March 14, 2014—Collision Experts, a two-facility collision repair business based in New York, announced Thursday that it has chosen to leave the State Farm Select Service direct repair network due to the insurer’s PartsTrader electronic parts procurement system.
“Sometimes you have to part ways in a partnership,” shop owner and CEO Maryann Bowman said in a release. “In this case, I believe that the national changes don’t work for my business model. We do not want to sever the relationships we’ve built with our vendors over the years.”
Collision Experts said that it will still welcome all State Farm customers who chose the shop on their own, but will no longer take referrals from State Farm’s national office.
State Farm has been rolling out the changes to its parts procurement policy over the past two years and just recently implemented the mandate in New York.
“Although we value the business that State Farm has referred to us over the years, the new Select Service Program does not fit our business model,” Bowman said. “This is strictly a business decision based on changes to the Select Service Program that would require us to change parts vendors. We have great relationships with our parts vendors, and we feel that this helps us provide an exceptional product. If at any time State Farm decides to change or adjust their Select Service Program, we may be more than happy to revisit this in the future.”
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