More than 500,000 independent garage transactions have now been logged on Garage Hive’s real-time data platform, Garage Industry Trends.

The website tracks average invoice value, future bookings, labour rates, net promoter score (NPS) and, thanks to the recent development of Trends 2.0, now also shows demand for repairs and maintenance by vehicle age and fuel type.

“It’s a substantial data set that’s increasing at a rate of 8,000 lines per day,” said Alex Lindley, Director of Garage Hive. “It provides a national average which garage owners can use to compare their own business performance against.”

Some 140 opted-in workshops have shared anonymised data through 506,900 transactions since Garage Industry Trends launched in September 2022.

The data shows that labour rates increased by 7.2 per cent in 2023, rising from £67.88 to £72.82. Geographically, the South East boasts the highest labour rate at £82.52, while Wales has the lowest at £61.77.

The average invoice value grew by 11 per cent last year from £252 to £280. Diesel vehicles generated the highest average bill at £320.68, followed by petrol at £235.96. Hybrid and electric vehicles (EVs) registered average invoice values of £223.82 and £201.44, respectively.

Revenue distribution by fuel type shows a predominant reliance on diesel vehicles, contributing 61.68 per cent of the revenue, followed by petrol at 35.96 per cent. Hybrid and EVs contributed to 1.73 per cent and 0.63 per cent, respectively.

Vehicles registered in 2016 generated the most invoices and highest revenue, contributing to over 10 per cent of all revenue. The data also shows fluctuations in future bookings, with a peak of 101 future bookings in September 2023 and a low of 57 in May 2023.

“This is unique insight which the entire industry can benefit from and it’s completely free to access,” said Alex. “Trends has already helped on the government’s 4-2-2 MOT consultation, offering clear evidence why reduced MOT test frequency would be detrimental for UK road safety.”

Alongside aggregated data from opted-in garages that use Garage Hive, ‘MOT Data Trends’ additionally analyses 250 million lines of DVSA MOT data. It features more than 20 reports, which users can filter to identify new trends in the data.

To view all the data and for further information visit www.garageindustrytrends.com.