My pal Kelly Spires has left Assurant to form his own general agency, Dealer Solutions Network. He will be representing a number of fine F&I products. Congratulations, Kelly. Any dealers (or providers) needing a new agent, please comment below or contact Kelly directly.
Author: Mark Virag
Management consultant specializing in software solutions for the auto finance industry.
Internet Car Buying
Dealer Track CEO Mark O’Neil gave an insightful keynote, ending with the topic of Internet car shopping. He described several features of a business-to-consumer (B2C) buying process, including online F&I. Since Dealer Track offers all of these features today, I wonder if Mark is planning a move into the B2C space.
Provider Network Expands
I recently attended the F&I Conference in Orlando, where I spoke with leaders of Open Dealer Exchange (ODE), ADP and Reynolds’ joint venture for credit aggregation. ODE will use the Provider Exchange Network (PEN), which I originally developed for MenuVantage. They are still running the network in good earnest. Route One is also a PEN user, so maybe there is room for “co-opetition” between the two aggregators.
Reynolds Certified Interface
About a year ago, I advised GMAC Insurance to develop a service-oriented (SOA) front end, so that DSPs could integrate with them – instead of a DMS extraction approach. This turns out to have been the right call, now that Reynolds has shut down DMS extraction. No one I spoke to at the conference has a good solution to the new security measures.
Contact me if you need help developing a sanctioned interface. I have a thorough understanding of the requirements, having been briefed in Dayton by Reynolds developers.
Virag Consulting 