There is a myriad of methods when it comes to deciding on how to plan your shop’s capacity. Among the most popular methods are the number of vehicles per day method, the severity method, the work load method, etc.
Depending on your goals, each method has its pros and cons.
To reach high performance levels, many collision shops plan their capacity with the severity method, where you establish the number of repairs according to their category (small, medium or large, for example). You can also plan your shop’s capacity based on the work load, which is the number of hours available for production (often expressed in percentage). These methods are quite user-friendly for shop managers.
However, you must stay alert. Planning according to the work load can create production jams. These generally occur at the painting stage since this planning method doesn’t consider each technician’s specialty but is rather based on raw hours.
As for the planning per severity method, floor managers must watch for two traps: the gap between the size of the category and the size of the actual repair, and the season. In fact, the mix of categories changes according to the season since the volume per category tends to fluctuate. This may lead to opportunity losses or create unplanned extra work. However, the combination of both methods will give you the best of both worlds, proving quite efficient in the shop and optimizing productivity. So, by playing your cards right, you can maximize profitability.
Applying these methods using paper or electronic spreadsheets can be a risky exercise. This is why there are specialized tools such as ProgiPlanning.
With ProgiPlanning’s unique concept, managing your shop becomes real and dynamic. You can create your own mix of categories and plan according to your load in order to receive and deliver vehicles all week long. One of the many advantages of ProgiPlanning allows you to meet your shop’s productivity goals.
Whether you want to start learning about capacity planning or you want to improve, the important thing is to first get your team on board to reach your new goals.
Author: Alexandre Rocheleau
Collaboration: Charles Aubry and Laurent Tri
Revision: Sophie Larocque
