It's a simple equation: an idle truck means lost productivity.
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So what do you do when one of your HGVs breaks down? As Steve Banner reports, manufacturers, dealers and independent wholesalers are keen to deliver those precious parts quickly...
A11 truck manufacturers are anxious for fleet operators who still do their own servicing to shut their workshops and hand over the task to their nearest franchised dealer. They like to argue that dealers are the only people who have made the investment in the trained technicians and diagnostic equipment necessary to service modem commercial vehicles.
But they are also realistic enough to recognise that many transport companies are determined to retain their own maintenance facilities for as long as they can and that—like it or not—their needs have to be catered for.
"The only way you can guarantee safety and reliability is to look after your trucks yourself," says Geoff Dawe, managing director of haulier GMH Transport. Based at Bagstone in Gloucestershire, his firm runs 30 trucks.
Fail to ensure that your vehides receive the care and attention they need, and you put your 0-licence at risk, he points out—and it's no use blaming the dealer for getting it wrong if you are hauled before the Traffic Commissioner.
In-house workshops are consumers of replacement components in the same way as dealer workshops are, and manufacturers are fighting to obtain their share of what remains a lucrative stream of business.
"Hauliers and independent workshops take 5o% of the parts we supply," says Ken Morris, parts product marketing manager at Volvo Trucks (GB).
Mercedes-Benz, for example, has a spares supply programme called Partner Plus, says David Luscott, responsible for strategic aftersales marketing at the coinpany's UK headquarters in Milton Keynes. "It allows transport companies to qualify for rebates on what they have spent with us if they hit certain agreed parts purchasing targets."
Programme participants can use dedicated phone and fax lines to place orders.
Availability can be more important than price if a truck is off the road. "Some 92% of our parts are immediately available from dealerships and we can deliver 99% to customers overnight from stocks held centrally" says Morris.
Scania claims 95-96% first. pickavailability at dealer level. "We hold stocks at Milton Keynes too and if necessary we can have items flown in from our warehouse in Belgium," says Dave Hickman, aftersales manager at Scania (GB).
Luscott says: "All our dealers can deliver parts two or three times a day to any customer and have more than 90% of what he is likely to require available immediately from their own stocks. The warehouse at Milton Keynes has 94% availability" Mercedes also offers a fast overnight delivery service. Its dealers can also arrange an impress stock—a service their rivals can provide as well—which involves the haulier keeping a selection of spares at his own premises. The dealer owns them and replenishes the shelves every so often. The customer only pays for the items he has used.
Ordering parts from a manufacturer on Saturday for delivery first thing Monday is no longer unknown, says Guthrie Aitken, UK aftersales manager at Renault VI, even if the components have to be sourced from the Continent.
"If we receive an order by midday Saturday and we haven't got the item in the UK, we will get it from France and have it taken by courier to our headquarters at Dunstable," he says. "We will then arrange to deliver it to the customer's nearest Renault VI dealer for 8am the following Monday."
Technicians
All truck manufacturers are uncomfortably aware that they face stiff competition from multimake independent parts wholesalers, such as Finelist.
"Our availability so far as Volvo parts are concerned is of course far better than theirs, and I do not see how they can match us," says Volvo's Ken Morris. "But they offer virtually an hourly delivery service to customers in urban areas."
Although they would prefer the work to be done in a franchised workshop, Mercedes dealerships can dispatch mobile diagnosticians to hauliers who have hit a snag while working on their vehicles.
"They may have been able to find out what's wrong with a truck, but been unable to reset its diagnostic system, for example," Luscott says. "That's where our technicians can help." The Mercedes network can also arrange to take away old batteries, worn-out tyres and other automotive waste products, and ensure they are disposed of in an environmentally-friendly manner.
"We recognise that some of our operators intend to continue servicing and repairing our trucks themselves, and we're happy to make the necessary diagnostic tools and related information available to them, as well as training," says Mike Walczak, director of aftermarket sales at ERF. "We run a service and parts advice line too."
What if a dealer is desperate for a spare at 2am? "We've got a parts call-out service that's in action 24 hours a day, seven days a week," Walczak replies.
"What's more, we run something called Parts Attack. If the customer can find the exact same part that we offer cheaper elsewhere, we'll refund the difference. Over the past three or four years we've made 30,000 refunds, which accounts for 0.00002% of our total parts sales. In each case we've adjusted the price to a new, lower level.
"In addition, if we can't get a part to the operator within 24 hours, we'll supply it free. That offer has cost us f8,000 over the past two years, which would suggest that our delivery service is pretty efficient."
One drawback of buying parts from a dealer is that he will usually carry spares only for the vehicles he sells. Several manufacturers have launched all-makes parts programmes through their networks, however, and one or two supply trailer parts.
Operators are not parts specialists, so how can they be sure that they are ordering the right component? One way is to use an electronic parts catalogue supplied by the manufacturer on CD-ROM. It gives an on-screen exploded view of all the compo
nents that make up a commercial vehicle and helps the operator identify the item needed before he rings the dealership. Daf has one on trial with two operators—one of which is GMH Transport—under the Parts Rapido banner.
"You can take a component, blow it up on screen and zoom in on individual pins and seals," says David Swift, general parts manager of Daf dealership Watts Truck Centre of Gloucester. It supplies GMH with spares for the large number of Dafs it runs.
"Parts Rapid° contains data on models going back to the old Dag 19005 and 2ioos and some of the older Leyland models, as well as more recent Dafs such as the 95XF," he says.
Dawe at GMH says: "We've had it for two months. We use it several times a day, every day of the week, and it has been l00% successful for us."
He is determined to keep servicing his trucks for as long as he can. "We have invested some f80-9o,000 in our workshops over the past two or three years," Dawe says. "If electronics become too much of a difficulty we may ultimately have to contract out some of the work, but at the moment we find Dafs are userfriendly for maintenance."
The logical next step will be for the electronic catalogue to be Internet-based rather than CDROM-based. CDs have to be changed regularly to be kept up to date—and for the operator to order parts on-line.
Volvo's Ken Morris is not entirely convinced that keying in orders and e-mailing them to the dealer is progress, however.
"The phone is a lot more flexi ble and allows you to discuss price," he contends.
"If we had all been used to using the Internet for the past Too years and somebody invented the phone, we'd make a lot more fuss over it than we've made about the net."