Not Accepted Through To Accepted And Then To Expected

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It is the progressive operators who move the safety standards and integrity of industry forward, with a lot of effort and cost, and relatively little thanks. Perhaps not surprisingly these progressive operators are not the major national companies with hundreds of shops under their control. The active progressives may have several locations in one marker area or in some cases, be a well-run single location.

Money is a constant theme and the very large operators cannot afford to take a stand that will put them offside with their essential insurance company relationships. Just like no insurance company wants to be the first to raise rates, none of the large national chains wants to be the first to tell the insurance company that a new and more costly repair is required. They may know it is required and they will get to it when they need to (which will be at a point between Accepted and Expected), but they will not rock the boat at the Not Accepted phase.

An Intelligent, Researched Explanation

That operator with 300 locations cannot count on a strong local reputation in each of his locations, with that strong local reputation overcoming the significant hold that insurance companies have on their policy holders. There are also very few (zero?) national chains where a single owner can get stubborn and do the right thing because he can, knowing that it will have short-term costs.

An intelligent, researched explanation on why a procedure is needed, backed by a reputation for integrity and honesty will, with some repetition, move the procedure from Not Accepted toward Accepted. There is limited financial gain to that operator during the move toward Accepted. As time goes on, the direction taken is seen by the broader industry (including those paying, mostly insurance companies) as the correct one. With this understanding there is a general movement toward the better and more rigorous procedures, and they become Expected. There is some return here for the progressive operators, as the lessons learned in the early stages allow them to work efficiently with these procedures, which for them are not new.