Page 98 - Australian Paint & Panel Nov-Dec 2020

58
BEST PRACTICE AWARDS
BEST CORPORATE SHOP
THE PAINT & PANEL AWARDS PROGRAM AIMS TO BE AS INCLUSIVE AS POSSIBLE. CORPORATE SHOPS ARE HUGELY INFLUENTIAL IN THE INDUSTRY AND DESERVE TO BE RECOGNISED.
PAINT&PANEL NOVEMBER / DECEMBER 2020 WWW.PAINTANDPANEL.COM.AU
REPAIRHUB
expanding across Australia. T We caught up with CEO James Knox and head of operations Chris Beatty. There are already four sites in up and running in Sydney, three in Queens- land, four in Victoria with another two
opening after Christmas Melbourne. Repairhub reports having weathered Covid conditions well – using towing and drop off centres to grab volume. They increased their scope of work to keep employees busy until ‘normal’ vol-
umes were achieved.
The company’s value statement is that:
“We are the leaders in quality rapid repairs”. Knox says the mission is simple: great teams, quality repairs, happy customers.
“IAG is the customer and they demand the highest standards. We’ll get as much scrutiny as the next repairer in the net- work and something we live and die by is to provide quality repairs.” Knox said.
There are currently over 200 employees in 11 locations and Repairhub is looking to build another seven to eight shops in the next year and double the staff.
There are regular performance reviews, and an employee assistance program that
provides employee mental and financial support. The group says it has an industry leading employee recognition program and with benefits such as generous maternity and paternity leave, it also buys lunch once a week and leverages benefit from partners such as RACV. The first of what is to be an annual employee engagement survey came back with an 81% engagement score.
There’s a laser focus on OH&S so there’s not excuses to not follow safety regulations. “It’s a massive focus for us a corporate,” Knox says. “We’ve just gone through the whole CM3 accreditations for all of our sites. We have the policy and procedures and our teams live it.
There are women in every position in Repairhub from the workshop floor to management and engagement with fe- males was 85% from the latest employee survey. The company is putting together a new apprenticeship program for next year and plans to have at least one on every site.
Delivering a positive customer experi- ence is a key and critical component for Repairhub an one focus is the presenta- tion of the facilities. Each shop is cri- tiqued with a CES score all shop scores are 90 plus. Obviously there is also the Motorserve relationship with new Mo-
Repairhub Banyo in Queens- land is the head office for the repair group which is rapidly
torserve Customer Hubs being built around the country.
The shop itself is impressive – huge at 3,000m2 with a massive car park, glass cube customer reception with a Thrifty desk. It’s designed so everything is vis- ible and its very clean. All of the new builds follow the same formula – re- pairs take place down the middle of the shop, there’s the blue ‘racetrack’ and paint is at the side. Refit and the car- wash (worth its weight in gold, says Be- atty) is nearest to reception so that cus- tomers can see their vehicle in the final stages of completion.
It doesn’t have a parts room just a parts area. There’s stringent quality checking process through the repair and the pro- cesses all managed using 1Q1. There are four downdraft bays, two masking bays, two ovens and a cool down bay. Every- thing is side loading can be pushed along the line and they can comfortably paint 25 cars per day. One booth is used for spraying, one for baking – the system works like clockwork and the refitters know when the next car is coming.
As we toured the shop Beatty used the words process again and again. Having got that right, the problem is finding enough cars to repair.
SPONSORED BY
ABOVE: From left centre manager Daniel Benea, CEO James Knox; Cars are rolled through the paint process