25 April 2014
Salvaging Parts
The London Region's February meeting was held at Travellers Insurance Redhill. members were given an insight into the parts recycling operation carried out by My Greenfleet -trading name of FAB Recycling Limited.
ason Cross, managing director of FAB Recycling, explained in detail the entire process of purchasing salvage, imaging the vehicle and parts, vehicle dismantle, comprehensive parts testing programme, bar coding and storage of parts and finally entry onto their 'real time' website for re-sale.
FAB completes a full audit trail of the vehicle from the point of purchase through to the breaking process, sale of parts and the crushing of a bodyshell. Being a registered professional recycling organisation FAB submit a Certificate of Destruction to the DVLA.
Once sold to a member of the public, within the motor trade or within a closed loop recycling contract, FAB provide a national delivery service using their own fleet of vehicles.
FAB's plan is to help reduce the number of vehicles being written off and increase the volume of repairs carried out in the bodyshop by supplying good quality cut priced recycled parts and endeavour to match the condition of the parts sold to the condition i.e. age and mileage of the car for which the order enquiry is made. FAB will buy salvage and stock parts at a maximum of 12 years old.
A Life in Service warranty is provided on all bodywork panels and lights and a six month standard warranty on all other parts which can be upgraded. Parts are priced at around 45-50% of the retail price of a new part. Supplementary restraint system components are not re-cycled but disposed of in the appropriate manner. FAB has compiled a grading system on the condition of parts sold, FAB 1, 2 and 3.
FAB is currently operating a closed loop recycling operation. This is the practice of procuring salvage from a client, completing the dismantle, audit trail, stock process and disposal as necessary and then selling the parts back to the client for the repair of other vehicles in their fleet.
The biggest clients are potentially self-insured organisations who want to make their own decisions on how to make savings and take control of writing vehicles off.
At present FAB's biggest clients are Police forces who contractually sell total losses on a percentage basis of the pre-accident value (Police forces do not have a license to dismantle vehicles, once parts start to be taken off a vehicle they then become classed as a 'breaker' and have to be treated in a certain way). Thirty nine out of forty three Police forces are contracted into the programme benefitting from a designated stock level, nationwide delivery and a high chance of procuring the same colour panel or body trim dressed in matching livery.
The presentation included a number of impressive statistics, 93,000 items sold in the last eleven years, 2.3 million pounds worth of parts sold every year and a present customer satisfaction rate of 97%.
The presentation ended with usual questions and answers followed by the region showing their appreciation in the usual way.
Darren Morgan