Fair pay for good work
We need to do something about motor club rates, but what?
By Richard Wolfe
We all know the horror stories about motor club work. You’re paid low or sub-standard rates and you try to make up the difference by diverting work into your repair shop. But given the trend to road service programs and extended warranties (ever notice it never works on your trucks?), you seldom have a chance to do that, and most shops now lack the equipment to repair modern vehicles.
BMW and some Porsche tires have to go to the dealer just for tire changes.
Many towers started working for motor clubs when the rules and programs made sense and the rates were fair, but times have changed. The cost of fuel, insurance, truck payments, wages, and more have gone up but the club rates have stayed the same, or gone up by token amounts only.
And we still have the same rules for the clubs; give them the first three to 10 miles of response free, and the same distance (or more) when in tow. Some clubs now want you to supply the gas on out-of-gas calls to their members.
We need to evaluate the practicality of providing service that we are uncompensated for. The simple answer is for towers to just stop towing for the clubs. But the clubs do offer some benefits, such as keeping your trucks busy and filling the gaps between calls that eliminate a lot of deadhead miles.
Is there really any club that can buy a fleet of trucks and run the calls they get? One club has been forced to go that route in certain areas because towing contractors do not want to work for them there at the sub-par rates they offer. Imagine the headache for that club if it had to provide its own towing services for its members on a nationwide basis? Bet it would be an expensive, logistical nightmare. No club would be able to provide that service for their members on that level and do it for them and for the rates that they now charge their members.
We need to get the clubs to pay us on a level where we are fairly compensated for our work. We cannot provide service for long at current rates since we also have the expenses that he clubs have. Do they have the expenses that we have? Sure they do, in a different form. Think about it: our truck payment , their building payment; our wages, their wages; our fuel, their heating and cooling; our/their supplies, insurance, phones and the mutual expectation to make a profit on services rendered – all expenses can be matched to validate my point. IF they can contract to meet their expense and make a profit, so should we.
As towers, we are viewed as the unwanted stepchild of the highways. No one wants us around until something happened, and, when something does, our services are demanded right then and there. Who cares of the interstate is blocked with a multiple-vehicle wreck? Someone needs a tow because their air-conditioning belt is broke and it is 90 degrees outside and the do not want to drive the car to the repair shop. Yeah, done that call before.
I have had motor club dispatchers fight with me when I have given back a call because the police requested every truck we had for a wreck. The dispatcher told me to “tell the police to wait, we have members waiting.” I responded to that with a laugh and hung up and went to the wreck.
Is it fair to get paid rates from 20 years ago, and be expected to give away our business for the privilege of working for a motor club? And I really have a problem with those clubs that take a percentage for marketing fees. I have yet to see one ad paid for by the clubs that mentions “OUR TOWING SERVICES.” Do they demand that the power company or phone company gives them a percentage off their bills for the privilege of providing service to them? They do that to us.
So what is the difference here? Well, we are generally not very good at negotiating contracts and that costs us in the long run. We need to look at what is affecting our business bottom line. Do we provide service or do we drop the club or do we ask for a raise? That is the decision we each need to make.
And we need to be better negotiators and more persistent in trying to get provision in contacts with the clubs that are beneficial to us.
Motor club contacts spell out what they expect of us. We need to negotiate contacts that let them know what we expect of them in return. We have to have insurance to cover both us and their members in cases of accidents. In some cases, we have to provide them with a certificate of insurance, and as is the case with some clubs, we have to list them as an additional insurance. Of course, accidents and damages do happen, but for a club to withhold payment is not good for our business, especially since we have to investigate the incident and see what happened.
The clubs usually determine that their member is right and that we are wrong, so we need to negotiate hard on these points. The liability and payment issues need to be discussed and clearly spelled out in the contract between the tower and the club.
We all know how to use computers to get information, including the mileage between points. There are many different programs that are out there to determine mileage, but the motor clubs seem to have a nasty habit od always being off by a few miles when they pay for our service.
Case in point: we provide service for several clubs in a town 18 miles away as the crow fly. But since 9/11, we have developed a problem. We used to be able to go through a military base to get there, but now we have to go around it. We have talked to the clubs, sent them maps, sent them actual mileages, and they still stick to the straight-line payment method. What do we do? Quit servicing that area? We keep trying to correct it. Do they listen? NO! But we have to keep working to negotiate this in our favor.
What about the contracts that do not pay us for en route mileage? And some clubs have big holes in their coverage areas. We get regular calls to run 20 to 40 miles to service club members but the club does not pay for it since “it is not in your contract.” We have tried to change the contract so we can work for a fair rate and continue to provide service for their members. If these changes are not made, however, their customers are going to have to wait longer while the club looks for someone to come from even further away to rescue their member.
This is where we have to keep digging in to get things right. To change things takes constant, efficient negotiation from as much of a position of strength as possible Remedying these situations unfavorable to use as towers will require changes in our contacts with the motor clubs and even changing the clubs’ attitude toward towers.
As good businesspeople, that’s where we need to focus our efforts. We need to work harder as individuals and as an industry to change the rules the motor clubs live by so what we get paid fairly and promptly for the hard work we do for them. Or take our business elsewhere.
(article reprinted with permission of Towing and Recovery Footnotes, June 2005 issue)
