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over the curb / dealership perspective F&I;, and if you are talking about showing people where to sign a form, sure, that can be easily done. What everyone can't do is run a tight ship that keeps a multi-million-dollar business legally compliant, ethical and profitable. When you start hybridizing sales and finance, you start what I like to call "the balloon game." You may remember it from a game show a few years back. It's really simple on the surface, but many contestants failed. Take three balloons and keep them in the air for 60 seconds without letting them hit the floor. If each balloon represents a responsibility, your salesperson already has three balloons for things like follow- up, prospecting and product knowledge. I talk to a lot of dealers who have difficulty find- ing people who can just pull off that balancing act. Now let's start adding in balloons for securing financing, compliance and paperwork. You just went from looking for a good sales- person to looking for Superman. Let's say Superman is on your staff already and he is your potential hybrid. So now there are six balloons up in the air, but these balloons aren't all the same shape, size and weight. It's been established that selling the tangible is different from selling the F&I; intangibles like VSC and GAP. But typically your salesperson has the skills for selling metal, so they use the same approach for F&I.; That's like adding a sinker to the F&I; product sales balloon. The profit in that department will hit the floor fastest, but since that's a source of revenue it will be carefully watched. The front- end profit is always important as a salesperson, so you know that one will be handled no matter what. Where the issues start creeping in is the balloons that are small and are slowly falling down. Sure, follow-up is getting close to the ground, but we know it will be handled be- fore long, and yes, that one ap- plication should be worked, but there was a new prospect on the lot, and I'll fax that stip over to the bank tomorrow … By the end of a short period of time, you have one exhausted super- hero with one or two balloons in the air, the rest having long since been forgotten. Let's hope it's you (instead of an auditor) who notices that the compli- ance balloon has hit the floor. It's the small but important things that make F&I; so vital to a dealership. Things that don't appear on a financial statement are just as important. It's easy to forget to run an OFAC check, look out for red flags or send out the adverse action letters. It's tempting to break or stretch the rules on a deal with a huge front-end gross, especially when you are paid on it. I really foresee issues in the realm of special finance, where the customer may suggest a straw purchase or other illegal activity. Finance departments execute more contracts on a daily basis than most lawyers. What if your expanded-function salesperson doesn't even know the laws? There is simply too much going on in that area to do it part-time. So while the hybrid discussion has picked up as of late, let's use it as an opportunity to learn and appreciate what each member of our team contributes to the dealership as a whole. If through good communication and some cross-training we learn our strengths and weaknesses, we can then capitalize on them. Maybe you do have a salesper- son who could really shine in F&I.; Give them a chance to learn, but don't overload them by trying to convince them they can do the work of two people. You will only end up hurting profits and proving that expanded function sales hybrids aren't a long-term viable option. 37