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3 comments:
Anonymous
said...
“ PDR…have we learned anything from the collision industry? “
Paintless Dent Removal [PDR] is an industry in it’s relative infancy. It has been around in the U.S. for about 25 years. This repair process has become more widely known to body shops in the last 5-10 years. As our industry has evolved and developed , it has grown into a legitimate and universally acceptable repair process. I have been a PDR technician for over 16 years and have seen some disturbing patterns arise in PDR that remind me of what‘s already happened to the collision industry. As with any new business, PDR is experiencing it’s share of challenges . The insurance industry is becoming heavily involved in dictating our pricing and referring which companies will do the repairs. Pricing agreements have been established with a few national PDR companies . These agreements , usually a pricing chart, have been used by the insurance companies as a substitute for local pricing surveys. I believe this is an illegal practice. As a new and relatively unorganized industry, PDR has become very easy for the insurance companies to manipulate and intimidate. Several large corporate PDR companies have established DRP hail agreements with insurers. These agreements have left many independent technicians lost in the shuffle. Independent technicians comprise in excess of 80% of the nationwide pool. Many independent hail technicians will subcontract for national corporate PDR companies during hail season because they are not able to compete or procure work for themselves. A group of independent technicians have united and started a new association known as NAPDRT. [ The National Alliance of PDR Technicians ] Time will tell whether this organization will be able to effectively stem the tide of insurance control in PDR. It is a difficult battle against a well funded insurance machine with deep ties to political lobbyists. I am a NAPDRT member and believe they are working in the right direction to unify and solidify our industry. In the early days of PDR , hail damage claims were adjusted as conventional repairs, yet many were repaired by PDR methods. Often times , the PDR repair was less expensive , sometimes much less. As the insurance companies noticed the viability and potential cost savings of PDR, they started writing PDR estimates. A problem arose as no universal estimating system was available for PDR. A large national PDR company sought to help educate the insurers by creating a matrix chart to help ballpark and standardize hail claims estimating . Unfortunately, the insurance industry has taken these charts which were intended as a quick reference guide, and turned them into a strict pricing limitation. Another PDR company created a more accurate computerized estimating system, but it was not widely accepted in the U.S. by insurers. The charts , have unfortunately become our industry pricing standard. Charts do not accurately factor in the dent shape, depth, difficulty or access issues. Insurance companies have capitalized on the ignorance and desperation of many techs and have pushed PDR pricing lower. Many technicians feel intimidated by insurance companies and give in to poorly written estimates and do the repairs. Does this sound familiar? Some insurers have been known to tell their adjustors to deliberately write hail claim checks short. They are banking on the fact that many customers will pocket the money and not fix the car. If a vehicle is not repaired , no supplement will have to be written. It is estimated that half of hail claims are not repaired. This results in insurers savings millions of dollars annually. This practice is unethical and illegal in some states. They are not writing estimates in good faith. The majority of the remaining half of the cars that do get repaired end up having to get supplemented . Insurance companies have gradually pushed PDR hail repairs into the body shops. They do this so that these claims can be satisfied there as a one stop shop . Some insurance companies will attempt to get the body shops to use their PDR DRP company for hail subcontracting. Many body shops cave in under this pressure and use PDR companies that they don’t necessarily want to use. Some insurers will lead the body shop to believe that if their PDR subcontractors start supplementing estimates too much, that the body shops DRP status will be jeopardized. PDR technicians are often unwillingly caught up in these battles. In the early years of PDR when an area would get hit with hail, repairs would be treated as a sublet for the body shop that used PDR technicians. In other words, a PDR technician would repair the vehicle for the agreed upon insurance estimate and the body shop was allowed the customary 25% mark-up as they do for any other subcontracted service performed on body shop premises. These PDR sublet mark-ups were quickly denied by the majority of insurance companies. Only a handful of smaller insurers allow this mark-up practice to exist anymore. The process of a body shop making a profit on hail repairs has now turned into the PDR company “renting stall space“ from the body shop. In other words, a PDR technician or company will pay a percentage of the hail repair estimate directly to the body shop in exchange for using the body shop facility for doing the repairs. This is now the most common scenario. What this has done is take a large chunk of income from the PDR technician. The body shop profit on hail should be allowed to come from the insurance company. At the same time that PDR technicians are being squeezed on that end, another scenario is taking place in regards to our income. The pricing on the charts used for PDR have gradually been reduced by the insurance companies. These reductions are illegal as pricing surveys are not done in many areas and no PDR companies actually agreed to these reductions. There are no accurate time and motion studies for the PDR process. This is because of our repairs taking place on the backside of the panels. This is different from spreading plastic fillers on the outside of a panel. That is a predictable process as no internal access issues are involved as in PDR. Body shops have realized the net profit capability from subletting hail repairs to PDR companies and have demanded a larger rent percentage every year. This squeezes the PDR technicians income even more. PDR sublet percentages have already greatly exceeded the average net profit percentages of traditional collision repair methods. I believe as the above named forces continue in our business, veteran PDR hail technicians will find other careers. This has already begun to happen. As veteran PDR professionals leave this field, quality repairs will decline. So far, the insurance companies seem to be content testing the bottom. The net effect remains to be seen for our industry. I believe that more and more PDR is going to be pushed towards the body shops by insurers. This will include door dings, larger dents and push-to-paint repairs in addition to the hail repairs already sent there. Insurance cost savings potential drive this. I believe this trend will make more high volume body shops consider training in-house technicians. Some insurance companies refer more work to body shops that have PDR services on site year around. I’ve summarized and commented on what has happened with PDR in it’s short history. The course of the PDR industry is becoming eerily similar to the destructive path that the collision industry has already been down. Insurance domination has greatly reduced the profitability of collision repair. It is starting to do so to PDR. We need to unite as industries and continue the fight to maintain our livelihoods. Education plays a major part in identifying the problem. Determination and unity will play a major role in solving our industries problems.
Just continue composing this kind of post. I have read a similar article related to it which will help you to increase your knowledge Check out Paintless Dent Repair Decatur
PDRCoach.com is an educational website intended to assist those who are
interested in learning more about the art of paintless dent removal (PDR). Through this blog, we teach you the techniques involved in the process.
3 comments:
“ PDR…have we learned anything from the collision industry? “
Paintless Dent Removal [PDR] is an industry in it’s relative infancy. It has been around in the U.S. for about 25 years. This repair process has become more widely known to body shops in the last 5-10 years. As our industry has evolved and developed , it has grown into a legitimate and universally acceptable repair process. I have been a PDR technician for over 16 years and have seen some disturbing patterns arise in PDR that remind me of what‘s already happened to the collision industry.
As with any new business, PDR is experiencing it’s share of challenges . The insurance industry is becoming heavily involved in dictating our pricing and referring which companies will do the repairs. Pricing agreements have been established with a few national PDR companies . These agreements , usually a pricing chart, have been used by the insurance companies as a substitute for local pricing surveys. I believe this is an illegal practice.
As a new and relatively unorganized industry, PDR has become very easy for the insurance companies to manipulate and intimidate. Several large corporate PDR companies have established DRP hail agreements with insurers. These agreements have left many independent technicians lost in the shuffle. Independent technicians comprise in excess of 80% of the nationwide pool. Many independent hail technicians will subcontract for national corporate PDR companies during hail season because they are not able to compete or procure work for themselves.
A group of independent technicians have united and started a new association known as NAPDRT. [ The National Alliance of PDR Technicians ] Time will tell whether this organization will be able to effectively stem the tide of insurance control in PDR. It is a difficult battle against a well funded insurance machine with deep ties to political lobbyists. I am a NAPDRT member and believe they are working in the right direction to unify and solidify our industry.
In the early days of PDR , hail damage claims were adjusted as conventional repairs, yet many were repaired by PDR methods. Often times , the PDR repair was less expensive , sometimes much less. As the insurance companies noticed the viability and potential cost savings of PDR, they started writing PDR estimates. A problem arose as no universal estimating system was available for PDR. A large national PDR company sought to help educate the insurers by creating a matrix chart to help ballpark and standardize hail claims estimating . Unfortunately, the insurance industry has taken these charts which were intended as a quick reference guide, and turned them into a strict pricing limitation. Another PDR company created a more accurate computerized estimating system, but it was not widely accepted in the U.S. by insurers. The charts , have unfortunately become our industry pricing standard. Charts do not accurately factor in the dent shape, depth, difficulty or access issues.
Insurance companies have capitalized on the ignorance and desperation of many techs and have pushed PDR pricing lower. Many technicians feel intimidated by insurance companies and give in to poorly written estimates and do the repairs. Does this sound familiar?
Some insurers have been known to tell their adjustors to deliberately write hail claim checks short. They are banking on the fact that many customers will pocket the money and not fix the car. If a vehicle is not repaired , no supplement will have to be written. It is estimated that half of hail claims are not repaired. This results in insurers savings millions of dollars annually. This practice is unethical and illegal in some states. They are not writing estimates in good faith. The majority of the remaining half of the cars that do get repaired end up having to get supplemented .
Insurance companies have gradually pushed PDR hail repairs into the body shops. They do this so that these claims can be satisfied there as a one stop shop . Some insurance companies will attempt to get the body shops to use their PDR DRP company for hail subcontracting. Many body shops cave in under this pressure and use PDR companies that they don’t necessarily want to use. Some insurers will lead the body shop to believe that if their PDR subcontractors start supplementing estimates too much, that the body shops DRP status will be jeopardized. PDR technicians are often unwillingly caught up in these battles.
In the early years of PDR when an area would get hit with hail, repairs would be treated as a sublet for the body shop that used PDR technicians. In other words, a PDR technician would repair the vehicle for the agreed upon insurance estimate and the body shop was allowed the customary 25% mark-up as they do for any other subcontracted service performed on body shop premises. These PDR sublet mark-ups were quickly denied by the majority of insurance companies. Only a handful of smaller insurers allow this mark-up practice to exist anymore. The process of a body shop making a profit on hail repairs has now turned into the PDR company “renting stall space“ from the body shop. In other words, a PDR technician or company will pay a percentage of the hail repair estimate directly to the body shop in exchange for using the body shop facility for doing the repairs. This is now the most common scenario. What this has done is take a large chunk of income from the PDR technician. The body shop profit on hail should be allowed to come from the insurance company.
At the same time that PDR technicians are being squeezed on that end, another scenario is taking place in regards to our income. The pricing on the charts used for PDR have gradually been reduced by the insurance companies. These reductions are illegal as pricing surveys are not done in many areas and no PDR companies actually agreed to these reductions. There are no accurate time and motion studies for the PDR process. This is because of our repairs taking place on the backside of the panels. This is different from spreading plastic fillers on the outside of a panel. That is a predictable process as no internal access issues are involved as in PDR.
Body shops have realized the net profit capability from subletting hail repairs to PDR companies and have demanded a larger rent percentage every year. This squeezes the PDR technicians income even more. PDR sublet percentages have already greatly exceeded the average net profit percentages of traditional collision repair methods.
I believe as the above named forces continue in our business, veteran PDR hail technicians will find other careers. This has already begun to happen. As veteran PDR professionals leave this field, quality repairs will decline. So far, the insurance companies seem to be content testing the bottom. The net effect remains to be seen for our industry.
I believe that more and more PDR is going to be pushed towards the body shops by insurers. This will include door dings, larger dents and push-to-paint repairs in addition to the hail repairs already sent there. Insurance cost savings potential drive this. I believe this trend will make more high volume body shops consider training in-house technicians. Some insurance companies refer more work to body shops that have PDR services on site year around.
I’ve summarized and commented on what has happened with PDR in it’s short history. The course of the PDR industry is becoming eerily similar to the destructive path that the collision industry has already been down. Insurance domination has greatly reduced the profitability of collision repair. It is starting to do so to PDR. We need to unite as industries and continue the fight to maintain our livelihoods. Education plays a major part in identifying the problem. Determination and unity will play a major role in solving our industries problems.
Regards,
Tom Price
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Just continue composing this kind of post. I have read a similar article related to it which will help you to increase your knowledge Check out Paintless Dent Repair Decatur
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