Aluminum in automotive to encourage paintless dent removal policies

The growing use of aluminum in car bodies to save weight and fuel could create an opportunity for dealership F&I departments to sell more paintless dent removal policies, some F&I experts say.

Aluminum is nothing new. Import brands such as Audi, Jaguar and Land Rover have relied on aluminum body panels for years. But the redesigned, all-aluminum Ford F-150 pickup puts aluminum on the mainstream F&I agenda because there’s a perception that the metal is susceptible to dents and dings.

“Can’t sell dent-and-ding? Ford built the new F-150 out of aluminum,” Rick McCormick, national account development manager for F&I training firm Reahard & Associates, said at an industry conference in September. He said some imports’ aluminum decklids need to be closed just right or they’ll get dinged up in everyday use.

Ford Motor Co. insists the notion that aluminum is fragile is urban myth. Spokesman Mike Levine said the new F-150’s “high-strength, military-grade, aluminum-alloy body is more dent and ding resistant than the outgoing F-150.”

Cliff Eller, executive vice president for F&I administrator EFG Cos. in Dallas, says experience with a limited volume of aluminum body panels shows that fixing them using traditional paintless dent removal techniques is more labor-intensive and time-consuming than fixing typical sheet metal.

Paintless dent removal involves inserting tools behind a dent and pushing and pulling until the dent is eliminated. Regardless whether aluminum is more or less vulnerable to dings and dents, Eller said, an increase in the use of aluminum would probably cause upward pressure on the cost of the average claim and, therefore, the retail cost of coverage. He speculated that if they were priced separately, standard dent-and-ding coverage might be $125 versus $175 for an all-aluminum body.

EFG CEO John Pappanastos agreed dent-and-ding coverage could get pricier: “At the end of day it comes down to what people will pay for the product,” he said. “It’s clear there will be pressure on the upside.”