ZeroDelay Academy · Field guide
Are auto repair estimates approved promptly—and what do comebacks cost?
Estimate approval timing and completed-repair contribution are separate questions. Track how long each customer takes to approve a written estimate without assuming speed creates sales. Then reconcile collected repair orders to original labor and parts and additional comeback work.
By ZeroDelay.ai · An educational framework, not a customer case study
A question to start with
Are approvals waiting on communication, and are completed jobs retaining direct contribution after rework?
Step 1
Define an estimate cohort and cutoff
Choose estimates delivered in one week. Record the delivered timestamp, each approval timestamp, declined status and a fixed review cutoff. Count each estimate once, including those still pending; a pending approval is not automatically a lost sale.
Step 2
Measure the lag, not just the approval count
For each approved estimate, calculate elapsed hours from delivery to approval. Report a median from those individual durations and the share approved within your chosen window; counts alone cannot produce average or median lag. Segment by job scope and contact channel before interpreting differences.
Step 3
Audit completed repairs separately
Choose a distinct set of completed, paid repair orders. Subtract job parts, direct paid technician hours at a loaded rate, and shop supplies from collected revenue. Track comeback labor and parts not already counted, including warranty work, separately from the estimate cohort.
Fictional worked example
All figures below are made-up assumptions to show the arithmetic. They are not industry averages, customer data, achieved outcomes or a forecast for your business.
Assumptions
- Fictional week: 20 estimates delivered; 12 approved within 24 hours and five more approved by a fixed seven-day cutoff. Three have no approval recorded by cutoff. Exact timestamps are not provided, so no median lag is claimed.
- Separate illustrative group of 10 completed, paid repair orders collected $12,000 before tax. This is not necessarily the same group as the 20 estimates.
- Those completed repairs used $4,200 in parts, 80 paid technician hours at a $36 loaded hourly cost, and $320 in directly attributed shop supplies.
- Two comebacks consumed a combined six additional paid hours and $90 in extra parts. These costs are not included in the original 80 hours, $4,200 parts or $320 supplies.
Simple math
- Within-24-hour approvals: 12 ÷ 20 = 60%. Approved by seven-day cutoff: (12 + 5) ÷ 20 = 85%. Three remain unapproved at cutoff; their eventual outcomes are unknown.
- Original direct labor: 80 × $36 = $2,880. Contribution before comebacks: $12,000 − $4,200 parts − $2,880 labor − $320 supplies = $4,600.
- Additional comeback cost: 6 × $36 + $90 = $306. Direct contribution after comebacks: $4,600 − $306 = $4,294.
- Direct contribution margin after comebacks: $4,294 ÷ $12,000 ≈ 35.8%. Approval lag is not an input to this contribution calculation.
What this suggests checking: The 60% within-24-hour count is not a measure of median lag and does not establish that faster contact would change approvals. The $306 rework cost is a cost in this fictional worksheet, not recoverable profit. Diagnose rework reasons and actual job-level records before attributing either issue to process or people.
Next checks using your own records
- Which written estimates have missing delivery or approval timestamps, and can the records be recovered without guessing?
- For pending estimates, what follow-up was actually agreed with the customer? Track outcomes after the original cutoff separately.
- For each comeback, was it diagnosis, part quality, installation, an unrelated fault or a new paid request? Use the original order to prevent double counting.
A worksheet you can repeat
1. Estimate ledger
One row per written estimate: delivered time, customer contact method, estimate scope, approved/declined/pending outcome, approval time and fixed cutoff date. Record later approvals without rewriting the earlier cutoff.
2. Timing calculation
For approved estimates only, subtract delivered timestamp from approval timestamp, sort elapsed hours and compute the median. Also show the numerator and denominator for approvals inside your chosen window.
3. Completed-job ledger
For a separately dated set of paid orders, record collected amount excluding sales tax, job type, direct parts, original technician person-hours, loaded labor rate and directly attributable supplies.
4. Comeback ledger
Match each return to its original order, reason, extra technician hours, extra parts and any separate customer payment. Do not deduct labor or parts twice; handle paid new work separately from warranty rework.
5. Decision check
Compare delays by scope and contact method and comebacks by root cause, without implying one caused the other. Review inspection notes, authorization records and warranty policy before changing the workflow.
What the numbers cannot tell you
- Approvals within a window are not completed jobs or incremental sales; pending estimates may be approved later.
- Shop rent, service advisor time, equipment, merchant fees, taxes and warranty reserves are not fully modeled. Direct contribution is not net profit.
- No causal link is established between approval lag and comebacks, and the two fictional cohorts are intentionally separate.
The free calculator currently covers plumbing, HVAC and roofing—not this guide's worksheet. Explore the free Service Business Profit Leak Check. Its calculations stay in your browser.