Webinar takeaways from IDS Marine, an MRAA Education Champion
Published by MRAA as part of its partner-contributed education series for marine retailers.
This partner-contributed webinar recap explores why service visibility matters to marine dealership performance. It explains how repair event cycle time, warranty delays, parts availability and technician productivity can affect service efficiency, profitability and the customer experience.
Marine service departments aren’t short on work. They’re short on visibility into service performance. This lack of visibility is limiting marine service department efficiency and costing dealers more than most realize.
That was the core message of a recent IDS Marine webinar (Get the recording) with Don Miller, creator of the IDS RECT Report, and Paula Crosbie, Partner at PCLM Business Solutions. Here’s what stood out.
RECT Is Still Your Most Important Service KPI
Repair Event Cycle Time (RECT) measures how long a unit is in the shop from work order open to customer pickup. As Miller put it: “Shorter repair event cycle time means you’re getting things done quicker and making more money. In my mind, it’s one of the most important KPIs in the bunch.”
The key is knowing your overall number and where within RECT time is being lost.
Two Bottlenecks Drive Most of the Delay
The data consistently points to the same two service department bottlenecks: out-of-stock parts and warranty coverage delays. Both directly impact repair cycle time.
Warranty Is Where the Money Disappears
Paula was direct: dealers without real-time visibility into warranty claim management are leaving earned revenue on the table every month. She described visiting a dealership with hundreds of thousands of dollars in unresolved claims that the owner was simply writing off.
“You paid money for parts. You paid money for labor. But you haven’t gotten your money yet,” she said.
When a dealer’s warranty claims are denied due to missed deadlines or incomplete there’s often a documentation process problem that needs visibility.
Efficiency Isn’t the Whole Technician Story
A technician can be highly efficient on the jobs they touch yet still underperform. Paula’s point was clear: efficiency, proficiency and productivity need to be evaluated together as core service technician performance metrics.
“This tech might be 116% efficient but only 37% productive,” explained Crosbie. “What would our numbers be if everybody was fully productive?”
What Changes When You Can See Everything
The webinar demonstrated how IDS Marine’s Leadership Insights platform gives dealers a single view of open work orders by age and job type, technician performance across all three metrics and parts inventory including vendor lead times. They are all pulled live from the DMS without a need for manual reporting.
Paula added, “I don’t have to run four different reports. I just come to my desktop and I can see everything.” This is visibility!
Dealerships Lack Control Without Visibility
Without visibility, dealers lose time, delay revenue and reduce overall service profitability. RECT reporting and real-time analytics are profit protection more than admin tools.
The IDS RECT Report, updated monthly, is free to all marine dealers. Access it here.
About RECT Subject Matter Experts
Don Miller is Senior Data Innovation Manager at IDS Marine and creator of the IDS RECT Report. Paula Crosbie is Partner at PCLM Business Solutions, with 25+ years of experience in the marine, RV and powersports industries.
Editor’s note: MRAA publishes partner-contributed articles to provide marine retailers with practical education, subject-matter expertise and industry perspective. MRAA maintains editorial oversight of partner-contributed content and may edit submissions for clarity, relevance, AP style, search visibility and alignment with MRAA’s dealer-first educational standards. Recommendations should be considered alongside each dealership’s goals, processes, team capacity and business needs.
