Busy caravan dealership gets invoices out faster and improves service

Somerset Camping and Caravans has 25 full time staff and usually some 60 caravans for sale – they’re Sterling Caravan Dealers. With shop, caravan forecourt sales, camping sales and caravan workshop, the beautiful site north of Taunton is a busy spot.

Their priorities for a new software system were straight forward. They needed a system to cover all their activities on the site which was easy to use and was backed up with excellent service and support.They use Kudos' software for caravan sales, shop, workshop and tent and awning sales. Kudos’ ease of use and maintenance impressed shop manager Colin Harlow.

“Putting down the stock bed was easy – 3500 lines and some 400 tents in under a month. The record management is very easy and much faster than previous systems. We book out parts to all departments and can be absolutely sure that everything is being charged. I have a much greater feeling of security that we know what’s happening to all the stock".

“Building and sending orders is much more accurate. The stock list is an excellent idea - it cuts the time I take for weekly orders by 75%. We designed our own goods received note so we check in the stock, Kudos prints the GR note and we use that to label the items before putting them on the shelf. It’s so easy – and very accurate".

Caravan workshop manager John Halford appreciates monitoring workshop job progress. “We’ve had better job management and stock allocation, being sure we have the bits we need has improved productivity. Having all the records in one place means I’m not backtracking looking for missing job cards or records. I monitor jobs better, we get invoices out faster and with the information to hand we give better customer service” says John.

Company Secretary and account Graham Buller reviews the story so far. He’s impressed that everyone has picked it up quickly, including the seasonal staff. “From previous experience we expected to have to track back errors due to learning problems, but I’ve been pleasantly surprised. Its ease of use has really paid off here. We have much better workshop control, with stock booked straight to the job card, reducing missed items – that’s cut our costs” comments Graham.

For Graham and the team, Kudos does all that they failed to find before.

“In a nutshell, Kudos has delivered better customer service and improved management control of what’s actually happening.” says Graham.