“Prevention is better than cure”, we have often heard this term and this holds good for almost everything in life be it your health or your vehicle’s. Understanding that a regular checkup of any vehicle is essential for its health is the key to the vehicle’s long lifespan. If you own a company that has a commercial vehicle, regular inspection will increase the profitability of your business.
Let us understand the same with the following example. Suppose you plan a trip with your friends to the forest side and successfully complete the same after spending 10 days. Once you return back, you find that your car’s performance has slightly diminished and you feel that it’s running rough.
You take your car to the AutoCare shop for a basic inspection so that you can resolve the issue. Your mechanic tells you that the spark plugs are bad and he resolves the problem.
In the above situation, the problem could have worsened in case you had delayed the vehicle inspection. Regular vehicle inspections are very crucial for the wonderful performance of vehicles. Let us understand the same in a bit more detail below.
Vehicle inspection of a commercial vehicle can prove to be very profitable for an operating business, the main benefit of vehicle inspection is the prevention of vehicle breakdown and dodging the repair cost. Vehicle inspection can be used to find the parts that need repair and hence prevent a potential breakdown that could have happened due to failure of the part.
While a commercial truck engine repair can cost anywhere from $4,000-$8,000, a transmission failure can cost up to 2000 AUD and 4000 AUD for replacing the whole as compared to 100-200 AUD for inspection of the vehicle. The money saved from preventing an accidental failure of the engine, transmission, or any other part and then having to fix it, contributes to the overall profit of the business.
With the help of vehicle inspections, the vehicles also run longer, hence cutting the cost of getting a new vehicle from the business side.
As already discussed, regular vehicle maintenance ensures that the car parts are working properly. If you find a part that is not working properly, it can be replaced which helps to prevent the other parts from further damage. This reduces the cost that is spent on repair.
A vehicle that has sustained significant wear and tears runs on high fuel consumption, this is primarily caused by problems such as defective fuel injectors, clogged air filters, under-inflated tires, faulty spark plugs, poor fuel quality, excessive idling, etc. Regular vehicle inspection helps to detect and solve the problem at the earliest hence saving the additional money required for fuel consumption.
Regular inspection of a vehicle ensures that the components of the vehicle are in a healthy state hence reducing the cost of repair and replacement of the car’s component which maximizes the car’s value and likewise its lifespan. When inspecting vehicles if we detect problems such as bad sparkplugs or air filters we can replace them, which if not done will decrease the car’s lifespan significantly.
If regular inspection is not done on a company’s commercial business then most likely the problems with the vehicle parts will be discovered when it’s too late and the vehicle is barely operational. This will lead to the vehicle being sent for repair or replacement of a part and thus causing the vehicle to stay non-operational for some time. This will harm the company’s profitability as they will have to arrange for a replacement vehicle to carry on the operation.
A vehicle that is not regularly inspected is bound to fail or break down at some point in time. When a vehicle failure happens on the go, it might cause an accident that can injure a person or workers of the commercial vehicle company or even cause fatality. When that happens, the company has to pay high insurance to the worker which will be an extra liability for the company’s overall profit. Hence it is necessary to have a daily inspection to avoid the higher premiums on driver insurance.
Elaborating on the previous point if a vehicle is not inspected regularly the chances that a vehicle failure occurs and causes a road accident increases. Apart from paying high insurance to the driver involved in the accident, the company also has to find a short-term replacement driver. This would add the expense to the business’s operational cost and hence reduce profits a bit.
If a business operation involves the delivery of products to customers, regular inspection will prevent vehicle breakdowns from happening so that the business operation doesn’t get hindered and the company can deliver the product to the customers on time. The on-time shipment promotes customer satisfaction which helps in getting brand loyalty and word-of-mouth referrals, increasing the business further.
The company’s vehicle needs to meet certain standard regulations before operating on the road. Frequent inspections will keep in check that your company’s vehicle meets the standards. This will not only keep the regulators from penalizing your company but will also provide you with the necessary documents needed in case the company’s vehicle meets with an accident. The absence of these documents would have resulted in getting charged and paying for non-compliance along with increasing the company’s liabilities.
Preventative maintenance is very important to prevent the big problems which are caused by small problems. A few problems such as shaking the steering wheel or shaking brakes may seem trivial but can give rise to much bigger problems that damage the vehicle in the long run.
By regular inspection, you can provide your vehicle with a Steering service and can repair your shaking brakes.
A vehicle that is used for the company’s business and has the name and logo of the company when running with broken tail lights or breakdown in the street conveys a very negative image about the company. This indirectly causes the brand to lose out revenue as some people avoid buying anything from the brand. This can be prevented with a regular inspection that makes sure that the vehicle does not get broken down because of the failure of its body parts.
Mechanical vehicle inspection involves 3 simple processes, namely:
\The vehicle inspector verifies details about both the vehicle and the vehicle owner before proceeding to inspect the vehicle. The vehicle details include vehicle brand, model, VIN, and year of manufacture.
This is the second process where the vehicle inspector notes down checks if the car’s engine can start, and notes down the odometer reading. In this process, the inspector checks only the components which are necessary for the operation. Eg: Brakes, suspension, exhaust, etc.
At first the tires gets checked for balance and other problems. The wheels are brought in proper balance and proper alignment with the car. The fluids contained in the car such as auto brake service, antifreeze, etc are checked to be at appropriate levels. The car inspector next checks for wiper blades and if the windshield has any cracks. The inspector proceeds to check the interior and exterior lights belts, hoses, etc. Finally, the inspector checks the vehicle battery, brake system, timing belt, etc. If any part comes to be faulty, it must be replaced.
Conclusion
If you are a company or business owner and you have commercial vehicles that are involved in business, you should get them inspected at regular intervals.
This will ensure that any defective part of the vehicle gets identified as early as possible before causing further complications. This ensures that a single faulty part such as a bad spark plug does not cause damage to other parts of the vehicle. Vehicle inspections also further significantly reduce the maintenance cost as we get an idea of which part we have to repair or replace instead of doing complete car maintenance. Avoiding vehicle maintenance can not only cause vehicle breakdowns which will result in thousands of dollars being spent by the company on its repair while bearing the inconvenience of getting another replacement vehicle but it can also cause deadly accidents which can prove fatal for the driver and the company has to pay for insurance and replacement.
Spending 200-300AUD from time to time for inspection is much better than bearing the consequences of not getting it done.
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