Toronto, Ontario – AI (artificial intelligence) and machine learning were key focuses of a talk given by experts from Solera-Audatex at the CCIF Virtual Experience on Wednesday.
Elliot Roberts and Marcos Malzone of Solera-Audatex led a presentation delving into the pros and cons of AI and machine learning as it relates to the workflow of both auto repairers as well as insurers and appraisers.
Photo estimation technology is quickly becoming commonplace in repair shops across the world, according to Roberts and Malzone, and with it come many benefits to repairers. Namely, a reduction in overall cycle times for repairs as photo estimation helps expedite the diagnostic process involved in repairs.
The repairer merely needs to upload photos of the damaged vehicle to the Audatex Estimation software and the program will automatically cross-reference the photos using machine learning with a database of similar photos from the same model of vehicle. From there a dollar-amount estimate is automatically tallied to give shops an instant quote to give to customers.
As well, photo estimation technology has the potential to assist insurers in determining instances of fraud and for vehicle dealers looking for an appraisal.
Roberts and Malzone consider photo estimation to be a worthwhile cost-cutting measure for shops as it attempts to ensure that the most appropriate repair is being done in every case with the most appropriate materials and methods and that is done once and only once.
