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| etyres Fleet Mobile Tyres put me in a vulnerable financial position Internet |
| 16th of Feb, 2013 by User355426 |
Having spent a few years as a franchisee I must concur with the comments made by earlier posters. For instance my tyre fitting training consisted of approximately 15 minutes instruction followed by one hours unsupervised practice. The hours involved generally came to around 100 per week and the business constantly ran at a slow loss, at one time my total worth was Ј32 when all deductions had been made, at least it was still positive. Franchisor support was generally very poor, particularly when there was any sort of customer complaint, in one instance it was claimed by the customer that I had buckled a wheel whilst fitting a tyre ( this is an impossibility as anyone who fits tyres will know) but the Cambridge team sided with the customer leaving me to source a replacement and foot the bill. In other instances I was given wrong tyre sizes by head office leading to embarrassment on arrival at the customer resulting in much lost time and money. Much was made about the work placed with me which was priced at Cambridge but in most instances it was impossible for me to source a tyre in the time frame available at a realistic price to make a sensible profit. Also the % charged by the franchisor is based on the SALES value which means that effectively you are paying them a percentage of your purchase price as well as the profit, regularly I found that I was making less on a sale than the franchisor and I still had all my other expenses to cover. Other franchisees that I did come in contact with were mainly disgruntled with the situation and most have subsequently given up, some siting serious situations with the company including threats of legal action. The only way to make any money that I saw from others was to deal strictly in cash and avoid creating receipts wherever possible by such means as doing work for garages in return for free servicing etc.. Whilst I am not proud of this and it is strictly illegal if you are avoiding taxation it was one way of keeping a better return for the effort involved and not keeping Mr Bowmans plane flying. As with other posters I would suggest that anyone interested in a new franchise should try to talk to as many existing and ex franchisees as possible, get the documentation read by an expert and then go it alone with a second hand van, building your own area. Be aware though that there are not the profits in tyres that there would appear to be and you will be constantly under pressure from idiots who think that turnover is more important than profit and will even sell at a loss just to get the business.
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