Category: Dealership Training

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Dealership Training F&I

A Revolution is Coming

Contributing Author: John Stephens Executive Vice President EFG Companies
Contributing Author:
John Stephens
Executive Vice President
EFG Companies

Can you remember the last time you walked into a fast food restaurant and they filled your drink order? It was a short few years ago when the restaurants started handing you a cup and you dispensed the ice and your drink of choice.  The shift happened as consumers demanded a better, quicker experience.  Now, order kiosks are being introduced to eliminate further wait time.

While established dealership vendors have built iPad and Docupad platforms to improve the overall customer experience in the transition to F&I, this segment of F&I technology is about to burst with robust competitive offers. Startups are now beginning to appear on the scene with full online financing capabilities. In addition, manufacturers are now investing in online financing technology.

In December of last year, AutoNation launched its first online financing offering, allowing customers to value a trade-in vehicle, determine payments and apply for credit.

In June, CarMax, Inc., the biggest U.S. used car dealer, announced the rollout of a new online financing initiative to help customers pre-qualify for financing before entering the dealership.

In October, Automotive News reported on a dealership in California that was using Express Storefront, an online-buying platform from Roadster that allows shoppers to select a vehicle, get approved for credit, sift through F&I options, and set up vehicle delivery.

Even Equifax is dipping their toe in the online financing product market. This past month, John Giamalvo, the vice president of dealer services at Equifax, spoke at the National Remarketing Conference, discussing his company’s soft-pull tab that allows customers to get a free credit report without affecting their credit. In his presentation, Giamalvo stated that he sees growing evidence that car shoppers are ready to do more of the financing process online.

Also in November, a partnership between Drive Motors, RouteOne and Dealertrack made headlines with a collaboration that resulted in an online checkout feature for dealership websites. The feature allows customers to structure their deal online before finalizing and taking delivery of the vehicle. This creates a 24/7 sales funnel, where customers submit their information at any time of day or night. The information automatically populates into the dealership’s Dealertrack and RouteOne platforms, saving an enormous amount of time in the store.

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Dealership Training

Your Personal Investment = Training Dividends

Contributing Author: Steve Roennau Vice President Compliance EFG Companies
Contributing Author:
Steve Roennau
Vice President
Compliance
EFG Companies

Today, most dealers in the automotive industry would agree that employee training is critical to business success. However, it can be tempting to simply “check the box” when it comes to employee training, (i.e. a manager simply offloads training to an outside party, schedules the training event, and calls it a day). No goals are set; no metrics are defined for skills development; and, no baseline is given to determine employee growth. Rather, the mindset is, “My staff needed training and they attended training – mission accomplished.”

The problem with this thinking is the lack of accountability on the part of the manager, the trainer, and the employees. If you are going to invest the time, money and energy into training, it’s imperative that you build in a measure of accountability to ensure a return on that investment. This starts with leadership support.

For any training to be truly effective, dealership leadership must fully support the training content and methodology. Remember, all training is not created equal. When engaging with training providers, it’s important that you have the opportunity to review the content, modify it to address specific dealership concerns, and provide final approval. If there are content changes that need to be made to ensure the training aligns with your operation’s processes and business philosophy, then the trainer should confirm with you that their delivery is in line with your dealership’s needs.

It’s also important to remember that everyone learns differently, and every dealership has different training needs and requirements. Ask yourself what you want your team to get from training.

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Compliance Dealership Training

Juggling the Compliance Acronym Soup: CFPB, ECOA, FCRA

Contributing Author: Steve Roennau Vice President Compliance EFG Companies
Contributing Author:
Steve Roennau
Vice President
Compliance
EFG Companies

Compliance has been a hot topic going on three years in the auto finance space. Lenders, such as Ally Financial, Toyota Motor Credit, and the American Honda Finance Corporation, have reached resolutions with the CFPB based upon dealership practices. We’ve all known that the CFPB has been trying to regulate dealerships through lenders. With this heightened sensitivity to compliance, other regulatory bodies that have jurisdiction over automotive dealerships, such as the FTC, are now turning their gaze to dealership practices.

While everyone is frustrated with the ambiguity of the CFPB, there are some well-defined actions dealerships can take to ensure compliance with entities like the FTC. With this in mind, now is the time for dealers to brush up on their F&I practices to ensure compliance, starting with this simple question: When a dealership sells a car and secures financing, who is the creditor at the time of sale?

If you said the dealer is the creditor, you would be correct. However, many F&I managers often think that the lender is the creditor. This mindset opens the door for non-compliant behavior as the F&I manager could think that their actions have fewer repercussions. As a dealer who knows about the legal repercussions, wouldn’t you rather have an informed staff that takes accountability for their actions?

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