Celebrating 20 Years of Innovation: Manager SE Tip #8

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 As part of our celebration of the 20th anniversary of the Mitchell shop management solution, we’ve compiled 20 helpful tips and tricks for Manager SE users. We reviewed literally hundreds of ideas and selected 20 awesome tips from shops using this software every day and participating in the Manager Forum, an interactive community of Mitchell 1 Manager SE users.

These tips have been written and shared by shops just like yours that are using this software every day. In their own words, they discuss their experiences and ideas that make their workday better for all concerned – and that includes you. We’ll be publishing the tips here in the Manager SE blog — one at a time — over the next several months. Enjoy!

Manager SE Tip #8 —

Quest for the Best LOF (oil change) Setup in Manager SE

“It’s 2014 and just about every other car that comes in takes more than five quarts. How do you all have your canned jobs or LOF packages set up? We’ve never used the LOF package (no real reason, just never have). How do you account for the cars with five quarts or less so that inventory is accurate? This is a battle I’ve been dealing with for a long time, and I ignore it for a while and then come back to it. It’s always nice to have new input from this Forum, so thank you for all your help.”

  1. ”We have a canned job for the type of oil change required using 5 quarts as the starting point. Those canned jobs have a set price based on 5 quarts and are broken down by oil type or spec requirement. For instance, I have a VW 502 spec canned job with 2 different weights. I have a 5w20 and 5w30 jobs, etc. Then we go to Manager and get the quantity. Once we know all this detail, we create a specific job in Revision #9 for that customer/vehicle, based off the generic canned ones. If you have more than 5, you pay more. If you have less than 5, you pay less. There’s just too many types of oil, specs and quantities out there to use packages or one set price. Frankly, the plain old oil change is a thing of the past. I’ve been working hard to get out of that and working toward maintenance intervals. You can charge what you’re worth and there’s more benefit to the customer. The quickie chains are just beating this as a commodity to the consumer. In fact, the chain down the street is doing them for 10.99!
  2. “I have two canned jobs, LOF4 and LOF5. I click on those and it then brings up all of the oils we have in stock. I select the proper oil and add to RO. I then look up the filter. ANY time a customer gets a new vehicle I add the LOF details to Revision #9. I know guys will have things like VWGS540/5 and I guess that makes sense if you remember that code. My pea-sized brain has no room for that. I rely on Revision # 9 for about 90%. This also makes it very easy when a customer calls, asking me to change the oil. I open the RO and look at that Revision #9 and I know what we use. In Revision 9 I also include in caps (if needed) “WE DO NOT STOCK THIS OIL/FILTER” as a reminder to myself, to order this stuff.”

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TIP: Don’t use the Sell Revision feature for an oil change! To keep the details in Sub-Est9, copy & paste it to Order.

Use Edit menu or keyboard shortcuts:

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If you’d like to read more user tips on the Manager Forum, simply click on the Forum button in the toolbar of your Manager SE program (see graphic below). Even if you’re away from Manager SE, you can still be connected to this community on the Internet at www.managerforum.net and gain valuable insights from content shared by your peers. Take a moment to open the Forum and check out what you’ve been missing!

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About the Author

Tim McDonnell

Tim McDonnell first joined Mitchell 1 in 1985 and is a senior product marketing manager for Manager SE. He has experience with various Mitchell 1 products and is the company’s primary media developer for product training assets and a subject matter expert in shop management software and other Mitchell 1 products. He also served as the Vice-Chair of the AMI Board of Trustees from 2009-2015. He is also the “voice of Mitchell 1” – you’ll hear him on the recorded message when you call the Mitchell 1 office.