Information Underload / Access Denied

It’s being called the most critical issue in the independent automotive service trade since the advent of electronic ignition. With vehicle technology increasing exponentially and computers controlling virtually everything right down to the brake lights, shop owners are finding aftermarket diagnostic tools becoming more and more obsolete. They know what they need to stay in business — access to OE-compatible tools and diagnostic service information — and they’re willing to pay for it. Problem is, in Canada, they can’t buy direct at any price.

Brian Taylor, owner of a four-bay shop in Burlington, Ont., says he’d “heard rumours about this nonsense going on,” but didn’t quite believe it “until it actually hits you in the face and you can’t do it.”

He was doing an alignment job on a 1999 import and needed a specialty socket for setting the toe on the rear wheels. “I couldn’t believe it. I gave the parts people the number, and they said ‘Yes, it’s a good number, but we can’t sell it to you,’” he recalls. “I finally did get the tool, but I had to go through a lot of back doors to get it.”

Taylor, who has been in the automotive service trade for 45 years, says he ranks the lack of cooperation from vehicle manufacturers and the denial of access to OE service tools and information “right up there at the top of the heap.”

“We’re not on the same playing field as our American brothers. Because they have access to the special tools, and they have access to reprogramming their computers, the whole bit.” He adds, “And if we haven’t got access to it, we can’t run our business.”

“That’s the bottom line,” says Glenn McNally, a director of the Automotive Aftermarket Retailers of Ontario (AARO) who runs Advanced Automotive Diagnostics and Service, a training business, in Tottenham, Ont. ” In Canada, we’re not allowed to equip ourselves to the same level that our American counterparts are.”

“It’s certainly going to change the whole face of the service industry. There’s very little you can do on a 2003 right now unless you have factory tools.”

In the United States, independent shops can access OE websites for parts, tools and service information through the National Automotive Service Task Force (NASTF, www.nastf.org) website in a voluntary, cooperative effort between the tool and equipment industry, vehicle makers, and the automotive service industry.

The pay-per-use access to OE websites is the result of a 2002 voluntary agreement between the Automotive Service Association (ASA) and vehicle manufacturers to share information and tools with independent shops, backed by a U.S. federal regulatory amendment. In 2003, a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) amendment to the Clean Air Act mandated vehicle makers in the U.S. to share emissions-related service information with, and provide OE diagnostic tools to, independent repair facilities.

The same amendments should have been put in place in Canada at the time, says McNally, but the federal government changed the wording of existing regulations, no Canadian amendments were put in place, and the door was left wide open for automakers and their dealerships in Canada to put the tool and information squeeze on independent shops.

Under the agreement between ASA and vehicle manufacturers, all ASA members — McNally points out that he’s one — are supposed to have access to the pay-per-use OEM websites. But ASA members in Canada are denied access — you can’t enter a Canadian address in a subscription form.

It’s at the point says McNally, where manufacturers and dealerships are generally going to great lengths to prevent local independent shops from servicing vehicles. He cites one example where an import dealership paid to have a customer’s car towed from Sault St. Marie to Ottawa and back, so that the car would be repaired at a dealership instead of a local shop.

“The OEs don’t want to have to pay to have a dealer network out there, they want these guys to be self sufficient. And to do that, they have to find ways to help them. And in Canada, one of the ways they’re helping them is that they’re restricting access to the service training and the service tools. The only people that will be properly trained will be the dealer people. What if the dealer can’t fix it because maybe they’ve got 22-year-old mechanics who aren’t seasoned enough, and the 35- and 40-year-olds left the dealer to work for independent shops? They’re there, they’re available, but they can’t get the tools.”

Fred Emslie, Jr., a member of the AARO board of directors who runs a shop in Downsview, Ont., agrees there’s a big problem now that needs to be dealt with.

He ran into it the first time three years ago when he bought an OE scan tool from e-Bay that wasn’t fully updated, and then faced outright refusal by dealerships to sell him any update software or hardware. He had to get it updated in the U.S. He says the lack of cooperation in Canada is a big threat to independents, and he’s running into the problem of non-sharing of information more and more.

“The big thing is, customers come to my shop, I fix their car. If I can’t fix their car, where am I going to be?”, says Emslie.

McNally, who has been in the automotive service trade since 1978 and has worked in both dealerships and independent shops, points out that he “saw the writing on the wall” five years ago and closed his shop in 2000.

“I wound that shop down into a training business. I would still be in business if I could buy service information on a level equal to my American peers. But I can’t, and I don’t see it happening in the foreseeable future.”

He’s frank about it being a crisis, which has him being “referred to as Chicken Little by a lot of people.” It also has the AARO butting heads with the Automotive Service Industries Association of Canada (AIA) over the extent of the problem, who should be addressing it, and what the strategy and solution should be.

As shop owner Brian Taylor sees it, “They’re both headed for the same end. One wants to take the high road and one wants to take the low road. For me, AARO is the way to go. I can’t afford to join the AIA, and I can’t afford to wait for the AIA to do their thing.”

“The problem is extremely serious,” says McNally. “People appear to be waiting for it to be a shop floor issue on newer cars, before they’re going to do anything about it.”

On the issue the AIA points out that it has consulted with the federal government, industry and business groups, written to one carmaker about its position, fostered discussions with AAIA and NASTF as well as an all-issues-on-the-table automotive service provider summit, and distributed 20,000 questionnaires asking for specific examples of denial of access that have elicited 30 responses. It doesn’t have a vision of a long-term solution yet, because it can’t quantify the problem yet, says AIA President Ray Datt.

“The key compelling issue right now is that we do not have enough evidence to tell us that we have a crisis today. And I’m not saying it’s not a problem. But let’s put the problem in perspective and deal with this thing from a strategic point of view. So that if and when it does become a big problem, we’re there and we have a solution to it.”

The AARO, however, is partnering with other provincial associations such as the Automotive Retailers Association (ARA) in B.C., and is planning to forge ahead with its own strategy. “We’ve planned a strategy and we’re working it, but it’s a long go,” McNally says. “We’re going to start a new letter-writing campaign to Industry Canada and Transport Canada.”

There’s a turf battle going on, but there’s also consensus: First, that vehicle manufacturers aren’t going to bend over backwards to accommodate independents with access to OE tools, training, and service information because they want dealerships to have more of the service business. Second, the playing field needs to be levelled in Canada as in the U.S. Finally, by restricting aftermarket ser
vice access to OE diagnostic tools and information, manufacturers are limiting the motoring public’s choices, and that needs to be addressed.

Everyone is watching what happens in the U.S. with the Right to Repair Bill, which is being modified and re-introduced to Congress this year by Texas Congressman Joe Barton. Although the bill had a record 118 co-sponsors, it failed to pass Congress last year. In a March 3 news release, the Automotive Aftermarket Industries Association (AAIA) said Barton was “strongly optimistic” that the bill would pass Congress this year.

If Right to Repair doesn’t pass, Datt predicts car makers “will accommodate some type of better agreement with the aftermarket”. He says it makes more sense to see how events unfold instead of coming up with a “made-in-Canada strategy that’s different from the U.S.”

McNally says it’s critical to separate Right to Repair from the EPA amendments. He believes Right to Repair “is tied to parts” and is “doomed” to fail as a solution. “Right to Repair is a new issue… if Right to Repair passes it’ll work out. But if Right to Repair fails and you’ve wrapped everything into one issue, you’re screwed.”

McNally and shop owner Brian Taylor don’t believe there’s time or a need to watch, analyze, strategize and get a handle on the problem before you can come up with a solution. They believe the problem is clear, and so is the answer: the EPA amendments.

“We need to address the EPA amendment that required access to service training, tools and equipment now, because our government was obligated by existing regulations when that amendment passed, to make the change here. And if they chose not to make that change here, they were obligated to get into a consultation process at the very least to justify why they wouldn’t get involved with it.”

“I see a solution similar to what they have in the States,” says Fred Emslie. “I think the OE’s would follow suit as they have in the U.S., and provide anybody access to repair data — other systems repair data — on a pay-per-use basis. That’s fair, because you’re accessing propriety data.”

Meanwhile, independent shop owners are watching their ability to repair cars — and stay in business — dwindle, and themselves slowly being turned into agents for dealerships.

Says Brian Taylor: “In a lot of cases, I’ll take it to the dealer, have them do it, and return the car to me. And the only reason I do that is because I know the customer doesn’t want to deal with the dealership. I feel as though I should just put a sign on the front window as a consultant.”