THE SMALL USER AND COSTS RECORDS.
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• Commercial Vehicle Agents Should Make Every ?Effort to Persuade Small Users To Keep Track of Expenses.
By "Vim."
IT IS a commonly-aceepted fallacy that the man is .a, small way of business can dispense with clerical work that is generally agreed to be indispensable in the ease of large concerns. That this notion is absurd should need 110 argument ; but lt does when one is dealing with the average type of -" small "tradesman. • Almost every firm that ownsara-, fleet Of motor vehicles keeps some sort of a record of the Cost of maintaining and running each van or lorry ; and now that this paper, in conjureetion with the Dunlop Rubber Co., has put forward aastandardized form of record sheet, the question of accurate costing has received an impetus which will make exceptions rarer 8ti11. There is no doubt that the big concerns understand fully that they must have constantly before them data, to show what their vehicles are costing and which of their vehicles are giving the 'best service; if some have been slack in this respect, it has been due to the fact that, hitherto, there has
been no recognized system in existence. But the man who owns and runs only one or two vehicles imagines, as a rule, that he can get along well enough without definite figures, simply by basing his judgment on impression, and it is the duty,of agents to kill this totally. wrong idea as quickly as they can.
The Folly of Guessing at Figures.
Every garage proprietor is aware how extraordinarily inaccurate mere estimates of distance travelled, and of running expenses, usually are. It is not at all -uncommon for a motorist to complain that a tyre has given bad service, on the ground that he " only bought it a month Otr two ago, and that it cannot have done more than a couple of thousand miles," when reference to the original invoice for the tyre, and an examination 91 the tread, prove w decisively that it was purchased six months back and must have run at least 5,000 miles before failing. The same thing • applies toarepairs bills. I have had an owner come to me in distressbecause his van was costing such a terrific amount to run and he was afraid I had sold him a dud. .On my asking what were the actual figures for petrol, oil tyres, repairs, etc., he admitted that he could not say. All he ,knew was that he "scented to be doing nothing else but writing out cheques" to settle our accounts. When we went together through every invoice that he had had since buying the van, we found that the heaviest items were for fitting an electric lighting set, altering the body to suit a whim of his, and equipping the vehicle with an expensive make of detachable wheels that had taken his fancy! Actual running and maintenaele,e expense costs were
particularly reasonable. .
This instance, being only one of many that I'could cite, cannot be different from thousands of othera that have come before motor traders all over the country. That unfounded complaints .must have a bad effect on the development of motot transport is obvious. People who have grievances seldom keep them to themselves, and, by talking about them, help to prevent those who would like tar buy from taking the plunge. Also, it is notorious that the tendency is to over-estimate, rather than to under-estimate, expenses of this nature, so that, apart from extreme cases, many, users who should be completely satisfied are only partially convinced that they -e,re receiving the best possible value for money.
Good. for User. is Good for Agent Also.
Costs sheets are, admittedly, two-edged swords; for, while they give credit where it is due, they also give discredit where that, too, is merited. But this is a consideration that should encourage, aotUdiscourage, agents to do all that is in their power tei persuade email users to keep figures. If it is, indeed, true that a given make of vehicle is unreasonably expensive to run, the sooner the agent who sold it knows this the,sooner can he cut himself adrift from a proposition that must, if left undetected, do his .goodwill an infinitie amount of harm, On the, other hand, if the vehicles that he is handling are of a kind that give ,their owners satisfaction, he loses golden opportunities by neglecting to see that their good qualities are continually impressed on their owners by means of indisputable figures.
Statistics are useless for purposes of comparison, unless they are compiled on similar bases. One has -only to take the figures of imports and exports of various countries, and to compare them, to realize that this is so. Theoretically, our exports of any given class of goods into a given country should correspond with that country's return of goods imported from us; as a matter of fact, they do nothing of the kind, because the methods of calculation and classification are totally different. This is where the great value of The Commercial Motor Dunlop standardized sheets for recording running and maintenance expenses of motor vehicles lies. Until now users who have been to the trouble of keeping figures have used all sorts of methods, mostly of their own devieing--with the result that, although the data so obtained have been of the greatest help to them individually, it has been extremely difficult to deduct information of worth by comparing one firm's reeorda with anether's. A standardized method abolishes this drawback, and, while giving each user all that he needs, ',enables the experience of a wide variety of users and vehicles to be eollated.
• Costs a Guide to Individual:Excellence.
• The agent who manages to persuade his commercial. vehicle customers to keep records is doing a service, riot only to his customers and to the trade at large, but to himself. He will be able to obtain their data from those customers at regular intervals, and to study them side by side. lie will thus End out whether any make of vehicle for which he is agent (assuming him to be agentfor more than one) is proving universally unsatisfactory, or only 80 in isolated instances. If the former, the remedy lies with him; if the latter, he can assist the users to discover what is wrong_ with their drivers_ Such an agent becomes, in-effeet, traffic manager for all his smaller customers, and can reader them practical • aid towards running their vehicles efficiently. In addition, he will soon acquire, ae range of practical figures, covering vehicles in actual use, which will be invaluable to him in dealing with the doubts and inquiries of prospective new customers.