Free calculator that estimates the dollar cost of cycle-time leakage at a collision repair shop. Plug in claims per month, days saveable per claim, per-day vehicle carrying cost, and average estimate. Default inputs (25 claims, 1.8 days saveable, $60 per day, $2,800 average estimate) produce $32,400 per year in direct rental and soft-cost recovery, plus a throughput uplift of approximately $216,000 per year.
Most collision shops do not lose cycle days to slow technicians. They lose days to wait windows. Adjuster sitting on an approval. Customer not responding to a deductible question. Parts ordered against a stale estimate that needs supplementing. Each wait is a day the bay does not turn. The biggest single lever is shrinking the wait windows: a clean adjuster email thread per claim, customer portal updates that reduce phone tag, and supplement aging that flags claims past the shop's follow-up threshold. A 1.5 to 2.5 day reduction is realistic for most shops within 60 days.
Throughput uplift assumes the bay time freed by a faster cycle gets refilled with new claims. Uplift is capped at 50% of baseline volume to keep the model honest. The math is claims per month × 12 × min(0.5, days saved / 7) × average estimate. Adjust the inputs to model your own shop.
No. Real shops vary by carrier mix, DRP composition, severity, technician throughput, and existing process. The 14-day free trial gives you the data to measure cycle-time delta against your own claims.