You may think that fleet management solutions like those offered by Dealerware are important only to big dealer groups with hundreds of cars in their fleet. You may also think that investing in your small fleet of 5-15 cars with software would only complicate the process and not be worth it in the long run. However, we’re here to prove to you that even small fleets can reap the benefits of fleet management software and we can show you how to take your fleet to the next level.
Why is Dealerware worth the investment for dealerships with small fleets?
Starting with cost recovery, Dealerware can assist you in making sure you aren’t paying for fuel, tolls, or damages that aren’t your responsibility and actually turn those costs into profits for your dealership. Connected Car Services automatically track fuel usage and mileage costs (where applicable) so final charges are calculated automatically. Dealerware also handles the entire toll process so you don’t have to. We work with the toll agencies to automatically charge customers for tolls they incurred, which saves a ton of employee time and takes responsibility away from the dealership to pay for tolls they should not be charged for.
Having a small fleet means that each vehicle is extremely valuable and losing just one could really be detrimental to business. That’s why Dealerware has created connected car software that can track exact vehicle location at all times, removing the need to worry about where a car is at or if it will come back. This also can help get cars in and out of the door much faster. If you know a car is on its way back and you have a customer coming in within the hour to book a loaner, you can be certain that you’ll have a car for them when they arrive rather than wondering when your vehicle will return and having to turn away business.
Dealerware has completely digitalized the loaner contract, making it much more reliable and ensuring all areas of a contract are completed before the customer leaves your lot. By having all aspects of the contract digitalized, dealers don’t have to worry about whether or not a claim will be denied by insurance due to lost or incomplete information.
When the average time to complete a manual contract is 15-20 minutes, shaving that time down to one minute can free up a lot of time for dealerships with minimal staff. With Dealerware’s unique scanning feature, service advisors can save time with tedious paperwork and mitigate mistakes by scanning ID and credit card information, which helps complete contracts in a minute or less.
What can small dealerships expect in terms of cost recovery performance?
At a dealership cost of just $10 per VIN, Dealerware’s software can pay for itself within the first month with an average cost saving of $70 per VIN. Dealerware makes recovering those costs as easy as possible by automatically charging a customers’ card on file, instead of the dealership having to add a line item to the repair order.
This feature comes in handy when something happens such as a customer returning a car with a half tank of fuel. From contract start to finish, Dealerware helps you avoid situations where a service advisor might hesitate to charge a customer for fuel. At the contract start the customer agrees to clearly-worded terms about refueling costs, and at the contract finish they’re automatically charged for fuel differences recorded by your staff or by Dealerware’s Connected Car Services.
In the event that a customer isn’t immediately charged when they drop off a vehicle (whether it’s a busy day or the contract wasn’t closed properly), Dealerware helps prevent unsettled transactions by continuously checking that customer payment information is up-to-date, and by providing dealerships with a scannable report of all unsettled balances so they can follow up and settle up.
What is the benefit for small fleets changing to Dealerware from either paper or other management systems?
The biggest benefit Dealerware can bring to small fleets besides cost recovery, has to be the time management aspect. When service advisors can allocate more time to important tasks rather than creating and resolving contracts, day to day operations can run much more smoothly which means more vehicles out the door, optimal fleet utilization and happier customers.
By switching from paper based operations, Dealerware also removes a huge risk for dealerships. When dealers have customers’ personally identifiable information (PII) lying around in file cabinets, there is a huge risk that the information could be lost or stolen. Dealerware encrypts and stores all of that information in the cloud so it is always secure and much easier to keep track of.
Growing a small fleet can seem like a daunting task, but Dealerware makes that a much more attainable reality by helping you generate the most revenue possible from your fleet and saving you days’ worth of valuable employee time every month.
We’re here to help get your fleet on the right track and transition it into a safer, more efficient, more profitable aspect of your business.
