Question for dealership auto techs

I work at a Chevy dealership. I was pulling a monstrous SUV into a
tight stall and scraped the side. I am told that I need to pay for the
$600 in damages. Shouldn't the dealership have insurance for this?
This is the first time I have ever done this.

> wrote in message
oups.com...
>I work at a Chevy dealership. I was pulling a monstrous SUV into a
> tight stall and scraped the side. I am told that I need to pay for the
> $600 in damages. Shouldn't the dealership have insurance for this?
> This is the first time I have ever done this.
>

Yes they should, I don't know if all states are the same... but where I live
they couldn't make you pay for it.

wrote:
>
> I work at a Chevy dealership. I was pulling a monstrous SUV into a
> tight stall and scraped the side. I am told that I need to pay for the
> $600 in damages. Shouldn't the dealership have insurance for this?
> This is the first time I have ever done this.

Perhaps you should assume responsibility for your actions?
When I worked at a Ford dealership as a line tech I accidentally backed into a
pickup truck bed cap that another tech temporarily placed behind the car I was
working on.
I accepted responsibility for my actions and paid for what was clearly my fault -
I should have looked behind before moving my vehicle.

On Wed, 19 Jul 2006 04:20:15 GMT, "« Paul »" <" « Paul
> wrote:

wrote:
>>
>> I work at a Chevy dealership. I was pulling a monstrous SUV into a
>> tight stall and scraped the side. I am told that I need to pay for the
>> $600 in damages.

The dealership where you work is sleazy.

>> Shouldn't the dealership have insurance for this?

Deductible is probably a good dealer higher than $600. Still the
dealership should cover it as an operating expense. If you make a
habit of it they can let you go.

>> This is the first time I have ever done this.

>Perhaps you should assume responsibility for your actions?
>When I worked at a Ford dealership as a line tech I accidentally backed into a
>pickup truck bed cap that another tech temporarily placed behind the car I was
>working on.
>I accepted responsibility for my actions and paid for what was clearly my fault -

Generous of you but not called for. If you had worked for me I would
have refused payment and thanked you for the offer.

>I should have looked behind before moving my vehicle.

We all make mistakes, owners and employees alike. Human weaknesses
reduce profitability for owner and employee alike. It should not be
punished but it is appropriate to review procedures to reduce the
chance of it happening again. This is the responsability of
management and employee both. For example: "monstrous SUV into a
tight stall." Sooner or later an owner or manager who had to do that
would probably scrape some paint also.

I am a shop owner and the risk of accidents is MY direct burden.
Not to say they're not bad for business and indirectly hurt employee
and employer alike, but as far as direct costs go the shop carries it.
This is the law in most if not all states, (Paul I see you are in
Houston -- I am almost positive what they are asking from you is
illegal in Texas!) It is absolutely ethically mandated as far as I am
concerned. My techs do not get paid every dollar of gross profit on
the vehicles they work on and some of the justification for the
owner's profit is the owner's assumption of risk. If one of my techs
causes an accident they are still going to make a good paycheck. One
of the benefits to me is there is relatively little temptation to
coverup an accident or rationalize the blame elsewhere. If a tech has
repeated accidents then he will have to go, but pulling reimbursement
out of a paycheck is WRONG!! If the cost of an accident is small to
middling its an unfortunate occasional operating expensive, if a
catastrophic accident should occur then that's why some of the gross
profit of the shop goes to pay for garageman's liability insurance.

Don
www.donsautomotive.com

In article
.com>,
wrote:

> I work at a Chevy dealership. I was pulling a monstrous SUV into a
> tight stall and scraped the side. I am told that I need to pay for the
> $600 in damages. Shouldn't the dealership have insurance for this?
> This is the first time I have ever done this.

Sure, that's fair -if- you get to keep 100 percent of the money
that your work area generates.

Sounds like the place you work at wants non of the risk of being
in business and all of the profits.

Unless of course you were horsing around...

> wrote in message
oups.com...
>I work at a Chevy dealership. I was pulling a monstrous SUV into a
> tight stall and scraped the side. I am told that I need to pay for the
> $600 in damages. Shouldn't the dealership have insurance for this?
> This is the first time I have ever done this.
>

In most states they can not legally make you pay for the damage, but they
certainly have the right to fire you if you do not.
When I ran a shop I would try to determine if such an accident was careless
or virtually unavoidable. If it was carelessness on the part of the
employee, he had a choice of easy payroll deductions or a pink slip. We did
have liability insurance to cover the damage, but our rates went up if we
made too many claims, so we only used the insurance when necessary.
--
Kevin Mouton
Automotive Technology Instructor
"If women don't find you handsome, they should at least find you handy"
Red Green

On Wed, 19 Jul 2006 04:50:49 GMT, aarcuda69062
> wrote:

>In article
s.com>,
> wrote:
>
>> I work at a Chevy dealership. I was pulling a monstrous SUV into a
>> tight stall and scraped the side. I am told that I need to pay for the
>> $600 in damages. Shouldn't the dealership have insurance for this?
>> This is the first time I have ever done this.
>
>Sure, that's fair -if- you get to keep 100 percent of the money
>that your work area generates.

Exactly!

Don
www.donsautomotive.com

>Sounds like the place you work at wants non of the risk of being
>in business and all of the profits.
>
>Unless of course you were horsing around...

wrote:
> I work at a Chevy dealership. I was pulling a monstrous SUV into a
> tight stall and scraped the side. I am told that I need to pay for the
> $600 in damages. Shouldn't the dealership have insurance for this?

I've got one better than that. About a year a tech was backing in a
huge van/small bus
type of vehicle that carries handicapped people. This was also in a
shop that was built for cars, but now the majority of vehicles being
worked on are the huge 4X4 pickups and space is at a premium. Anyway,
he was given hand signals by the shop foreman and the tech was being
completely dependent on the foreman for directions. As he backed the
behemouth up, he scrapped the side of a Ford Focus. At first the
foreman was going to make the tech pay for all of it, but after much
complaining by the tech, they split it 50/50. We still think the the
50% that came from the foreman was paid for by the owner. If I was the
tech, I would have pushed this a little harder.

«» wrote:
> wrote:

>>I work at a Chevy dealership. I was pulling a monstrous SUV into a
>>tight stall and scraped the side. I am told that I need to pay for the
>>$600 in damages. Shouldn't the dealership have insurance for this?

>Perhaps you should assume responsibility for your actions?
>When I worked at a Ford dealership as a line tech I accidentally backed into a
>pickup truck bed cap that another tech temporarily placed behind the car I was
>working on.

Policies that blame employees result in mistakes being covered up and
making workers so angry or nervous that even more mistakes occur.
Punish employees for being careless or malicious, train, transfer, or
get rid of incompetent ones, but otherwise the problem is the company's
responsibility. A good company wouldn't make a mechanic work in such a
tight space anyway.

There was an instance where 4-5 workers dropped and broke an
approximately 30" space telescope lens costing millions. Should they
have been held liable for its cost?

Kevin wrote:
>
> > wrote in message
> oups.com...
> >I work at a Chevy dealership. I was pulling a monstrous SUV into a
> > tight stall and scraped the side. I am told that I need to pay for the
> > $600 in damages. Shouldn't the dealership have insurance for this?
> > This is the first time I have ever done this.
> >
>
> In most states they can not legally make you pay for the damage, but they
> certainly have the right to fire you if you do not.
> When I ran a shop I would try to determine if such an accident was careless
> or virtually unavoidable. If it was carelessness on the part of the
> employee, he had a choice of easy payroll deductions or a pink slip.

I don't know what state you are in but in most states simply asking an
employee to pay for damages is considered to be extortion and is quite
illegal. You have various things you can do to discipline an employee
including immediate termination. Requiring that an employee buy their
way out of a disciplinary action is blackmail.

-jim


> We did
> have liability insurance to cover the damage, but our rates went up if we
> made too many claims, so we only used the insurance when necessary.
> --
> Kevin Mouton
> Automotive Technology Instructor
> "If women don't find you handsome, they should at least find you handy"
> Red Green

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