Twelve years ago, I was a senior in High School, considering what I should do after we all tossed our graduation caps in the air. I was considering going to college, along with many of my peers, but a visit from a recruiting representative for a local vocational college persuaded me and several others in our shop class that a career in automotive technology was the map to a prosperous future. Automotive dealership service departments, he claimed, were on the cutting edge of automobile repair, and those service departments would be willing to pay big dollars to anyone certified to work on modern automobiles. This same recruiting representative showed our shop class a video depicting “service managers” practically begging for clean cut, motivated, and certified technicians to come apply at their service departments. The face of the industry was changing, they claimed. Seasoned technicians were leaving the industry in droves, more quickly than they were being replaced. Being the naïve young kid that I was, I thought I'd be able to go to a year of technical school and be on the fast track to six figures a year. I envisioned myself working in a pristine shop, like those displayed in the dealership commercials, with smiling customers and service staff. I couldn't have been more wrong about many things, about the future of my career, the careers of my colleagues, and about the level of service provided to customers by dealership service departments.

After my graduation from my technical vocational college, I immediately went to work for a small dealership in the city that I grew up in. I lickety-split learned that the claims of the tech school recruiter were cherry coated half-truths. After being hired into a local dealership as an entry level technician, with no sincere world experience to utter of, I was put to work. There was little to no guidance or help when I ran into problems I had never seen before. The only other technician at the dealership was a guy who had been working there for more than 25 years. Due to the fact that we were all on commissioned only salary, he didn't want to give many pointers on how to fix the cars I was tasked with repairing. If I couldn't repair them, I would have to give the cars up and let him fix them. I would receive no compensation for the time I spent trying to fix the cars I gave up. This guy was such a colossal prick, he didn't even want me watching how he went about fixing these cars. Within one month, scratch that, within one week, I learned the evils of the 'commission only' structure of automobile mechanic compensation. Now, I ask you, dear customer, if you would be comfortable with a 19 year old kid trying to fix your $40,000 car with no guidance? To me, this would be highly undesireable. I would have nothing against a young guy trying to learn a recent trade, as everyone needs to score their feet wet, but I would want an experienced tech guiding the current technician. Would the FAA be comfortable with 19 year old kids trying to fix airplanes with no guidance? Would hospitals be okay with interns performing surgery without an experienced surgeon to guide them? Then why is it okay for automobile technicians to be thrown to the wolves when they first enter the business? Peoples' lives are in the hands of automobile technicians as well, (think brakes) and I don't understand why dealership service departments throw caution to the wind when putting green technicians to work. The commission structure for automobile technicians in automobile service departments does nothing but create strife amongst technicians within dealership service department s. No one wants to help each other, jealousy is rampant, and occasionally fights fracture out. When I think of the” commission only” compensation structure for automobile technicians, I think of the show “Bridalplasty.” There truly is that much jealousy and backstabbing going on amongst the automotive technicians within dealership service departments. The fact that anyone learns anything and actually becomes a better technician in such an environment is remarkable. Those that do stick it out rarely do so without becoming embittered.

Here is how the commission only 'flat rate' system works for those that don't know:

A labor book declares how many hours a technician is paid for any particular job. For example, if the labor book says that a front brake job should pay 2 hours labor time, the technician doing the brake job gets paid for 2 hours labor time, regardless if he completed the brake job in 1 hour or 10 hours.

Consequences: Automotive technicians are always trying to work faster to 'beat' the book time. Usually we find some, lose some, and it all evens out in the end. The technician doesn't get paid until the repair is completed. In some cases, especially with current green techs, the commission only system leads to below average work, especially on driveability problems & check engine lights. (Work is not double-checked, and cars come back with further problems after repairs are attempted.) The reason for this is that the tech is only thinking about being able to put food on the table, and he must get the job finished before the raze of the pay period! So, he just releases the car and prays that it's fixed… hoping that it does not come benefit. I've often overheard customers on the service drive of dealerships complaining to service advisors and managers that they shouldn't have to bring their cars in 3 or 4 times to have a check engine light properly addressed. More times than not, the customer can thank the commissioned pay structure for their inconvenience. Rather than properly diagnose the vehicle, a part gets put on the car, the diagnostic trouble code gets cleared, and the car is released without any further quality control. The reason for this is because service departments, and of course, dealerships, are run for one purpose and one purpose only, and that is to stuff the dealership owner's pockets with money as fast as it can be made. All that blather about customer service is unprejudiced a side note.

For warranty repairs, the concept is the same. Only now, labor times for technicians are slit in half (or more) for warranty repairs. Let's take the brake job for example again, only this time, it's being covered by the manufacturer's warranty. So instead of being paid two hours labor time, the tech is only being paid one hour of labor to complete the same repair. So, the technician is forced to try even harder to beat the labor time. For tall jobs such as engine mechanical repairs, or transmission repairs, it's practically impossible to beat the labor time set forth by manufacturer's warranties. It just kills me to think about who comes up with warranty labor times…. A bunch of chimps throwing darts could approach up with more accurate and graceful labor times.

Consequences: The hurried nature of trying to make a living doing warranty repairs puts a lot of stress on the technicians. I don't know how many cars I've seen come abet with loose lug nuts or loose bolts, unplugged wire harness connections, hose clamps left undone, etc…. This doesn't mean that the tech doing the work was incompetent; he was more likely in a bustle trying to make ends meet under unrealistic warranty labor times. Several weeks in a row of working 60+ hours per week but only being paid for 20-30 hours of that labor can lead to a state of despair for technicians. A lot of guys feel that they are too deep into the business and are afraid to collect out. They are in debt to their eyeballs for the tools they had to purchase from Snap-On, Matco, or some other tool company, not to mention other obligations like car payments, house payments, etc. This state of despair over an extended period of time can lead some guys to turn to drugs or alcohol. Of course, this doesn't help matters when these same unfortunate technicians are still expected to fix the highly technologically advanced cars. Eventually what happens is that these guys make too many mistakes due to the substance abuses, and they are eventually fired. Some guys who have seen the writing on the wall, have killed themselves. Chalk up another technician swallowed up by depression and a ruthless dealership compensation system. ( At this point, it's time to hire in some bright-eyed bushy tailed tech straight out of tech school, and promise him the world. Don't worry, by the time he figures out how terrible he's being screwed, it will be too late for him to get out of the business!) So, I ask you dear customer, would you really want to have your car possibly being serviced by a possibly embittered & depressed alcoholic? Is this what you're really paying $90-$100 per labor hour for?

Like I said before, dealership service departments are open for one reason and one reason only, to extract as powerful money out of your pocket, and put it into the dealership owner's pocket. The glitzy waiting room where you watch that 60 promenade plasma screen is supposed to distract you from the wretched conditions wait on in the service department shop. Since my first service department job, I have gone from working at a slight family owned dealership with only one technician, to a service department in a large city with over forty technicians. It's all the same. Dealership owners would much rather have a bunch of young bucks working on commission for a much lower dollar per hour rate doing mediocre work, than having a bunch of experienced guys doing a big job for a higher dollar per hour rate. Quality of work is secondary to profit percentages. Either way, the dealership owner is making money, unprejudiced with having a bunch of young lower paid techs, the owner makes more. I've seen it time and time again to where experienced technicians leave a shop because it has been flooded with young guys who are working for a lot less money. The more techs a shop hires, the less work there is to go around, and therefore, less money to go around. This leads to lots of experienced guys throwing in the towel to go pursue other opportunities. (This excludes those who have not been consumed by depression and substances abuse.) After twenty or so years in the business, no competent experienced technicians should have to be taking a pay lop honest to remain employed, but it happens all the time. After seeing this happen, I began to understand why I was treated with such hostility when I was first hired as a technician. I do pride myself on having never treated other new guys with hostility, but I can understand where it was originating from.
So you can imagine where all of this chaos and employee shifting leads to for service department customers…. It leads to lack of continuity in a service department, and a lack of continuity leads to a lack of quality customer service. So if you wonder why you spy different faces every time you drop your car off at the dealership service department, now you have some idea as to why. Greed has consumed this country, and dealerships are no exception.

If all of this hasn't convinced you that you might want to find some other place to have your car serviced, assume this. Most car dealerships are not owned and operated by “car guys.” They don't have any passion for repairing cars, their only passion is profits. They don't have motor oil running in their veins, nor do they have pistons pumping in their hearts. Consequently, they're cheap. They won't repair equipment when it breaks. Their policies demoralize the technicians who are supposed to be upholding the dealership's brand by providing good service. A demoralized service staff only leads to mediocre service at best. In short, dealership owners could care less about their staff, so by extension, they don't care about you either. Do yourself a favor, and fetch a sterling independent shop to have your car repaired at. Some shops have their fraction of problems as well, but you are more likely going to be able to win some place that truly values good customer service over profit percentages.

Lastly, as my own personal grievance, it would be nice to see technicians treated on a level of respect similar to other professionals (both by society and by employers). Unfortunately, old stereotypes remain, and it seems that society (and employers) will continue to conception us all as 'dumb grease monkeys' in the forseeable future. Even though modern cars employ enough computing power to launch a rocket to the moon, yup, we're all still fair a bunch of expendable grease monkeys. As long as this stigma remains, turnover within dearlship service departments will remain high, and customer service will be mediocre at best. As for myself, I intend on throwing in the towel on the car repair profession.