How do I find a mobility van shop?

How do I find a

Good Shop to

Transform My Mobility Van?

The first shop we visited was at least 40 miles away and the only one we could find in the Portland Metropolitan area, through the phone book, internet and referrals from our durable medical equipment (dme) provider. The smart aleck salesman turned us off, but they did have several vans that were new or used and ready to drive off the lot for $30,000 - $50,000. We were shocked by the huge prices, so started looking elsewhere.

Next we stopped in at the van conversion shop near our home, thinking we might get a recommendation or referral to another shop. We were pleased to find that much of their work as for disabled people who needed lifts. They had a couple of vans they were working on to show us different possibilities. The salesman also showed us stacks of pictures of different features. Here we confirmed from different pictures that the two foot pop top would work well.

The salesman told us we could order a new (this was 2004) utility van for $20,000 and then their shop would do the conversion in about 30 days. Different lifts were from $8,000-$18,000 dejpending on what they do, their durability and whether they stow inside the van (folding up against the door), inside the floor or under the van. This leads to clearance issues, so a mini-van would preclude the under the van stowage.

We selected several modifications and were told each one might add a few days to the delivery date, due to stocking and shipping, but not much. When we were ready to sign the order, we asked the salesman to give us an estimated delivery date and put it on our purchase order. He refused to do this, even precluding vendor or shipping difficulties. This should have been our first clue that we were dealing with a shady character.

Another clue that we noticed but dismissed was the fact that 2/3 of the workers didn’t speak English. Even though they may have been very talented, if they can’t understand directions without an interpreter, this slows down work and leads to misinterpretation and do-over work due to errors. The workers were not dressed in any kind of shop or mechanics clothing, hats, boots, which should have sent a red flag telling us this shop had turnover and inexperienced workers. The very shabby looking vehicles parked out back could have told us these workers were not paid a living wage.

We purchased our new Ford Van from a dealer who delivered it to the conversion shop.

The loan from our credit union to cover the van purchase and the conversion, required the purchase order and only one check be, made to one vendor. The mobility van was paying the $20,000 to the dealer (probably with a little kickback), so the check was written to the van shop for $40,000 with the agreement that they would immediately refund $7,000 back to us, to be paid to them upon completion of work. We took the check to the van shop and they refused to give any of this money back, saying they had to be assured they could pay wages, and any number of other excuses. We finally agreed that he would pay us interest on this amount if he needed the security of knowing it was available. He agreed that they would add $200 of air brush work that we wanted, in lieu of a month’s interest. This was July.

A few weeks passed and we dropped in to see the progress. There was none. “No supplies,” “other vans ahead of us,” were the first excuses, but with promises of on-time delivery! At the end of a month, it was always, “just another week.”

By October we’d written a letter to our attorney, given a copy to the shop, with demands for them to reimburse us for our four loan payments to the credit union, since we had not enjoyed our van yet. We included renting a van a couple of times and mentioned some of Tim’s falls and hospitalizations when we used our old van since he had to still walk to the passenger door from the back after loading his machine. This got them cracking and finally around Thanksgiving, after several heated conversations with the owners, we were sitting in our van after hours, waiting for them to finish it. The owners authorized overtime until it was finished and we sat in it until it was finished. At that time we negotiated a lower price for our inconvenience, and agreement that we would not sue them.

The upside in dealing with this shop that was only a mile from our home, was that we found one good and competent employee at that shop who understood all of the mechanical and electrical workings of the lift and other modifications, such as the complicated GPS/rear view camera and the custom lighting we had installed. Needless to say, he became a very good friend and is treated like one of the family.

He also understood how to override these systems when something went wrong and could talk us through problems on the phone (at all hours of the night and day) from out of town, out of state or just in our driveway at midnight. The lift, for instance, can be operated from overhead buttons near the driver’s seat, from a control on a cable that Tim can hold onto as his lift is going out of the van and down to street level. It can also be operated by remote controls that are very much like any car remote lock/alarm. In an emergency, there are very complicated override buttons in the back on the motherboard.

You are probably starting to see that this is an unfilled business niche with great potential to do a good job building custom vans. In the coming years of huge numbers of baby boomers needing these products and possessing the financial wherewithal to purchase these big ticket items, this will be a great money maker for the company that can do it right.

For example van see: http://www.coolwheelchairvan.com