Holmes Williams and Purvey (HWP) opened their new spare parts department on St. John's Road in Pembroke on Monday after spending $1 million to improve customer service.

HWP management said 16 months ago that it would invest heavily in training, warehouse improvements, inventory systems and consolidating its parts service.

HWP chief executive and president Jonathan Brewin announced the project in May, 1999 after conceding the spare parts department was not up to scratch.

Mr. Brewin said at that time: "Many of our customers may be wondering if we are actively addressing the parts issue.

"We want to acknowledge to the public that we have not been doing a good job lately, however we are now far enough into our project to begin to reassure our customers that we will be providing increased parts availability as well as additional benefits to them.'' The project involved the counting, relocation and reorganising of more than 100,000 items, and Mr. Brewin said it was critical to the company to execute the warehouse centralisation carefully and their goal was to become the best parts and service operation on the Island.

He said they expected to offer a level of service on par with parts operations in North America and Europe. Mr. Brewin said the new parts department would mean a far better utilisation of staff and is just part of the strategy to consolidate and improve the department.

He said the next step would be to make sure they were meeting customers' specific needs by having the parts people require on site.

HWP's investment was not just to improve inventory levels, but also to improve how parts are stored, how they get to customers, and how parts are distributed amongst all HWP departments.

HWP opens spare parts department HWP Management said: "HWP's ongoing success is reliant upon investment not only in physical assets but also in our people. We want to assure you that HWP will continue to invest in our people through training and various other ways so that they can better service all HWP customers.'' In July, Bermudian Jay Simmons was promoted to the post of senior manager with the parts department where he will assume full responsibility for all the activities within the Auto Parts section.

In the works is a new computer system designed specifically for parts distribution which is expected to be up and running by April.

HWP represents more than ten different franchises with 45 models, and they now have four warehouses at the same site on St. John's Road, Pembroke.

Parts are ordered on a monthly basis. Eighty percent of sales are from 20 percent of the inventory, and there are more than 80,000 parts valued at more than $7 million currently in stock.