A Secure Check-Up

Dec 1, 2007 12:00 PM

Valvoline oil change stores fight fraud with Dedicated Micros DVRs

As long as there are auto owners and “quick change” oil stores, there will be the occasional friction. Auto owners sometimes have car problems that begin shortly after an oil change, and they immediately assume the technician intentionally or unintentionally damaged their vehicle. The stores find that there are some owners who try to bring in their vehicles for a free repair, when their service technicians didn't do anything to make the car malfunction.

Newton, Mass.-based Henley Enterprises Inc., owns more than 50 Valvoline Instant Oil Change stores, which are spread across the Eastern Seaboard from Northern New England through the Mid-Atlantic states and into Southern Florida. They also own seven AAMCO stores, primarily in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. Valvoline Instant Oil Change (VIOC) is the second largest quick-lube chain in the United States. Created in 1986, VIOC is a business group of Valvoline, a division of Ashland Inc.

Henley Enterprises needed a system that would help it assure customers that their technicians did the right work on their vehicle and nothing more. The system also needed to be one that would protect the stores and their staff from false claims.

“In our trade,” says Ed Batchelder, service department supervisor at Henley Enterprises, “the biggest issue is fraud. Customers get an oil change and then come back a week later and say we messed up their brake system. Internally, store personnel may also offer discounts to their friends.”

Most of the facilities have a burglar alarm system in place, but they didn't have a system for resolving internal and customer issues. The company made the decision to invest in a CCTV system that would protect both their customers and its assets. Henley Enterprises' IT Manager, Steve Salter, was tasked to find the right system.

The company's requirements were extensive. Management wanted a user-friendly, digital video recording system that authorized personnel could audit as required, but not be able to erase. They also wanted to be able to access their system remotely and retrieve images for as long as 30 days.

“Generally,” Batchelder says, “if a customer comes in with a problem on their car, it happens within one to two weeks.”

They also wanted the ability to burn a CD from the unit that they could then load onto a laptop while maintaining courtroom evidentiary quality and be able to show a judge that they hadn't tampered with it. In addition, they wanted to be able to install it themselves.

“Price was important as well,” Batchelder says. “A lot of the equipment isn't available on a retail basis. We wanted customer service without having to hire someone else to install it.”

Henley Enterprises approached Rich Giannattasio, owner of RG Sales Associates in North Reading, Mass., a manufacturer's representative for video and security products, including those from Dedicated Micros, Chantilly, Va.

Giannattasio contacted Wilmington, Mass.-based Surveillance Specialties Ltd., also known as SURV, the security dealer that provided the individual system packages, including DVRs, cameras, cables and power supplies to each store. He recommended SURV because they had the technical capability, and they put the job together with all the pieces and parts for Valvoline to install their own systems. SURV proposed the necessary components for Valvoline to install their own systems.

“The project started in 2004 and is still ongoing,” says Lloyd Hanright, service manager of Surveillance Specialties Ltd. “Each store has a Dedicated Micros 6-channel, DS2A DVR with 320-GB internal memory and CD-burner. We recommended the unit because it is easy to use, and it's a real workhorse. When you search on a Dedicated Micros unit, the information is uniformly there. On some other DVRs, you hope it's still there.”

Hanright says the other advantage of the DVR is that “because it isn't Windows-based, you don't have to worry about the hard drives crashing or the system going down.”

Each Valvoline store has four to six CBC Ganz day/night color cameras with CBC Computar 3.5 - 8mm varifocal lenses, high-resolution and a 15-in. CBC Ganz color flat screen monitor.

“Once the first few installations were completed,” Hanright says, “we brought their managers into our 12-desk training center for a day of training on the system.”

Hanright, Giannattasio and a Dedicated Micros regional sales manager instructed the managers on how to run the DVR, create evidentiary-quality clips from a potential incident and how to troubleshoot the units.

“We also provide Valvoline with technical and phone support,” Hanright says, “In three years, we haven't had a single unit returned for repair to our service center.”

Salter and Batchelder equipped the first store in Somerville, Mass., and Giannattasio helped them with the initial programming.

“It took us around four hours for the first install,” Batchelder says. “We initially used a coax cable with a separate low-voltage wire for transmitting. But then we learned from Dedicated Micros about Siamese wire, in which both sets of wires are enclosed in one sheath. That's an industry standard now, but they steered us in the right direction.”

Each store has an open bay, and the cameras are generally mounted to the exposed roof trusses. Some of the stores in the North have sheetrock ceilings, but they can easily run the wires up above and drop them through.

Joe Ribeiro, Henley Enterprises' internal installer, set up the rest of the systems on his own.

“He came with limited experience in security equipment installation,” Batchelder says, but he had a passion for electronics, and Steve showed him how to configure and program the units.”

Today, Batchelder says, a customer can also be assured that the work that is being performed is done correctly.

“Our cameras are positioned on the area under the hood,” Batchelder explains, “and where the customers and staff interface. The cameras cover that interaction to ensure top customer satisfaction.”

Other cameras focus on the cash drawer and the entrance to allow management to monitor all business transactions and customer service.

Worker's compensation claims are an issue in every company, as are customer slip-and-fall situations. A quick lube shop has slippery floors from time to time, and there's an open pit in the middle of the floor. Management can use the cameras to identify what is on the floor that someone should have cleaned up and hold the proper people responsible for cleaning up.

The biggest surprise for Henley Enterprises was the increase in productivity.

“We can see when the cars have slowed down for the day, Batchelder says, “and see if staff are cleaning up the shop or standing around doing nothing. The employees behave a different way once they know there's a camera on them, and our customer service representatives are more aware of what they say to the customers.”

Management can monitor remotely from the main office, but they don't constantly monitor the activity. Instead, the system is used for archiving what goes on at the cash drawer, how customers are being serviced and what's going on under the hood. Later, if the need arises, they can review the images.

The company also has a measure called an EH&S (Environmental Health and Safety) checklist that is performed in-house on a monthly basis to determine cleanliness levels in every area. Batchelder says that the scores have gone up since the security system was installed, and he attributes those higher scores to the crew's awareness of the cameras.

All the cameras are overt, which gives customers some assurance that management is watching over the operation and the employees.

“One of the benefits of Dedicated Micros DVRs is that you can fully customize the DVR for sensitivity and length of recording time. We can record at a different frames per second (fps) at night than in the daytime, and use the motion detection feature at night,” he says.

Henley Enterprises also owns seven AAMCO transmission garages, which have very different security needs than the Valvoline shops. The setup is for parking lot security because customers' cars are stored on the premises. Fixed lens cameras cover the entire area to deter burglaries and vandalism.

Once the company installed a Dedicated Micros system and JVC dome cameras to monitor the office and the lot, potential culprits were much more aware that they were being watched. The company also took measures to add taller fences and cut bushes back to open up the view in the back lot.

“The system allows us to monitor the activity, and I think the crime has decreased,” Batchelder says. “We haven't caught anyone yet, because they're usually wearing hoods, so we can't see their faces.”

Henley Enterprises currently has 25 locations fitted with Dedicated Micros units, and the company plans to continue to install them in all of the stores.

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© 2008 Penton Media Inc.

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