June 12, 2012—After weeks of gathering facts surrounding State Farm Insurance’s online parts bidding and ordering pilot program through PartsTrader, the Automotive Service Association (ASA) has directly asked State Farm to prove the benefits it offers to the industry.
The ASA recently release_notesd the facts and details that its Collision Division Operations Committee has gathered on the program through meetings and interviews with State Farm, PartsTrader and collision repairers. But now, it is State Farm’s obligation to provide evidence that the program is beneficial for collision repairers and the motoring public, the ASA said.
“If this is a ‘win-win’ situation, as stated by State Farm, then now is the time for State Farm to provide the numerical data that specifically identifies any benefit (financially or operationally) to Select Service shops,” said Denise Caspersen, collision division manager for the ASA. “If State Farm is not able to clearly demonstrate the benefits of this pilot application to the repair community, then this application should not move forward.”
“The State Farm pilot of the PartsTrader application has generated a great deal of speculation and commentary from all corners of the collision repair industry, so it was incumbent on ASA to perform comprehensive due diligence on behalf of its members and the repair community at large,” added Ron Pyle, president and CEO of the ASA. “The results of that exercise have been published and now we believe the ‘burden of proof’ falls to State Farm to demonstrate the benefit of this program as soon as practically possible.”
The ASA said it will continue to determine the long-term impact and other immediate concerns regarding State Farm’s program. Collision repairers are able to share their concerns, comments and experiences with the program by contacting Caspersen at [email protected].
