Mack Trumpets Improved Maintenance Practices
At the Management Conference & Exhibition of American Trucking Associations, Stephen Roy said the certification initiative is designed to help customers get trucks with maintenance problems diagnosed and repaired quickly.
The certifications start with 21 dealerships in major markets, but Roy said he ultimately wants all 420 locations in the United States and Canada to participate.
A lot of the improvement comes from using better diagnostic tools that allow dealer maintenance departments to better deploy technicians. Roy said nearly half of the maintenance problems brought into shops can be fixed in four hours or less.
Some technicians are assigned to do quick fixes and roll through as many of those cases as possible. Other technicians, usually those who are more experienced, Roy said, get assigned to the lengthier jobs and are not bothered with the quick fixes.
The certification system benefits all Mack owners, Roy said, and is not limited to new trucks.
“It’s for anything rolling, there’s no limit on age,” he said.
“This is not a program but a process change,” Mack Vice President David Pardue said. “The issue is how to get more trucks through bottlenecks. We’ve already seen increases in the number of repair orders getting closed.”
Mack, based in Greensboro, North Carolina, is part of Volvo Group of Sweden.
