With location, direction and severity, decide the need to disassemble, disconnect the battery, remove sensors, identify damaged components, etc. If required, then scanning should be added as part of the repair order.
Let’s take a look at the cost of scanning and the impact on repairers, insurers and the vehicle owner.
Scans cost between $75 and $300 depending on who completes the scan, what type of tool is used and if a third party is involved. A technician has time involved that needs to be compensated. A shop needing to conduct pre- and post-scans on all vehicles would also need to hire a dedicated person or persons to conduct these scans, which adds another cost.
Shops delivering 150 cars a month with pre and post scanning on every vehicle would be completing 13.6 scans every day. With each scan taking 20 minutes, overall daily labor times to complete the scans would be 4.5 hours. If 50 percent of the scans show no accident-related codes, who provides compensation for the time spent for the scans? The insurance policy only pays for accident-related damage.
The insurers’ impact on overall severity will be significant with an average pre and post scan of about $187.50. Larger insurers with 10,000 vehicle claims a day would result in a daily severity impact of $1,875,000 or $495 million dollars annually. This impact would require insurers to obtain rate increases, which would be passed along to the vehicle owner.
So ultimately the cost is just added to the premiums for buying auto insurance.
