CIECA announced today that the organization completed the 2020R2 Release of the CIECA Standards for the collision industry. The release includes new Calibration Standards developed by CIECAs Calibration Committee and an enhancement to CIECAs Scanning Standards. “With the rise of ADAS technologies in vehicles today, it is necessary to calibrate the sensors as part of the repair,” said Paulette Reed, CIECAs technical project manager/business analyst. “The industry identified the need to exchange this information among industry partners in the supply chain, and as a result, new standards were created by the CIECA Calibration Committee.” “CIECAs mission is the exchange of electronic data within the collision repair industry,” said Darrell Amberson, chairman of CIECAs Calibration Committee and president of operations at LaMettrys Collision. “The Calibration Committee worked diligently to develop and maintain message standards and codes for the industry in regard to the calibration process and properly documenting all of the procedures.” Formed in January 2019, CIECAs Calibration Committee represents all segments of the collision repair industry. This includes repairers, insurers, information providers, OEMs, parts providers, car rental companies, recyclers, financial services, glass companies, vendors of scan and calibration tools, and calibration service providers. During the weekly meetings, led by CIECAs former project coordinator, Charley Quirt, the committee identified the business needs of each industry segment. “By creating industry standards for calibration, it will enable the data to be shared electronically with everyone involved in the process,” said Quirt. “Consumers demand an assurance of vehicle safety and function, and setting standards is the first step toward this goal. Gene Lopez, a member of the Calibration Committee and director of development and training at Seidners Collision Centers, said committee participants also drafted a document with details on the calibration process. This includes information from the initial pre-scan to the disassembly of the damaged vehicle, blueprinting, discovering Diagnostics Trouble Codes (DTCs), vehicle repair, the post-scan process and calibration functions. “By having all of the industry segments come together on the committee calls each week, it helped us identify a broad range of possible what if scenarios in terms of the documentation that may be required or expected pertaining to the repair,” said Amberson. Similar to other CIECA committees, Calibration Committee participants shared information relevant to their industry segment and worked together to reach a consensus. Throughout the discussions, the committee collaborated with CIECAs Vehicle Damage & Imaging and Repair Order committees to ensure the standards were created for all industry segments. “It was a great, unified effort to create great universal standards,” said Quirt. The committee also referenced other industry working groups such as the Collision Industry Conference (CIC) Definitions Committee, which maintains the CIC Wiki, a glossary of terms used in the collision repair industry in the United States. “CIECAs Calibration Committee continuously identified terms related to the calibration process, which were then provided to CIC to add to the Wiki to help drive consistent communication across the industry,” said Chuck Olsen, senior vice president of Automotive Technology Solutions for AirPro Diagnostics and also a member of CIECAs Calibration Committee. “It was a pleasure to work with everyone and what we created as a committee and industry is and will be VERY important to the collision, calibration, glass and insurance industries for many years,” said Frank Terlep, committee participant and co-founder of Auto Techcelerators. Bob Scharaga, president of All Star Glass, agreed. “My team was involved in these very informative conference calls that consisted of a great group of people who wanted to put safety first for our customers,” he said. CIECAs Architecture Committee publishes updated collision industry standards twice a year. For more information about the 2020R2 Release, contact Paulette Reed, CIECAs technical project manager/business analyst.
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