IC Bus announced that 51 school bus dealers qualified for the manufacturer’s Diamond Edge Certified Program in recognition of their demonstrated commitment to improve service dwell time for customers.
IC Bus added that the awards reflect IC Bus’ mission to improve overall uptime of its models by increasing the number of dealers that in turn are decreasing the amount of time buses are out of service to have issues diagnosed and repaired before being returned to service.
“Customers are saving significant time and money when they service their buses at one of our Diamond Edge Certified dealers,” said Mark Reiter, vice president of customer support at Navistar, the parent company of IC Bus. “Customers are banking approximately $1,000 for every day that their bus is not in the shop. When we launched the Diamond Edge Certified Program, we set an ambitious goal to reduce dwell time across our dealerships and our dealers have worked really hard to drive down this important metric.”
To obtain the Diamond Edge Certification, IC Bus dealers must meet several criteria, including:
• Meet or exceed service dwell time metrics and define long-term action plans for continuous and ongoing service improvements at dealership location
• Provide dedicated Accelerated Service lanes where customers receive vehicle evaluation by a technician and are informed of required repair, required parts and availability, and estimated repair time within two hours of vehicle’s arrival
• Enroll new vehicle orders onto the OnCommand Connection remote diagnostics system and designate an OnCommand Connection service champion at each service location
• Participate in the dealership inventory alliance (DIA) parts inventory program to ensure common parts are readily available in dealer inventory
Every dealership recognized as Diamond Edge Certified supports IC Bus customers with parts availability and service throughout the U.S. and Canada.
“We are proud of all of our dealers who go above and beyond to provide exceptional customer service and to keep our customers’ buses on the road, and we look forward to recognizing more dealers for taking the right action to improve dealership service dwell time,” added Reiter.
A company spokesman told STN that Diamond Edge Certified dealers is noted in the IC Bus Dealer Locator with a check box.
