employees

[Kenny]

i am new to this business and thinking long term. Does anyone have any experiance with hiring other people to run a route by themselves, but working for you? If so, how do you pay them(salary, commision, both and how much) and more importantly, how do you control them so that they do not perform cash jobs and keeping the money for themselves?

Also, thanks so much for an amazing forum!!!

[GlassStarz]

If you cant trust your employee they shouldnt be your employee that said basic stuff like numbered reciepts and performance bonuses will help but lets face it all buisnesses run the chance of employees putting some in thier pockets its just a fact of life.

[repare-brise]

Kenny

I have employee's and franchisee's(and my franchisee's have employee's as well), and our formula is quite simple.

Control

The resin we use comes in 1oz bottles, 1oz containes 350drops(when measured with water, 360drops) the injectors we use reqiuire 6 drops per repair, which translates to 58 repairs per bottle. So far so good, when I hire an employee they are told that a bottle is good for 55 repairs, and that I allow 5 cash repairs per bottle. When it comes time to replace a bottle I check the computer(which tabulates which resins are used for each repair). If they did the required 50 repairs with the bottle they get a new one, if they did 45(as an example) they owe me 5X $25(my lost reveneu), if they did 55 repairs with the bottle they get a $20 bonus per repair. To this date I have only given bonuses(I am lucky to have the employee's that I have).

Renumeration

I pay employee's a commision of 50% before taxes, plus milage(36c per KM). Technically they are not employee's but independant contractors that I rent equipment to(in Quebec to be classed as an independant worker you must own or lease your own tools, the supplier, me, can provide consumables, but not tools, so I set up an independant leasing co. and they rent the equipment for $1 a month), In being ''independants" they are responsable for income taxes, unemployment insurance ect. With commision they earn $150-200 per day on average. For my 50% I provide the phone, jobs(they do little or no solicitation, and there cards have my phone # on them) supplies, invoices, warrenty, insurance, and pay there milage. I net roughly 20% when all is said and done($150-200 per employee per week).

When doing the employee thing a follow up call to your customers is a good check to perform, hire only people you and your customers(from my experiance our society has a predjudice agianst people of firm skin tone(under 30 years of age), techs that apear too young must first prove themselves before proving the product, us of slightly more relaxed skin tone have assumed respect when entering a customers business, even though the person of un streched skin may indeed be the better tech, the opposite is assumed) can trust. If you have doubts about your tech you are wasting your energy, and there time, so choose wisely and enjoy life,

Merci

[Don Boccafola]

Yvan, Do you have to deal with workmans compansation up north? If you do who is paying it, you or your subs? Also you say you supply all the work to your subs and they don't have to look for work. what kind of promotion do you use to keep everyone busy? You also said your subs make from $150 to $200 a day on average. Is that what they make or is that what they gross for you. How large a geograhic area do you alot to a sub?
I have been doing repairs for the last 24 years and have had techs come and go over the years. My business has gone full circle a few times over the years. That being said I am not sure its always financialy worth it to hire people. There are many weeks when I wish I could just work as a tech ,get my 50% at the end of the week and not deal with all the crap. The main advantage to having employees is that instead of you being the business, your business takes on a life of its own, it can enable you to take a day off and it will still run if you have the right people. The bigest disadvantage is is that even the best employees can not be depended on all the time and will go awol when you need them the most. I aways thought If you treat an employees well they will not go out on their own and steal accounts, so far so good.

[repare-brise]

Don

Yes we have workmans omp ect to deal with, but being subs I don't deal with it, and being self employed the subs have the choice to participate or not in the project.

On average our employees gross $3-400 per day, they net 50% of that. We have enough work to keep the subs working full time without having to do solicitation, they are sent an e-mail every night telling them there route for the next day, and knowing where they are supposed to be at any given time we can add work during the day if required(emergency calls, we infact only scrdule 6 hours of work a day and leave 1 hour in the morning and 1 hour afternoon open for last miniut calls). The subs of course will get more work on there own if the possibility is there(go to a dealer for 1 repair, but check other cars on the lot as well) and they often do(the great part about commission and ambition).

As for the value of employee's, for us it's very lucrative and benificial for a few reasons. First we are able to service 98% of our customers within 24 hours(usually same day), second it free's me and my franchisee's up to do Public relations, sale, follow-up, get new accounts, service existing accounts, take a break, ect. We have yet to deal with the AWOL thing(thankfully) and our first priority is keeping the sub at work, the employer handles the surplus, and emergency calls that are not close to the sub. Also the subs are fre to take a day off when they want to we ask that they give us 2 days notice(tell us on Wed that you want Fri off), and in they case of a family emergency(kids ect) if they know in the evening that there child is not feeling well they have the decency to call and warn us that they may not be able the next day, and we deal with it.

One additional thing we not only do WS repair but also polishing, this is where the subs do most of there work for us. The average polishing job is 1 hour(1 1/2 with traveling time ect), and on occasion when we do commercial polishing the sub can be at the same job-site for a few days( schools, skating rinks, office buildings, ect) and when we do polishing we charge $90 per hour(1 hour minimum) and it takes about $2 in supplies per hour. When polishing the subs cost us less and they bring in more, plus they stay in one place longer, so we pay less milage.

Enjoy

[Kenny]

Merci,

Thanks for the detiales reply, I really apreciate it!

What is your secret? Everyone in the forum says that the hardest part of the business is finding clients and you seem to not have that problem. In fact it seems that you have an overabundance of them? We would all love to here your marketing methods!

Thanks

Kenny

[repare-brise]

Kenny

It's the power of numbers.

The more franchisee,s we have using the same name and techniques, the more business we get. I have spoken(written) before that what is needed in this industry is a common voice, a recognizable name brand, standardization, and equality. When I started i was like most, a single opperator with fairly good results(financial that is), but I observed a need in the market, stability. When you go to Mac Donalds, you know exactly what it's going to taste like whether you are in Buffalo, or Bangladesh. In this industry there might be 1000 techs in the US that do good work, make a living, and enjoy a certain confidence from there customers. The problem with that is that there are 1000 different techs. If all those same 1000 techs used the same name(Mac Windshields?, lol), had the same warrenty, the same logo, the same standards, the same 800 number, the same web site, ect they would all benifit from 1000 times the exposure. Having 1000 techs working under the same banner would give a boost to the credibility and power of our industry. The first stumbling block in achieveing this lofty goal is ego, we have 1000 techs that have worked hard to make a name for themselves, and don't want to relinquish part of there control over there destiny. Once that barrier can be surmounted a system of territorial contracts, franchises, or banners could be set up. Of course the benifits would not be imediate, nor would the transition be without perils for some, but in the long run those who would join would be winners.

The reason we have more work than we can handle is that we are slowly becoming a household name in Quebec, having a large number of techs means more advertising dollars(it costs less per tech to reach more people, we do provincial advertising not local), we have a strong word of mouth noteriety, we are known by dealer associations, insurance companies, rental companies, fleets, ect. We stand behind our warrenty everywhere in the province, we do work that others(repalcement shops) don't do(polishing, repairs larger than a quarter), we don't do replacements, we have a recognisable brand name, all techs are dressed the same(uniformity goes a long way in professionalism), we are proud of who we are and what we do. The old saying "devide an concur" doesn't apply to business its more like unite and succeed. 1 person singing a song is good, 1000 people singing the same tune is a hit.

Enjoy