What does the Mechanic get

Hi all, I've recently been wondering, I've taken my jeep to a business where they charge 75.00 per hour for the mechanic's labor. I'm curious what take does the mechanic get from that charge? I guess the business owner probably has to pay various things to have the mechanic work there so I'm sure he's not getting the full 75.00. Anyone who's a mechanic or anyone who knows please feel free to respond.

thanks,

Bill

Reply to
William Oliveri
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Not enough. It used to be 50% of the labor, but that is very rare now. The costs of compliance with epa, osha, bar , very high insurance and workers comp rates, defective parts, etc., adds up and most techs get less than they used to, but are still expected to have 20-50K tied up in tools and specailty tools that become obsolete with every design change. A certified Master Auto Tech with 25 years experience still makes less than a San Francisco Garbageman.

Reply to
Paul Calman

It really depends on what the wages are in your area, but here they get anywhere from $14 to about $21 with the dealers charging $65-80 per hour. Here being northern Michigan. I would suspect it is higher in the bigger cities.

Chris

Reply to
c

a typical dealership mechanic averages around $15-$17 an hour. the dealership has to pay for all the shop expenses including insurance and match the mechanics ss deductions but its still a rip to charge $75 an hour. they do it because they can.

Reply to
Nathan Collier

Reply to
William Oliveri

You have to take into account the "specials" they run which generally discount the labor and then balance in the fact that lower skilled technicians perform some jobs but overall in a store that has a $75/hr posted rate their "effective" labor rate is roughly $65/hr, $70/hr if they are very well run.

A typical dealership runs 65-70% gross profit on retail labor which is the "effective" labor rate minus the mechanic's wages.

Now factor in the cost of "non productive" employees such as the service advisors, cashiers, car jockeys, service manager, dispatcher, warranty administrator, shop foreman (in some cases) and remember that all of their wages and benefits come out of what's left of the $65-$70/hr_after_ the mechanics are paid.

Now factor in the overhead for the facility, rent/lease payment (if any), insurance, special tools, utilities, hazmat storage & disposal.

Now add in the costs for advertising, "goodwill" adjustments, etc. and most dealerships are lucky if they hit a 5% net profit in the service department. The goal of any dealership is to reach 100% service absorption, IOW the net profit from the service & parts (fixed operations) covers the costs of the entire dealership including the salaries of the owners & all other overhead. Very few dealerships hit that mark.

Reply to
Bill Beyer

Possibly, but the fact remains that every day they turn away business to cheaper mechanics who do a better job..

Dave Milne, Scotland

Reply to
Dave Milne

Reply to
Jeepster

I think it goes both ways, Dave. Every day, there are cars that come to my dealership that were referred by the corner garage. The story is always the same: "My mechanic says he doesn't know what he is doing with this, told me to take it to the dealer."

Who could be more qualified to work on a specific model of vehicle than a guy who works on nothing but that model for eight hours every day? If you needed brain surgery, it stands to reason that you would want to be operated on by someone that does it daily, not a doctor that operates on feet, and stomachs, and bungholes.

Jerry

Reply to
Jerry Newton

Not as many as you used to, unfortunately. That's why whenever I pick one of my vehicles up at the local garage, I make sure the shop fridge is full :-)

I just heard a story on the radio this week that some organization representing independent shops is lobbying congress to require auto makers to provide diagnostic information, schematics, etc to independent shops. That would be a good thing, so it'll probably never happen.

-Ed

Reply to
Ed J.

They don't "do it because they can", Nathan. The overhead of my particular service department, before paying the tech, is about $42 an hour. This isn't a gas station, this is a 23 bay repair facility, with every special tool and piece of equipment necessary to fix anything on the cars we work on. We don't have the luxury of telling an owner "you will have to take it somewhere else, we don't do that here."

Refrigerant recovery machines are about $5000. A brake lathe that is capable of turning out rotors with less that .001 lateral runout while turning 50 rotors per day is about $10,000. A handheld scan tool with which to diagnose and reprogram your car is about $3000. These are just three examples of shop equipment. We need two recovery machines, four brake lathes, and five scan tools. You do the math. This is just the tip of the iceberg.

Factory training isn't free. It also isn't voluntary. If you want to work at the dealership level, you have to attend training, as the manufacturers make changes every year to major components and electrical/electronic systems. We can't be five years behind the curve like the gas station guys, then learn it as we go.

For all of the complaining about the cost of dealership labor, there are still cars lined up out to the street, waiting to be serviced. It defies logic. You would think that a shop that supposedly gouges customers "because we can" wouldn't be in business for 50+ years.

Seems there was a thread on this topic just a month or so ago. Perhaps Lon can refresh our memories.

Jerry

Reply to
Jerry Newton

There has been talk for years about how the automakers should "give" the diagnostic information and schematics to anyone that asks for them.

In fact, they are currently available (and have been for some time) through aftermarket sources, such as Mitchell and Alldata. There is a fee involved, of course. I don't know about Mitchell's product, but I know that a subscription to AlldataPro is $200 a month.

Alldata is simply factory service manual information, copied into a web format and indexed. If you pull up a schematic for a 2000 Cadillac Deville on Alldata, it will match exactly the factory schematic. They do the same for all manufacturers.

Jerry P.S. I am always glad to help someone in need of factory service information. Anytime that anyone in the group needs a schematic, I am pretty quick about fetching it up.

Reply to
Jerry Newton

My oldest son just got his first taste of a regular auto shop after a few years in a small engine/cycle shop. After 6 months, he decided to go back to school for his teaching credentials to make a living. First, his cut of the flat rate was considerably less than 50% - I don't remember exactly what he said it was but it was in the 30-35% range. Second, he was expected to produce a large amount of upsales (on which he also earned commission). I think his target was that his upsales gross equaled his wrenching output. He said the hell with that and left. Having run my father-in-law's service station while he was sick, that sounds about right since our TBA sales represented most of the profit. Even in the 60s gas sales barely kept the lights on and overhead ate the profit on the service bays. With current workmans comp rates the way they are i would expect that that alone eats close to as much as the wrench bender clears.

Reply to
Will Honea

Good point, Ed. If you are happy with your mechanic, a plate of cookies or a 12 pack helps them to remember you when they write the next bill. No one ever tips a mechanic, but a pizza at noon is greatly appreciated . Conversely, here in this small town area there are some people who have to travel to the next county to find a mechanic who will work on their cars.

Reply to
Paul Calman

Which is still more then a certified aircraft technician and the car mech. can write off all those tools he/she has to buy, an aircraft mech. gets to write shit off as we as a whole are not classed as "skilled" (at least here in canada) were only recognized as "semi-skilled" go figure ..

Snow ...

Reply to
Snow

What's a San Francisco Sanit Worker make? What's the age limit for hire?

Reply to
COLLIDE13

ive seen far to many examples of dealership abuse to buy any dealership sob stories about overhead and expenses. a large portion of the expense may be justified, but a lot of it goes to pay for dealership inefficiency and ineptness.

Reply to
Nathan Collier

that came into effect here in the last year I believe.

Dave Milne, Scotland

Reply to
Dave Milne

Fair point, but most of the time my Jeep justs needs the odd splinter removing :-)

Over here we have a huge dealer parts problem - the prices that dealers charge for parts is much greater than you pay. For example, I was asked for

450 bucks for a steering wheel and 350 bucks for cruise control. I got the cruise control for 220 bucks from Jeepsareus.com inc p&p. Consequently, if you read any write up of any Jeep product in a magazine, it usually goes "Horrendous running price of spares". This might explain why I see a Wrangler every other month on the road, and see more Ferraris than Wranglers. I suspect DCs policy might have something to do with this.

A Sahara given todays exchange rate costs 34132 USD.

Dave Milne

Reply to
Dave Milne

Our shop rate is $70 an hour. My cut of that $70 is $18. I pay my own health ins. I pay my own uniforms, And of course I pay my own tool bill. (the average box in our shop is worth in excess of $25,000) The shop supplies compressed air, stalls to work in, a couple of lifts, lights and heat. I drive a '95 YJ(165,000 miles),my wife drives a '93 XJ(167,000 miles), and my boss and his wife both drive BMW's.

-- Old Crow '82 Shovelhead FLT 92" 'Pearl' '95 Jeep YJ Rio Grande ASE Certified Master Auto Tech + L1 TOMKAT, BS#133, SENS, MAMBM, DOF#51

Reply to
Old Crow

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