Last month’s Vehicle Service Contract Administrators Conference included a panel featuring three veteran agents: Bruce Sievert of Centurion Automotive & Powersports Inc., SouthWest Dealer Services’ Peter Velau and Tom Wilson of American Financial and Automotive Services Inc. I had the honor of moderating this panel, and my first order of business was to excuse the absence of our fourth agent: Steve Veldkamp of Great Lakes Companies was across the hall at the F&I Conference, where the five reigning winners of the F&Idol video training competition had assembled for a panel of their own. Veldkamp was there, with our blessing, because three of those panelists were his clients. Their success is a tribute to Veldkamp’s work and proof that the right agent can take a dealership’s F&I development to the next level.

That led us to Sievert, the subject of last month’s Agent Profile. Sievert has made in-dealership training a key component of his work, tracking product sales and other benchmarks for his dealer clients’ departments and individual staffers. He believes that level of involvement has been key to his company’s success.

Wilson enjoyed a successful, 20-plus-year career as an F&I director that was capped when he was named F&I and Showroom magazine’s 2011 Dealer of the Year. He noted that his and his co-workers’ perception of the agents who visited his stores varied with the individual. Now, having worked on both sides, he advised that agents contribute if they can — but not beyond their level of expertise.

Velau then discussed the merits of general F&I development vs. product-specific training. He said that a successful training program should accommodate both, or, at the very least, not create a conflict between them. That led to a discussion about video training, which all three panelists are very much in favor of. Wilson said the introduction of video technology should deliver results to any F&I department; Sievert it adds a layer of accountability, teaches good habits and can serve as an indispensible compliance tool.

Next, the panel debated the formula for an ideal provider/agent/dealer relationship. Each agent provided examples of successful combinations, and a common thread quickly became apparent: open lines of communication from all three parties are crucial to success, and to keeping underperforming stores and agents from slipping through the cracks.

That led to the topic that closed our discussion: Can an agent serve as a compliance officer for dealer clients? Opinions among the panelists varied; the consensus was that agents who are working at all levels of the dealership are in a unique position to help spot bad practices. The question of whether they should involve themselves was taken up by James Ganther, our emcee and an attorney with Mosaic Interactive LLC (and our View from the Top this month). Ganther took the podium and advised agents to consider themselves the first line of defense for heading off compliance issues and act accordingly, an assertion that met no objection from our panelists.

“Agents Speak Out” ended the day with a bang, and P&A thanks Sievert, Velau and Wilson, as well as Ganther, for joining the discussion.