Ron Reahard wants to put an end to "commission breath."
That's the term he coined to describe the obvious eagerness some dealership F&I managers exude while presenting customers with costly add-on items that will earn the managers big commissions.
“Today's consumer can smell commission breath a mile away,” says Reahard, an F&I trainer and consultant who is based in Soddy-Daisy, Tenn.
J.D. Power and Associates agrees. The company has advocated for years that to avoid commission breath, dealerships should pay bigger monthly salaries and less commission. But there have been few takers -- certainly too few to be statistically significant, says Jon Osborn, research director for J.D. Power, of Westlake Village, Calif.
"It would be quite a challenge to change the compensation structure," Osborn says. "The whole system is set up to reward an aggressive salesperson, even if it works against customer satisfaction in the long run."