New I-CAR Live Training Hybrid & Alternative Fuel Program Available
I-CAR’s live training program Hybrid Electric and Alternative Fuel Vehicles (ALT02), a follow-up to the Electric and Electric Hybrid Vehicles (ALT01) program, is being offered throughout North America in the coming months. This program prepares technicians to service and repair emergent new technologies on hybrid and alternative-fuel vehicles. Topics covered by the course include: •
PPG Announces 2008 Vibrance Collection Show Truck Appearance Schedule
PPG’s 75-foot tractor-trailer rig, custom painted in PPG Vibrance Collection colors, will crisscross the country from March through November, making 24 stops along the way at truck, car and hot rod shows and events. The truck, with PPG driver Chad Hook at the wheel, is a 2007 Freightliner Coronado. Larry Wood, chief designer for Hot
List of Auto Body Trade Associations
NATIONAL ASSOCIATIONS Alliance of Automotive Service Providers (AASP) Minneapolis, Minn. Tel: (612) 270-6696 www.autoserviceproviders.com Automotive Service Association (ASA) Bedford, Texas Tel: (800) 272-7467 www.asashop.org Coalition for Collision Repair Excellence (CCRE) Bainbridge Island, Wash. Tel: (877) 700-7743 www.theccre.com Collision Industry Relief Mechanicsville, Va. Tel: (888) 667-7433 www.collisionindustryrelief.com Independent Auto Body Association (IABA) Raleigh, N.C. Tel: (336)
Fox Fiasco Mars Industry: Fox Collision Centers
For a little over a month now, we’ve been following the saga of Fox Collision Centers. How embarrassing! It’s like a bad train wreck that you can’t pull your eyes from. This story line gets more and more tragic with each passing day, and not in a way that makes you the least bit compassionate
Going Head to Head
Collision repair consolidators seem focused on customer service as opposed to offering insurance companies even lower repair costs. They’re also concentrated on honing their operations to a razor sharp state of efficiency (which, incidentally, will lower repair costs).
Facing Your Fears
If you’re making decisions out of fear, you’re making bad decisions. Although this shop owner was referring to how repairers are agreeing to just about anything because they’re afraid — afraid of angering an insurer, afraid of losing work, afraid of going out of business — his comment, taken in the larger context, epitomizes a
Thoughts from the NACE Show Floor
Business has been bad lately. Real bad. So I went to NACE
looking for some inspiration and insight — and I got it.
Scare Tactics
Adjusters often use the “steering” phrases.
Trade Secrets
Unusual, everyday tools commonly used in the collision repair industry.
State Steering Regulations
Alabama None Alaska A claimant may not be required to travel unreasonably either to inspect a replacement motor vehicle, obtain a repair estimate, or have the motor vehicle repaired at a specific facility. If a person adjusting or settling a claim elects to have repaired a claimant’s motor vehicle and chooses a specific facility for