HONK switching things up and they are getting worse

[ESC]

We don’t do much motor club work anymore. But I have had the Honk app on my phone for the last year or so. It’s worked well. I take what jobs make sense for me. My rates could be set by me. I had it set to $95 hook plus $5 per mile for a tow. $125 minimum for a winch. Etc. I also have it set to only alert me to calls within 5 miles of me.

 

 

This weekend I got an email from them saying that they made changes to make things better, faster, etc. We all know where this is going!!

 

Now the last few days my phone had been blowing up with jobs. All at rates far lower than I would have been before. And far further away than I’d ever considering going for those rates. Honk will no longer be getting serviced by us.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[ESC]

Here’s another one. They was me to go 41 minutes away for peanuts? Quit wasting my time!!!




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[ESC]

Another one tonight. My set rate was $95 for a jump. And they are only supposed to send me jobs writhing 5 miles. Not a chance am I headed all the way to king of Prussia for less than $300.




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[TowZone]

Let's see if we can get some insight from Honk as they were maintaining a top 5 ranking up until the past few days. While I have not added these numbers into the system it could effect the outcome.

 

@DennisHONK

[ESC]

Let's see if we can get some insight from Honk as they were maintaining a top 5 ranking up until the past few days. While I have not added these numbers into the system it could effect the outcome.
 
[mention=3238]DennisHONK[/mention]

Let’s hope they figure this one out quick. Their big push from the beginning has always been “you set your own rates” now this crap.

Just got another silly one. My set service rate was $95. Now they are wanting a $65 tire change at 8:30 pm over 40 minutes away.




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[Kjband13oc]

Funny thing,just talked to honk representative in person 2 days ago.They said this wasnt happening.I dont know how long this company is going to last with these business practices.

[ESC]

I gave up today and signed out of the app and deleted it from my phone. They were annoying enough when I had rated set my way. Now this low ball stuff took it too far. Another road club bites the dust for us.


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[Jim B]

I just google a couple of them. Not bad money if you were close , like with in 10 miles

[BlackAutoload]

It’s like these 3rd party apps think we want to play a game instead of using a platform to perform business . 

They are credit card before rolling out, 100%  goa with me now.  

Took me a year to get paid and had to work a 300 job into a 400 one making The job 700.

I never forget working and not getting paid for it.  

 

[ESC]

12 minutes ago, Jim B said:

I just google a couple of them. Not bad money if you were close , like with in 10 miles

If I happened to be passing by one of them, i could make it work.  But each of those jobs would have tied me up for 1.5-2 hours each... i need to average $95/hr minimum to have a job to be profitable.  That doesnt even take into consideration for the headaches that come along with road clubs and their customers.  For me, Id rather pass on this low budget work.  I have plenty of good accounts that keep us going.

[TowZone]

I am sure that at some point an app will come along that targets companies or tow trucks within say 15 miles of the motorist. That would work if the system was built out and used by numerous companies. Problem is those who create these apps often do not understand that a large percentage of those using them are in urban areas and not suburban/rural areas. Any Motor Club sending companies more than 45 miles from their base area are defeating the purpose and have likely contributed to the problem of not being able to secure a company to service the member/customer.

 

I would hope that someone with HONK can give us some insight into this topic of discussion soon.

 

To date HONK has dropped from #5 to #8 in the current 2019 Rankings which are far from wrapping up.

 

 

[DennisHONK]

Hey Ron, thanks for bringing this to my attention. I've been away from the office for the past few days so I haven't been checking my email much, but allow me a moment here to explain some of this.

 

I get that this looks like the same nonsense you all are used to hearing from motor clubs. "More work for less money!" That's not what we're doing here and I want to explain how this works. You can make your own decisions based on that. 

 

HONK has always been clear that we are trying to get the customer off the road as fast as possible without sacrificing the integrity of their Partner network. The goal is to always dispatch the closest truck. By doing so, we reduce the money you spend on gas and truck maintenance. I think it’s also important to remember that you can reject a job at any time if you think it is too far and doesn’t pay enough. 

 

The instant dispatch method that you’re seeing was built to dispatch the absolute closest available provider to that customer. When a customer breaks down, an alert will go out to the providers who are closest to take the job before it goes to those providers further away. The providers who are farther away might still get an alert asking for their availability. Think of it more like a safety net in case the closer providers aren’t available. Who knows, maybe you are headed in the direction of the customer and are available to pick up the job.

 

Again, keep in mind our goal is to dispatch the closest provider because it gets the customer back on the road quickly while reducing the operational costs a service provider faces on a day-to-day basis. 

 

The team here put together some articles under the Instant Dispatch section that I’d recommend checking out as well: https://intercom.help/honktechnologies/en/
 

[ESC]

On 12/11/2019 at 5:07 PM, TowZone said:

I am sure that at some point an app will come along that targets companies or tow trucks within say 15 miles of the motorist. That would work if the system was built out and used by numerous companies. Problem is those who create these apps often do not understand that a large percentage of those using them are in urban areas and not suburban/rural areas. Any Motor Club sending companies more than 45 miles from their base area are defeating the purpose and have likely contributed to the problem of not being able to secure a company to service the member/customer.

 

I would hope that someone with HONK can give us some insight into this topic of discussion soon.

 

To date HONK has dropped from #5 to #8 in the current 2019 Rankings which are far from wrapping up.

 

 

That was the nice think about Honk.  Their app was supposed to target those drivers close to the jobs.  I had my radius set to within 5 miles of the driver.  Each driver had the app and if they were passing within range of a Honk job, it would alert us to try to accept or decline.  Many times, this worked out.  Honestly, it was the best effort I have seen from any club.  It was still lacking, but they are moving in the right direction.  The big blow for me was their change to the rates.  They had always promised you could set your own rates... now they took that away in their favor.   For me, that was the final straw.

On 12/12/2019 at 11:51 AM, DennisHONK said:

Hey Ron, thanks for bringing this to my attention. I've been away from the office for the past few days so I haven't been checking my email much, but allow me a moment here to explain some of this.

 

I get that this looks like the same nonsense you all are used to hearing from motor clubs. "More work for less money!" That's not what we're doing here and I want to explain how this works. You can make your own decisions based on that. 

 

HONK has always been clear that we are trying to get the customer off the road as fast as possible without sacrificing the integrity of their Partner network. The goal is to always dispatch the closest truck. By doing so, we reduce the money you spend on gas and truck maintenance. I think it’s also important to remember that you can reject a job at any time if you think it is too far and doesn’t pay enough. 

 

The instant dispatch method that you’re seeing was built to dispatch the absolute closest available provider to that customer. When a customer breaks down, an alert will go out to the providers who are closest to take the job before it goes to those providers further away. The providers who are farther away might still get an alert asking for their availability. Think of it more like a safety net in case the closer providers aren’t available. Who knows, maybe you are headed in the direction of the customer and are available to pick up the job.

 

Again, keep in mind our goal is to dispatch the closest provider because it gets the customer back on the road quickly while reducing the operational costs a service provider faces on a day-to-day basis. 

 

The team here put together some articles under the Instant Dispatch section that I’d recommend checking out as well: https://intercom.help/honktechnologies/en/
 

Dispatching the closest driver makes perfect sense.   But what has me is this new rate cut.  You guys are setting what you say is a "fair" rate.... which its sure not fair to me.   It wasnt bad to take your jobs when the rates were what I set.  Now that you guys took that away and set a low rate for the job, then want me to drive 45 min away.... not a chance.  Unless things change for the better, you have lost a very qualified towing company to take care of your customers in our area.

[DennisHONK]

4 minutes ago, ESC said:

Dispatching the closest driver makes perfect sense.   But what has me is this new rate cut.  You guys are setting what you say is a "fair" rate.... which its sure not fair to me.   It wasnt bad to take your jobs when the rates were what I set.  Now that you guys took that away and set a low rate for the job, then want me to drive 45 min away.... not a chance.  Unless things change for the better, you have lost a very qualified towing company to take care of your customers in our area.

The whole idea is that we don't want to dispatch providers that far away. We're only sending those alerts as a safety net. The idea is that there is someone within 15-20 min range to get to that call, but we still have to do our due diligence and have a backup plan in place.

Think about it this way: It costs you $XX/hour to operate a light duty truck, so you need to make $XX+$YY per hour to make a profit for that truck/driver. For your current model, if you had to take jobs 45 minutes or more away, you would only be able to run about 1 call per hour. What if, instead of taking 45 minutes to get to calls, you were able to get to all of your calls in 10 minutes? What if that savings in time allows you to run three calls per hour instead of one? Now multiply that by the number of trucks you're operating daily. Imagine how much more profitable your fleet could be if you didn't ever have to travel more than 10 minutes to a job. That's what we're trying to do! 

Keep in mind, HONK is still a very young company comparatively speaking in this industry. We're growing, adding new clients in new areas every day, but frankly, there are some areas where we just don't have a large volume of jobs all the time. The hope is that as we grow, we can continue to offer providers more work that actually costs less for them to run, therefore increasing their ability to make a profit, and sharing in that savings. 

I personally am very open here on this forum, Ron and I have spoken privately multiple times. While I represent HONK currently, I come from within the industry. I've been a member here for over 15 years. I'm a second generation tower, and am WreckMaster certified. I'm not here to deliver company lines and promises to anybody here, but I am always willing to have an open and honest discussion. Like I said in my earlier post, I know that all you see is "lower rates", which has been how every one of HONK's competitors has approached the market before now, and it results in the provider getting taken over a barrel. I can honestly say that we're not here to take money out of your pockets. We want to help make the towing industry as a whole more efficient, and thus more profitable. 

[ESC]

49 minutes ago, DennisHONK said:

Like I said in my earlier post, I know that all you see is "lower rates", which has been how every one of HONK's competitors has approached the market before now, and it results in the provider getting taken over a barrel. I can honestly say that we're not here to take money out of your pockets. We want to help make the towing industry as a whole more efficient, and thus more profitable. 

To me, this is exactly what I am seeing.  Honk was different, they let me set my rate that made sense for me to help them.   That has been their big push since day, one.... set your rate.   Now they pull that from us and set the rate much lower.  I am all for being efficient and more profitable.... but this change was a terrible decision.

[DennisHONK]

1 minute ago, ESC said:

To me, this is exactly what I am seeing.  Honk was different, they let me set my rate that made sense for me to help them.   That has been their big push since day, one.... set your rate.   Now they pull that from us and set the rate much lower.  I am all for being efficient and more profitable.... but this change was a terrible decision.

I understand your feelings on the matter, but please note that you are welcome to continue to be a part of the HONK network. You can accept as many or as few jobs as you see fit, and your account status will never be affected by declining job offers. Maybe you'll see something that does look like a job you'd feel is profitable in the near future. Or not. Either way, we appreciate your feedback and your help with service to this point and beyond. 

[ESC]

1 minute ago, DennisHONK said:

I understand your feelings on the matter, but please note that you are welcome to continue to be a part of the HONK network. You can accept as many or as few jobs as you see fit, and your account status will never be affected by declining job offers. Maybe you'll see something that does look like a job you'd feel is profitable in the near future. Or not. Either way, we appreciate your feedback and your help with service to this point and beyond. 

For the time being I have turned notifications off.   Until they fix the radius issue, I am not interested in having to keep taking the time to check my phone and decline calls that are nowhere near any of my guys... it became too much of a waste of time and aggravation for me.  If they get back to a point that they only alert me when it is something near my guys, say within 5 miles, I am not opposed to it... but I already dont have enough time in the day.... I cant waste more time with all these calls 45+ min away

[TOWMAN27]

To my fellow towers,

Please stop falling for the "you will be able to do more tows per hour" line.  We all know how the story ends.  

[GRUMPS The Towman]

I am not a contracted provider for honk. They do call me from time to time with jobs usually within 10 miles of me. Now for my gripe with them. when im asked to bid on a job, I give them my standard rate as if anyone on the street has called me. not a penny more or less. It always turns into a hassle and 30+minutes on the phone with someone who has no clue as to what they are doing and seems to be reading off a cue card and trying to get me to do the job for what they want to pay. My rate is my rate and is NOT negotionable. I like many other professionals out there have put careful consideration into my rates to pay the bills and make a little profit. I dont just pull a number out of my hat. Yet these companies like honk feel like because they play phonebook for these people they deserve a piece of my profit. You(meaning honk), like me are providing a service to these people so CHARGE THEM for it. If they want to save $$ then they should have called a tow service directly. Secondly, I had a situation with honk a while back where I was guaranteed  CC payment at the completion of a job, called them back with their reference #  only to be told they dont do cc on weekends and they would have a rep call me on monday to discuss my rates with them. I blew my top and all of a sudden they had a cc for me. I am a small 2 man company. I am the receptionist, the dispatcher and 90% of the time the operator. I dont have time to play phone tag for 30 minutes. I am usually working a job while on the phone with these clowns who have the audacity to tell me my rates are too high. So it has been CC up front,100% goa and the card is run before I even start heading in the direction of their call. Nobody else I deal with on a regular basis (My account customers, Real motor clubs, regular customers etc..) Try to beat me up on my rates so why would I let honk do it? and dont give me that B.S. that you can streamline my business and feed me tons of work blah blah blah... Ive heard it all before.. I dont need your work, HONK needs me and others like me So they can continue to play phonebook for lazy people... 

[Kjband13oc]

Honks bottom line is they have to make money.This is the same thing the other motor clubs do.

 

Explain to me DennisHONK why a Mother and 2 children would be left in cold car 2 hours in the middle of winter while Honk looks for cheap prices, meanwhile commercial accounts geeksquad , optimum and others get immediate service and Honk is willing to pay top dollar.In my area we are competing for Honk calls that are being given to unlicensed uninsured companies. We have been fully licensed and insured for almost 40yrs. my insurance is 10k a year unlicensed company $800 a year.

 

Next they give you bad info and then wont pay for extra services required , for instance truck with flat. Spare was flat and all 20 lug nuts stripped turned into 2 1/2 hour call 12 o'clock at night.Try to get authorization for extra services good luck.

[GRUMPS The Towman]

I totally get that they have to make $$. My theory is given their business model of just playing middle man between the casualty and the service provider then charge the casualty owner an appropriate rate instead of trying to lowball the service provider they call to help.they are not like a AAA or road america where you pay a yearly fee to have towing coverage. they are open to anyone to use. Basically just a phone book for some one who is too lazy, incompetent, or whatever to look up and call their own towing service directly. At least that is the way I see their business model. maybe I am looking at it in the wrong light. They ( honk ) certainly have their priorities screwed up If you have had senarios as you described. But face it, the commercial accounts will pay out the whazoo for services so of course honk will jump at their beckoned call..

[TowZone]

There is a way to tweak the App to be much more appealing to regions with several tow companies.

[ESC]

17 minutes ago, GRUMPS The Towman said:

I totally get that they have to make $$. My theory is given their business model of just playing middle man between the casualty and the service provider then charge the casualty owner an appropriate rate instead of trying to lowball the service provider they call to help.they are not like a AAA or road america where you pay a yearly fee to have towing coverage. they are open to anyone to use. Basically just a phone book for some one who is too lazy, incompetent, or whatever to look up and call their own towing service directly. At least that is the way I see their business model. maybe I am looking at it in the wrong light. They ( honk ) certainly have their priorities screwed up If you have had senarios as you described. But face it, the commercial accounts will pay out the whazoo for services so of course honk will jump at their beckoned call..

I'm there with you.... i don't like that there is a need for companies like Honk... but lets face the reality, those clubs all saw an opportunity and jumped on it.  I don't think clubs of some sort will ever go away.

 

I also was the biggest hater of Honk from day one with that stupid loud ship horn in the middle of the night when I would answer the phone.  After an accidental meeting with their CEO at a bar in the hotel at the Baltimore tow show and him covering our bar tab, I gave Honk a shot.  I actually thought they were doing a better job of dispatching the calls close to the provider than most of the other clubs.  Also the ability to decline calls without being penalized.  Plus the big one, we could set our own rate.   I set my rate high enough that if i took a job from them, it would be worth dealing with the added hassle of a club call that we all know.   The calls paid right after completion, etc... it was good.   Now they pull the rates from us and set the rate at a much lower number.  No way.  My trucks will sit at the job and lose money before ill send them out for Honk again.  Now Honk has joined the list of the others that we get a credit card up front at $175 minimum before we go.  

[GRUMPS The Towman]

The set your own rate thing was, Again in my opinion either A) a way to get us all to jump on board the honk band wagon or B) a shot in the dark by them to get rolling only to realize they were not making any money that way. If you go on their website, and look up having a tow performed, they give you a rate of what the services will cost. How do they do that BEFORE they have even contacted any providers?? I looked up having a tow performed locally Just to see what they do and how their system works and I was shocked at the price they gave me. It wasnt even half of what ANY reputable provider around here would charge. Obviously I did not go through the whole thing because I didnt want the service but I am seriously curious as to who or what would have shown up to do the call.. I mean after honk woulda took their piece the provider would have ended up making around $30-$35 according to my math... 

[ESC]

20 minutes ago, GRUMPS The Towman said:

The set your own rate thing was, Again in my opinion either A) a way to get us all to jump on board the honk band wagon or B) a shot in the dark by them to get rolling only to realize they were not making any money that way. If you go on their website, and look up having a tow performed, they give you a rate of what the services will cost. How do they do that BEFORE they have even contacted any providers?? I looked up having a tow performed locally Just to see what they do and how their system works and I was shocked at the price they gave me. It wasnt even half of what ANY reputable provider around here would charge. Obviously I did not go through the whole thing because I didnt want the service but I am seriously curious as to who or what would have shown up to do the call.. I mean after honk woulda took their piece the provider would have ended up making around $30-$35 according to my math... 

Exactly... set your own rate got them results.  It got us to get out there and get the job done.  They came up from nothing and managed to pull some contracts due to those good results and statistics that they were able to show.  Now they cut rates, and those of us willing to stand up and say NO to their calls their service will decline and they will end up like the rest of the clubs that cant get good help.

[Cleverboyz]

On 12/12/2019 at 10:51 AM, DennisHONK said:

Hey Ron, thanks for bringing this to my attention. I've been away from the office for the past few days so I haven't been checking my email much, but allow me a moment here to explain some of this.

 

I get that this looks like the same nonsense you all are used to hearing from motor clubs. "More work for less money!" That's not what we're doing here and I want to explain how this works. You can make your own decisions based on that. 

 

HONK has always been clear that we are trying to get the customer off the road as fast as possible without sacrificing the integrity of their Partner network. The goal is to always dispatch the closest truck. By doing so, we reduce the money you spend on gas and truck maintenance. I think it’s also important to remember that you can reject a job at any time if you think it is too far and doesn’t pay enough. 

 

The instant dispatch method that you’re seeing was built to dispatch the absolute closest available provider to that customer. When a customer breaks down, an alert will go out to the providers who are closest to take the job before it goes to those providers further away. The providers who are farther away might still get an alert asking for their availability. Think of it more like a safety net in case the closer providers aren’t available. Who knows, maybe you are headed in the direction of the customer and are available to pick up the job.

 

Again, keep in mind our goal is to dispatch the closest provider because it gets the customer back on the road quickly while reducing the operational costs a service provider faces on a day-to-day basis. 

 

The team here put together some articles under the Instant Dispatch section that I’d recommend checking out as well: https://intercom.help/honktechnologies/en/
 

That's bullshit.. you would pay less for a closer provider and pay more for a provider further away. Keep your pennies and stop dictating our worth volume no thanks not for pennies

 

[Moose]

I thought they were going to be different. I since we have not heard from them in more than a month I thought wrong.

[GRUMPS The Towman]

 

On 1/20/2020 at 7:49 AM, Moose said:

I thought they were going to be different. I since we have not heard from them in more than a month I thought wrong.

Exactly. Honk is a total mess. At least around my neck of the woods. The last call they basically begged me to do for them was a 3 mile tow, 29 miles away from me. Wanted me to do it for $80. ( No, I didnt accept it. )The customer had been waiting for 5+ hours. No one around here will work for them .  

[yoBdaBenO]

Since I posted my rankings list, it seems HONK has gone down hill. Do I want to change my ranking, no as that was 2019. However, if they continue down this road they'll not make the 2020 Top Ten.

[Kjband13oc]

Honk seems to have tried to reinvent the wheel once again.How many times is a new motor club going to try and make money off of what we build,what we pay for our equipment,our hard work to build our reputations.Thousand of hours of training,thousands of hours of truck maintenance.The motor clubs, lets make computer programs that make them money.Its sad.What happened to customer service and helping people that are actually in trouble.