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Letter to the Editor
Tuesday January 16
New SCRS Committee Formed to Address Scarcity of Clips, Fasteners and Other Attachment Parts; March Taylor to Chair
Tri-Cities, Wash. -- A new Society of Collision Repair Specialists (SCRS) committee has been formed to address the scarcity of clips, fastener, bolts, screws and other pieces used to attach parts to the vehicle and to other body and mechanical parts.
The shortage of such small, but important items is a relatively new phenomenon, as it was once common practice for them be included with the parts packages available from Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM). Over time, this practice by OEMs came to an end, leaving other vendors plus OE dealer parts departments to fill the needs of the collision repairer.
Recently, attachment parts have not been readily available even from these sources. This has had several adverse effects on the repair, including lost productivity (when the technician stops work to track down these items), delays (when the parts are not immediately available) and expense (missed billing on overlooked pieces). Customer satisfaction diminishes when the car is tied up for unexpected amounts of time and the rental car expense of the insurance company increases. In addition, the incorrect re-use of some of some attachment pieces - steering suspension and steering torque bolts, for example - can result in serious safety problems.
"Body shop professionals from New York to Hawaii called this problem to our attention, so we began to look into the issue to see if we could come up with a solution," explains John Loftus, SCRS Executive Director. "It became obvious there was no quick fix, so we thought the best approach was creating a committee that could focus on the issues for an extended period of time."
SCRS member March Taylor (Hawaii), owner of Auto Body Hawaii has been selected to head up this committee. As an integral part of the Collision Industry Conference (CIC) committee on estimating, March has been instrumental in bringing attention to this often overlooked concern, and will help ensure SCRS and CIC efforts are coordinated.
"Fasteners have a profound effect on an estimator's productivity and a technician's efficiency, key concerns in an industry that is committed to improving cycle time," says Taylor. "Not only is it important that these parts be supplied to the repairer with more consistency, but we need more specific information regarding how they should be used. In addition, the information providers must make a concerted effort to account for these items in their automated databases."
The SCRS committee will dedicate itself to fostering improvement in each of these areas, although making fastener "kits" available on commonly used crash parts will be a primary focus at first. Though the committee is in its first stages of formation, much progress has been made to date, beginning with NACE 2000 in Orlando, when SCRS leadership met with Randy Boyd of General Motors, who agreed to work with CIC and SCRS to improve the situation. SCRS will continue to support CIC's related efforts.
To expedite its efforts, SCRS is actively looking for collision repairers to help join the committee. Those interested can contact SCRS at (877) 841-0660 (phone) or scrs1@aol.com. March Taylor can be reached at march.taylor@autobodyhawaii.com.
"The industry has never been more precise about way it does business, which makes the unsatisfactory handling of fasteners and attachment parts intolerable," adds Taylor. "With the help of the OEMs and the information providers I am sure we can make things better, and prove, once again, that working together is the most important work we do."
Through its direct members and 32 affiliate associations, SCRS is comprised of 8,900 collision repair businesses and 75,200 specialized professionals who work with consumers and insurance companies to repair collision-damaged vehicles.
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