Product Innovation and Enhancements Will Continue, Says Xtime CEO

SAN MATEO, Calif. (Business Wire EON/PRWEB ) May 23, 2007 -- Xtime, Inc. (www.xtime.com), the leading provider of CRM solutions for dealership service operations, today announced a major upgrade to its ServiceCRM software. Version 4.2 represents the company’s fourth release in one year and provides service departments with unprecedented capabilities to book more appointments and increase shop revenue.

From the minute we turned on Xtime, it instantly helped us. Before we deployed it, the phones were ringing off the hook. The service drive was so busy, we were just trying to survive to handle it all. With Xtime, we saw huge benefits within two weeks. Our hours per RO are up six-tenths to seven-tenths. Without Xtime, it wouldn't have been possible.

Xtime's ServiceCRM software combines consumer web scheduling, advanced shop control, and sophisticated marketing campaign tools into one complete and unified solution for automotive service departments and business development centers (BDCs). ServiceCRM also fully integrates with dealer management systems (DMS) from Reynolds and Reynolds Company and ADP. By combining these features into one easy-to-use, affordable system, Xtime gives automotive dealerships the ability to generate, capture, and manage more service appointments per day, driving profitability through increased customer-paid service.

Xtime provides its software to customers via the Internet, which lowers training costs with easy-to-use web interfaces. Each upgrade Xtime makes to its software is immediately available to users, eliminating the need for hardware investments, software installation and onsite employee training.

“Four major releases in 12 months speaks volumes about the advantages of our approach to software development and deployment,” said Neal East, CEO of Xtime. “Our customers benefit from frequent updates with zero hassles. We are able to innovate aggressively, as demonstrated by the many new features we added in a short period.”

The key features, added to ServiceCRM in version 4.2, enhance its capabilities to generate, capture and manage demand for service departments. ServiceCRM has now been tailored to suit the needs of service departments utilizing dedicated call center agents in a business development center. New marketing tools allow call center agents to generate new appointments by intelligently targeted campaigns for service reminders, first service appointments for new vehicle owners, and other campaigns. Enhanced capacity controls ensure that appointments are booked accurately against shop capacity, without overbooking technicians, loaner vehicles, and other capacity constraints.

In the past five years, dealership service operations have experienced increased challenges. Decreased warranty claims, lower profits on new car sales and customers that demand higher levels of customer service have left dealers scrambling to find new ways to increase revenue. Even though service departments generally excel at fixing the vehicles they sell, many discover competitive weakness in all aspects of their customer interactions, including answering the telephone effectively, coordinating outbound marketing campaigns, accurately managing shop capacity and providing excellent in-store customer service. Xtime’s software is a customer-relationship management (CRM) solution specifically designed to address these challenges.

“We use a BDC exclusively,” said Kregg Hurlbert, service and parts director, Luther Automotive Group in St. Louis Park, MN. “From the minute we turned on Xtime, it instantly helped us. Before we deployed it, the phones were ringing off the hook. The service drive was so busy, we were just trying to survive to handle it all. With Xtime, we saw huge benefits within two weeks. Our hours per RO are up six-tenths to seven-tenths. Without Xtime, it wouldn’t have been possible.”

Some of the nation's largest auto dealer groups use Xtime's ServiceCRM solution such as the Conant Automotive Group, West Herr Automotive and Luther Automotive. Xtime has over 700 dealer customers under contract.

“Our customers can expect our pace of product development to accelerate," said East. "Our goal is to help service departments better generate, capture, and manage customer demand. Given the upside of doing so, for both the dealership and their customers, you can expect Xtime to continue its aggressive product innovation."

Highlights of new features released in Xtime's ServiceCRM version 4.2:

- Service Reminder Campaigns and Other BDC enhancements

Service Reminder Campaigns allow dealership or BDC staff to book new appointments by identifying owners who are due for maintenance service, and targeting them with outbound email or phone contact. Customized scripts for emails and phone dialogs are automatically populated, simplifying staff workload. Contact lists are automatically generated and assigned to staff with task lists that can be monitored by management. New management reports analyze campaign metrics such as appointments and revenues by user, campaign, dealer or region.

- Enhanced Dealer Management System (DMS) integration

Enhanced DMS allows the dealer to perform appointment pulls, repair order (R.O.) and status reports on the fly. ServiceCRM makes this information more usable by presenting it to users via rich web interfaces and by utilizing it to enhance intelligent shop controls. For instance, service managers now have a global picture of appointments made by service advisors and the BDC.

- Carryover Capability

This feature enables service departments to accurately account for and manage their carryover appointments that extend across multiple days. When service advisors specify carryover appointments in their appointment ledgers, ServiceCRM immediately adjusts shop capacities available for appointment booking.

- Teams View

This feature is vital for the largest shops that deploy their technicians in multiple teams. With Teams View, ServiceCRM version 4.2 is the industry's first software to provide a comprehensive dashboard view of shop loading for all of its teams at once, including critical factors such as waiter and loaner status.

About Xtime

Xtime is the leading provider of CRM solutions for automotive service operations. With over 700 dealerships and over 1,000,000 appointments booked, Xtime's ServiceCRM is designed for maximum performance and value. By merging and automating consumer direct bookings with full service BDC capabilities and sophisticated shop management, dealerships realize significant increases in customer satisfaction while maximizing service drive throughput and profitability. Privately held, Xtime's investors include Draper Fisher Jurvetson, RPM Ventures and Innovacom, the venture capital arm of France Telecom. Xtime is based in San Mateo, Calif. and can be reached at 650-653-4000, or www.xtime.com.

MULTIMEDIA GALLERY

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