Interview with Robert Caruthers, CFO of Ricart Automotive | Compli.com

Interview with Robert Caruthers, CFO of Ricart Automotive

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Article: Interview with Robert Caruthers, CFO of Ricart Automotive

Article Date: Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Article Source: Dealer Management Weekly

Dealer-Management-Weekly-Interview-with-Ricart.pdf

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This Week: Robert Caruthers

Tell us a little bit about Ricart Automotive?
We are a two-store chain. Our largest store has 66 acres and seven franchises, and is the largest dealership in the area. In addition to the two new vehicle locations, we have a separate finance company and a stand alone used car business.

Tell us a little bit about your compliance needs and what you have found with the Compli solutions that you have?
One of the things that we went away from a couple of years ago is that we stopped distributing paychecks and pay stubs. That was our last opportunity for handing paper communications to our employees. We would attach memos or other correspondence to pay stubs to make sure everybody got them. We went away from that and now that we are in multiple states with multiple locations, getting consistent communications and messages out to our employees was something that we were really having trouble handling.
But now Compli provides us the opportunity to have consistent communications, consistent policy updates and makes for an easy way for the employees to get all of the information that we want and for us to know that they are getting the information. It eliminates the "I didn't get that information", "I didn't get that message," or "I didn’t get that memo" excuse.

What would you say to other dealers out there who are thinking about their compliance needs as far as what Compli has to offer?
In addition to the improvement in communications, they also have good policies and forms that are already on the shelf. If there is something that the dealership needs to update, whether it be forms or existing policies, they can use the library of forms that Compli has to be able to extract information and easily update policies. It eliminates the need to consistently re-print an employee handbook, and you always have things that are current.

Tell us about the people who work for you.
We have 500 employees with five different physical addresses in two different states, Ohio and Mississippi. That was one of the things that drew us to Compli. As we grew outside the state of Ohio, it was becoming more and more difficult to make sure that we were getting communications out to our people.

What do you see as future compliance needs in this landscape and where you think that is going?
I think there are a couple of different fronts. On the retail side, there are always compliance needs. When you are selling cars there are many federal, state and legislative guidelines that you have to follow. As a company that employs five hundred people in several locations in different states, the employee relations and employee compliance issues also present a challenge. Both of these areas are constantly changing and the need for managing these compliance issues is critical.