eDealer Services: Superior Electronic Solutions

Increasing automation, digitization, and novel business models have revolutionized industries today and the automotive sector is no exception. With diverse mobility, autonomous driving, and connectivity services, the industry is driven by the increasing speed of innovation. As electrified vehicles are becoming viable and competitive, many states are embracing electronic solutions to old paper processes. For example, in the Temporary Registration Permit (TRP) process in Arizona, “Every vehicle that is purchased from a dealer in Arizona, must have a TRP mandated by the legislation,” begins Jonathan McCauley, Director of Technology, eDealer Services (eDs). Saving cost on the old paper permits and speeding up processes, TRP makes the process of purchasing a vehicle easier on dealers, MVD, consumers, and law enforcement. Building this original application in 2003, Phoenix, AZ based eDS, has carved a niche in the automotive industry with its internet based software solutions that assist in Electronic Lien and Titles (ELT), vehicle registration, title processing, document management and issuance of license plates and TRP. ELTs enable lien holders to reduce the handling, storage, and mailing costs associated with paper based titles. Satisfying the key service metrics of responsiveness, capacity, availability, and reliability in services, eDS helps customers develop, implement, and maintain a successful ELT program from start to finish.

The first technology project created was eTitle in 2001, which is an application that assists dealers in their title and registration work from start to finish. It is used solely by AADA, eDS’s parent company which is an authorized third party for the state of Arizona. “The software program enabled dealers to upload their funded vehicles directly from their dealer management systems into eTitle and prepare them for processing. This cut down on title clerks at the dealerships from having to enter the data again,” McCauley explains. eDS worked with the state as part of this project to develop and begin sending batch files nightly to get new vehicles titled and registered.

Unrivalled Experience

The concept of eDS was created to take the firm’s experience and expertise outside Arizona and pursue other technology based projects, and an ELT project with the state of North Carolina became its first venture. A little background on eDS’s experience with the ELT program, in 2010, they were given the responsibility to run the electronic title and lien program—enabling eDS to become a hub between service providers and the state, with regards to vehicles that were titled with a lien. North Carolina put out a Request For Proposal (RPF) in 2014 and eDS was awarded this contract. “Since then, we persist to pursue ventures that could benefit from our experience in the automotive industry,” McCauley affirms.

As stated before, eTitle initially started out as a service that calculated fees and allowed import of funded vehicles from dealer management systems. It was the flagship application and was very robust in all that it did for dealers and MVD. eTitle is a full service title and registration application used by the association to process new and used vehicles for dealers. Since the dealer base grew significantly from using the product, the need for a web-based solution became imminent and the second version was launched in 2006. As part of the new version, there were to be phases of the project that worked to improve functionality for the dealers and MVD.“Phase two was the ability for eTitle to connect directly to Arizona’s mainframe and update vehicles instantly, instead of the batch process. We contracted with the state and had them build the services necessary to accomplish that,” McCauley says.