Specialty Body Works Inc
330 Paularino Ave, Costa Mesa, CA
(714) 557-0780

Customer Service did not want to give me an estimate at 3pm, when the
shop closes at 5pm, because they are too close to closing. What a bunch of slackers. I'll never go back to find out how well they do the body work.

Work it, I don’t want to continue Mr. Sniffer and my peeing match so I hate to even comment but I have to give you a different side of the info that has been misunderstood here. First off, “industry standard” is a not “hack” work done by “bad body shops”. It is a repair done with “reasonable” quality that a “reasonable” person in the industry would see as “proper”. It isn’t flawless, and it isn’t poor workmanship, it is somewhere in the middle. I use “reasonable” in the law sense of the term. As an example, a judge would likely rule in favor of a defendant if the claimant wanted his car replaced after you put a ding in it at supermarket parking lot. The claimant has a point, he doesn’t want his new car that didn’t have a speck of plastic filler and has only the original paint on it to get any now. He owned a perfect car and anything less than that isn’t right being he didn’t put the ding. HOWEVER, in the eyes of the law, a new car would be “unreasonable” being the ding can be “repaired”. The same goes for kid throwing a rock through a window in your home. You can’t sue him to replace all the windows in your home because the color of the rubber seal that holds the glass in isn’t going to match all the other windows in your house now, that would be “unreasonable”.

To discuss something as objective as “quality” here on the computer is pretty **** hard, all we can do is to use the “industry standard” description, which is why it was created. One persons “quality” is another mans “hack work”, especially when that one of them is “unreasonable”. I CAN and have picked apart a half a million dollar show car, PICKED IT APART pointing out the “flaws”. This is great if I was judging two equal equality cars. That IS how you judge which one is better. But it wouldn’t be “reasonable” to pick the car apart just for the sake of it. It is “nearly” flawless and to a “reasonable” person in the industry “perfect”.

This is one of the reasons for the development of organizations such as ICAR http://www.i-car.com/ and ASE http://www.asecert.org/ these organizations are nationally recognized for standardizing auto repairs. Believe me, if every shop followed the guidelines set by these organizations the consumer would be a LOT better off. To quote Laurence J. Peter “Some problems are so complex you have to be highly intelligent and well informed just to be undecided on them”. I am a cynical person, I believe (to quote someone again) “You can’t have certainty without first having doubt”. I remember when I was a small bodyshop owner; I scoffed at ICAR and ASE too. “You can’t learn anything from a book” I though. I thought I had to stay working everyday, I “couldn’t afford” to go to a class, besides they don’t know about the “real world”. I worked in this business for almost twenty years before I went to my first class; HOLY CRAP was I wrong about them. I now have many ICAR and ASE certifications. I remember laughing at the ASE tests, what the heck does that prove I would say, now I say, GO TAKE THEM. I agree there are some flaws with out dated info in the tests, but studying for them you WILL learn something. ICAR, they are GREAT. So they have,” insurance executives” advisory board, so the hell what? ICAR has laid out standard of PROPER REPAIRS, PERIOD. Like I said, if every shop followed those guidelines the consumer would be a HELL of a lot better off than they are now. I personally think after seeing some of the welds guys do, there should be a LAW that you must pass the ICAR welding certification test before you can even touch a car.

There is NOTHING FURTHER FROM THE TRUTH that ICAR or ASE are “in bed” with insurance and that it is some sort of men in the black helicopters sort of conspiracy. THE GUIDE LINES ARE FOR PROPER REPAIRS. There is NOT ONE SINGLE thing in the ICAR guidelines that is a “short cut”. If you go to an ICAR class and think you could do a better repair than they are (“reasonably better”) laying out, you need to LEAVE THIS BUSINESS because your head is way to big and you need to get smart just to find out how dumb you are. If you can find a “short cut” in the ICAR guidelines, let’s talk about it.

There once was a young lumberjack who challenged an old timer to a contest to see who could chop the most trees in a day. On the day of contest the young strong lumberjack got off to a good start cutting with a mighty swing of his ax. Throughout the day the old timer was seen sitting taking breaks and lunch. The young guy with all the energy of youth worked the entire day without stopping. At the end of the day the piles of wood were measured, the old timer had won the contest! The youngster couldn’t believe his eyes. He asked the old man how he could do it when he took all those breaks and the youngster never stopped cutting. The old timer replied, “while on those breaks, I sharpened my ax”.

I sharpen my ax by learning as much as possible at ICAR classes, ASE, classes at NACE, etc. I have gotten smart enough to know how dumb I am.


Do I fulfill the customers expectations?


I have made a car “road worthy” by pulling on the radiator support only so the headlamps could be aimed. Bending the hood back into shape only so it would open and close and lock properly. Replacing a light bulb here or there and leaving the dents and cracked paint. The customer’s expectations were filled. He paid me to make the car so he could drive it back and forth to work safely, I did just that. Now, at the same time in the shop there may have been a show car that I was building that ended up on the front cover of a magazine and in the main arena of a prestigious car show winning best in class. Because I didn’t fix the first car perfect doesn’t mean I was a hack or a thief, I fulfilled BOTH of these customers expectations.

Just yesterday, I did a door skin on a Honda Civic, and put a pull on the front of a GMC van that belongs to a plumber. The Honda has PERFECT (there goes that word again, “reasonably perfect” would be better) two and a half mm door gaps all the way around. The customer EXPECTS that. The van, it came out very nice, however, the hood gap isn’t “perfect”. One side at the rear it is a little tight. The customer was happy to get the van back so he could make money with it over the weekend and his expectations were met. Was I a “hack” for not making the Vans hood fit as well as the Hondas door?

Like every industry in the world, there are good and there are bad. There are good techs and there bad ones. There are good shops and there are bad. Pointing at a car on the street and saying “that car was done by a hack” without knowing the customers expectations is wrong. It is like saying a Kia is a piece of junk when comparing it to a Mercedes. Well of course it is, IF that is all you are looking at. But if you take into account the customers expectations of the person who would walk into the dealership and buy one of these cars, “opinion” about which is better is a moot point.

Bringing this back to the body shops, there are “McPaint” shops like Macco or Earl Shieb that do $200 paint jobs. Your average quality shop would spend three or four times that much just on the paint materials! Now, I have had my fair share of bad dealings with these “McPaint” shops so I don’t think very highly of them. BUT, they are supplying a market out there. There are people who are just happy with the low quality they are PAYING for. If they paid the $2500 or $3500 that the high quality shop was asking and got the “McPaint” shop quality, that would be wrong. Now, this isn’t to say that the “McPaint” shops marketing tactics and sales approach is on the up and up. I have been sickened for years with the “we are the best” impression their ads have. If there is ONE person who unsuspected has drove their car into one of these “McPaint” shops thinking “they were the best”, that pisses me off. And I can say, I KNOW there are plenty who do.

The “bad body shops” that Mr. Sniffer mentions who “enter into agreements with the insurance companies to have a steady stream of work illegally steered to their shop.” What he is talking about are “Direct repair” shops who have an agreement with an insurance company to repair cars. These DRP shops negotiate an agreement where they give a certain amount of discounts on parts, a certain hourly fee and things like reduced or no storage fees for total losses and that sort of thing. But the biggest thing they give up is their privacy. The insurance company saves on employees by making the shop do all the leg work. And, they have an open door policy to come and audit the jobs. I work at a shop that is a DRP for a few insurance companies and the auditors come around on a regular basis. They randomly pick a few cars in the shop and go over the work order and inspect the car to make sure they are being billed appropriately. Like I said, there are good seeds and bad seeds and I am sure there are plenty out there who repair cars poorly, they don’t understand that you can make money doing it the right way.

The insurance companies require the shop to have certain equipment to make proper repairs and to run the business properly, they are sort of a “partner” with the insurance company. Much like a large paint company will give an “incentive check” to a shop to change over to their paint line, they need to know that shop will be there in five years to get a return on the investment. The insurance company wants to do business with a healthy business. So the shop has to have a computer network using the latest in estimating software. It has to have a spray booth (not all shops do you know), a frame rack that will provide multiple pulls at the same time, a computer measuring system to provide a print out to “prove” the repairs were needed and completed. And depending on the company, a number of other pieces of equipment.

NEVER, have I EVER heard on of these auditors ask us to “cut corners”. Sure, they will say “That looks like a two hour dent and you put three on the estimate”. But when it comes to following the guide lines laid out by the organizations such as ICAR and ASE, they will NEVER, EVER ask that. If a structural component has a “kink” by ICAR’s standards of a “Kink” (and I think they are **** liberal) the part gets replaced. And not how the body shop thinks it should be done, but by a standard laid out by the cars manufacturer or ICAR. There are strict guidelines as to where a door aperture or frame rail could be spliced for instance. You just can’t leave that engineering up to the average bodyman. Sure, some would have the commonsense to make a good call, but MANY could not. The guide lines laid out by ICAR are backed by engineers from the industry, what in the living hell could be wrong with that? Sure, there could be mistakes made, but if every shop FOLLOWED THE ICAR GUIDE LINES CONSUMERS WOULD BE BETTER OFF.

“Weld thru primer”? When do you use it? Well, I learned from a class a NACE something I didn’t know, not all manufacturers even want you to use it! Ford for instance wants you to use epoxy primer only and NOT a zinc rich “weld thru”. The Toyota class I went to for my Toyota Certification told me Toyota WANTS weld thru. How about a “sleeve” when welding a quarter panel to the roof post. What does a tech do? Well, ICAR says use one but check with the manufacturers recommendations. Ford says yes Toyota says no, they want you to butt weld it.

I don’t know what it is like, I honestly don’t have a clue what it is like to think that the DRP shop must cut corners. Let me give you a little outline on what we do. We remove EVERY SINGLE part off any painted or blended panel. I am talking every moulding, door handle, emblem, window rubber. ANYTHING that touches the outer paint surface gets removed, EVERYTHING. We get PAID from the insurance company to REPLACE all glue on mouldings, emblems and seals. We get paid and remove ALL windows that are on a blend or paint panel. Urethaned in, bolted in, or pop out like the rears on a mini van, ALL get removed if they touch or restrict painting the ENTIRE outer paint surface. We remove all pick up beds if the bed side or cab corner are being painted so you can get all around the corner. We remove ALL bumpers that touch (or even come close) to the outer painted surface. We REPLACE all decals and under hood information stickers on replaced parts like hoods and rad support. We will remove a sun roof to paint a roof. There are NO open blends, EVER. If the quarter panel to roof has no breaking point the roof and other quarter get cleared, PERIOD. We are NEVER asked by ANY insurance company we are contracted with to use aftermarket or used parts, EVER. ANY part where there is a HINT of safety involved gets replaced. A TINY bow in an intrusion beam, the door gets replaced. ANY HINT of damage to a seat belt, door, hood or trunk latch, gets REPLACED, without a question. A tire with a TINY damage gets replaced, ANY suspension components that COULD be damaged are replaced, NO QUESTIONS ASKED. The paint dept. have all been to TRAINING supplied by the manufacturer of the paint we use. We can offer a lifetime warrantee because of this. We have two heated down draft $100,000 booth set ups. A computer, robotic measuring system for frames to get them back to specs (within 3 mm) http://www.car-o-liner.se/smartprods/sm ... 6&Lang=044 a laser four wheel alignment system to ensure the cars wheels and suspension work properly.

You do NOT have to “cut corners” and be a “bad body shop” to have a business relationship with an insurance company. NOW, to debate the legality of “steering” customers to the shop, that is a whole different argument that I can see both sides. To tell you the truth, I don’t know the legal leg the insurance companies are standing on. But I am not a lawyer, it appears it is “legal”.

Brian

I have to clear something up here, YES, there are insurance companies that will ask you to sell your soul for a DRP contract. Not all DRP shops have done this. When I say we are NEVER asked to use aftermarket or used parts, I mean by the companies we have DRP relationships with. Sure, there are other who do, BUT WE DON'T DO BUSINESS THAT WAY. They can "ask" that doesn't mean they will get it. We use to have a DRP relationship with a company who did ask, after a short while we found that doing business with them would COST us about a hundred thousand dollars a year, we dropped them. That very company wants you to use used parts, we refuse, even today when we get the odd job from them. Right this very day there is a Ford Focus sitting in my stall where they instisted we get a clip from a wrecker. We WILL NOT, NEVER, EVER, EVER, use a used weld on part, EVER. And this car didn't need it, but they found some clip with all he parts we needed and insisted we use it. We went along, nowing we would win out in the end. The clip was delivered, only four parts were undamaged on the clip. We wrote up a supplement including all the new parts we would need AND a $200.00 to discard the structure and unused parts. They gave the ok to buy all new parts and the wrecking yard that brought us this piece of junk is coming to get it next week to bring back to the yard.

Like I have said many times, the money is made in the office, not in the shop. It is a BUSINESS, and the OFFICE is where the BUSINESS is done.

If you don't get paid for what is right, the OFFICE is doing something wrong.

I want to add to the previous posts list of what we get paid for to do the job right. How about we have NEVER been asked by one of the DRP relatonships to repair a plastic part. We REPLACE ALL damaged plastic parts with new, NO MATTER HOW MINOR. A plastic finder liner with ONE torn screw hole gets replaced. A headlamp with a scratch, gets replaced, a water bottle with a cracked mount, gets replaced, a line of any kind, AC for instance that "COULD" break one day in the future because of a bend or kink gets replaced. A rad or AC condensor that COULD leak in the future gets replaced (I just remembered we do use "aftermarket" on them because they are usually from the OEM supplier), we use ONLY OEM bumpers on ALL cars newer than six years old, and MOST of the older ones. NO "reconditioned" bumpers on a late model car.

ANY glass with the slightest damage gets replaced with OEM glass. A door glass with a chip the size of this period . from a broken mirror glass hitting it gets replaced. We have replaced tail lamps,sun roofs, door glasses, headlamps, etc with VERY minor damage from a truck dropping sand or something out and damaging the car. If it is damaged, it gets replaced, PERIOD. The CUSTOMER gets EVERYTHING they are entitled to, PERIOD.


I didn't know, when I had my shop I certainly wasn't a good businessman, I was a bodyman. Because of that, I didn't understand that the MONEY is made in the office. I use to do almost everything the insurance company told me to do. The very companies we do work for at this shop would tell me they don't pay for blends, or R&I windows or things like that (I usually did them anyway even though I didn't get paid for them) we do at this shop and DO get paid. This is a BUSINESS, my employers are BUSINESS PEOPLE, they GET PAID for what we do.


I am including this to hopefully help stop the ridiculas rumors that any shop who has the good business sense to make money (lots of it, we do about 4 million$ a year doing about 1500 cars) must somehow be doing hack work. You can do good quality work AND make money at the same time.

By the way, our shop was voted "Best in the Bay" a number of years in a row by the readers of a local newspaper in an area with HUNDREDS of body shops over a number of cities with hundreds of thousands in population.

Brian

It's interesting Brian how two techs can have such different views on the industry. If your shop truly operates like you say it does, with no concessions, than you have certainly found the exception to the rule and I would encourage you to never leave there.

Have a nice day,
Nate

Nate, a lot of it may be the states in which we live. I know from what I have heard, some states have much different rules the insurance companies can follow. I know there are "no fault" states where YOUR insurace company is who you go thru every time. The problem being you have signed a contract with them that may include using aftermarket or "like kind quality" parts (LKQ). If that is the case your poor customers may HAVE TO accept using these parts.

Brian

There's no doubt that an uneducated customer can get stuck with inferior parts if they go to many direct repair shops.

On a different note, as it seems this has turned into our thread, I'd like to get your take on how technicians get paid. What do you think of the flat rate/commision pay system. I think this promotes quantity over quality and is a breeding ground for hack technicians. As we seem to disagree on just about everything related to the collision industry, I'd like to know what you think.

Nate

PS.. One thing that I do think we have in common is our love of the work, and a committment to doing quality repairs.

Thanks Nate, I will tell you that you are right on the money with the quanity over quality. I have WITNESSED it in the happening. After four years at the shop where I now work they put in a "bonus" system that pays five dollars an hour "saved" on your clock times. They pay this after 25 hours and then after 60 hours it goes up to 10 dollars an hour. This is on top of your hourly pay.

I have no problem at all with this bonus system or a commision, AS LONG AS PEOPLE ARE HELD TO STANDARDS. If you have inspections of welded panels for instance, what does it matter if the guy kicks butt as long as he is held accountable.

The other problem with a commision or bonus is that when you have a selfish tech who will leave things in the way by not putting his parts in the parts room, use the frame rack as his own personal work bench covered with his tools, work in the door way of the shop because he doesn't want to move a car out of his stall, that sort of thing. All he is thinking of is HIMSELF and not the production of the shop. Then you have the guys who want to grind metal to "metal finish" which forces the paint shop to prime a part that could have just been sealed and shot if the tech would have metal finished it in 180. He will say things like "that is the paint shops job", well, that hurts production. And many of these things hurt MY bonus.

So, in a nut shell, it can work as long as the techs are held accountable for quality and for effecting the production of the rest of the shop. This leads me to my other gripe about commision or bonuses.

Nate, I have always been fascinated by the manufacturing process. As far back as I can remember I could watch a machine stamping parts out or a bottling plant filling bottles of soda and putting the caps and labels on.

How the jobs are handed out and how the shop flows can effect each techs efficiency more than "how" they work on cars or how fast they are!

If you have a production manager who doesn't understand this or does and wants to screw you, your efficiency can be effected.

Brian

You couldn't be more right with that post. It's like you just described every shop I've worked at that is flat rate. Car's pulled just in the shop blocking all sorts of flow through the shop. Frame rack a mess. Floor looks like a mine field in Iraq. Haven't had much of a problem with guys metal finishing in grinder though. They metal finish in an inch of bondo. Body work sent to the paint shop in 80 grit if you're lucky. Luckily, the shop I'm at now is a salary shop, so some of these problems I don't have to deal with as much. Alot of that does come down to management too. Efficiency depends more on shop layout and scheduling and complete sheets than whether a guy is hustling or not. Although there is always a couple drag asses out there. Quality control is important, and if a shop is very stringent about enforcing it, than that does alot for how jobs turn out. Problem with alot of shops is they overload the shop with more work than the techs can handle, everyone is rushed, one part ends up being wrong it throws of everything. I'm more of the perfectionist type that would be better suited for a restoration type setting where top quality work was expected, and the time was given for it. A boy can dream, and in the mean time, this will have to pay the bills.

Nate

Nate, there is always a middle ground, collision repair at a high end shop. I am looking, seriously thinking about heading over to a shop here in town that specializes in high end European cars. They have a BEAUTIFUL shop with a Celete frame system and the best of everything. I hear the boss is a bit of a jerk, but I can respect a jerk if he isn't jerking you around with lies and just for the sake of being a jerk. Our old production manager was a jerk, but I respected him. I respected his work ethic, I would respect him with the key to my house to water my plants while I was on vacation, you know what I mean? So, I am thinking about it, I am just getting tired of some things that are going on around here.

On your issues, yeah, we MUST finish the bondo work in 180. They only get primed once, then blocked and painted. They usually do a decent job, but not the job you or I would do if we were blocking that primer. They usually look pretty good.

Yeah, the most "productive" guy in the shop, all he does is 35 hourish jobs and he is left alone. He will punch in and stay on the job the whole day until it is done. I on the the other hand do all kinds of little crap along with my bigger jobs. I am the wheel alignment guy (about six or more a week) and the "fixer" for little screw ups like dented fenders in the paint shop they want metal finished so they don't have to prime. I am a "mentor" for a couple of apprentices (neat program, http://mentorsatwork.com/ ) so I am punching in on many different cars. DUH, my efficiency is lower than the guy that stays on a car all day. He rakes in $1000 dollars or more bonus I get three to six hundred usually.

The production manager has a LOT of control. That is IF he even understands this, most do not.

Brian

There's a high end Euro place five minutes from my house that's pretty well regarded. I was also thinking of going over and introducing myself. Check over the site, it looks like a cool place to work.
http://www.karosserie.com/