Handover to the professional team

Handover to the professional team

The CAR-REP professional team now counts over 1,000 workshops in Austria among its partners. In addition, there are numerous large car dealerships in neighboring countries that are asking the experts from the small Upper Austrian community of Zell am Pettenfirst for support after heavy hailstorms. Dominik Denk founded the company in 1999 and led it to success with a lot of hard work and skill. “The weather is currently calm in Austria, part of the team is working at a large paint and bodywork center in southern Bavaria,” reports the senior. He handed over the management to his junior Peter on May 1st, and since then he has only helped out slightly when there is a need. Peter Denk has the 20-person CAR-REP team well under control. The now 39-year-old master of body construction technology and certified dent presser has been working in his father's company for 20 years, knows all the partner workshops personally and has become well versed in both the technology of dent pressing and the administration. “Although I have less and less time for it, I still enjoy being out in the workshops,” he says. “I like customer contact and appreciate the challenge of working on new vehicles and solving previously unknown problems.” The number of dented vehicles that the CAR-REP professional team “irons out” each year varies depending on the weather, but always adds up to a high five-digit number.

Not only the weather conditions, but also the framework conditions for the repair trade are constantly subject to unexpected changes. “Due to pressure from the insurance industry, the hail dent list was recently changed and the work values ​​were significantly reduced,” reports Dominik Denk. Previously, it took 5.17 hours of work to iron out 300 light hail dents on a car roof - according to the new hail dent list, it takes 5.3 hours to iron out 600 dents. The reason was the sharply increased hourly rates of the paint and body workshops, through which dent pressing is also billed to the insurance company. “This fundamentally sensible Austrian system brings advantages for everyone involved,” says Denk. “The dent repair remains in the workshop and the customer receives a car that has been repaired to appropriately high quality standards.” This is how the newly crowned CAR-REP managing director Peter Denk starts into a future that is secured, at least for the next few years. Father Dominik sees the development pragmatically: “We are coming away with a black eye and are happy that the proven system is being retained.”