Eight cars booked, work for eleven
Yesterday afternoon the diary for Thursday looked fine: eight cars, four technicians. This morning one of the eight is a timing belt that turns out to need a water pump too, one service has an approved brake job added, a customer arrives with a warning light and asks if you can fit them in, and one of the technicians rings in sick.
By lunchtime two customers have been rung to say their cars will not be ready today, one car is parked outside untouched, and the advisor is apologising at the counter. Tomorrow starts with yesterday's overflow before any of tomorrow's bookings.
A diary that counts cars instead of hours
Most diaries, paper or electronic, are built around slots or a count of cars. That was fine when most work was servicing. It does not work when jobs vary from half an hour to two days, when some need the one ramp with the four-post lift or the one technician trained on hybrids, and when a proportion of cars will have extra work approved during the day.
The advisor is left to judge capacity in their head. Under pressure to say yes on the phone, they book one more car, and nobody sees the total until the day arrives.
What overbooking does to the week
| Knock-on effect | Who feels it |
|---|---|
| Cars not finished when promised | Customers who arranged lifts and time off |
| Carry-over into the next day | Tomorrow's customers, who are now also late |
| Approved extra work pushed back | The customer who agreed to it, and your invoice |
| Rushed work late in the day | Technicians, and the comeback rate |
| Walk-ins turned away | The advisor, who cannot see where they would fit |
It also hides the opposite problem. Some days are genuinely light, but because the diary shows a count rather than hours, nobody fills them.
How we build booking by hours, ramps and skills
- Each technician has working hours per day, with holidays and training days entered once, and a list of the work they are trained for, such as hybrid and electric vehicle work or air conditioning.
- Each ramp or bay has a type, so a job that needs a particular lift or the alignment bay can only land there.
- Each job type carries an estimated time from your labour guide or your own menu, and the advisor can adjust it.
- When a booking is made, the diary shows remaining hours per day for the skill and ramp needed, not just a count of cars.
- A share of each day, which you set, is held back for extra work approved on the ramp and for urgent walk-ins.
- When someone is off sick, the diary recalculates and shows which bookings no longer fit, so the advisor can ring those customers early.
Some garage management systems already do parts of this. If yours does and the settings are simply not used, we will show you where they are rather than building a second diary.
The phone call that goes differently
A customer rings on Tuesday for a clutch on Thursday. The advisor can see Thursday has hours left, but not on the ramp the clutch needs once the morning jobs are counted. Friday has room. The customer gets an honest answer and arrives on a day the car will actually be done.
On Thursday the buffer absorbs the extra brake job and the water pump without pushing anyone's car into tomorrow. The walk-in with the warning light is booked for a diagnosis in the afternoon slot the diary shows as free.
- Capacity shown in hours per skill and ramp
- A held buffer for extra work found on the day
- Sickness and holidays reflected straight away
- Honest dates given on the phone
Does your diary look like this?
- Most days end with cars that were promised but are not done.
- The diary counts cars rather than hours.
- Approved extra work regularly pushes other jobs back.
- Only the advisor knows whether a day is really full.
- A single absence throws the whole week out.