FARMINGTON HILLS, Mich. — RouteOne announced recently that it has partnered with Black Book. As part of the deal, Black Book will provide its used-vehicle values for RouteOne to use in its Vehicle Values assessment tool, which has now reached more than 5,000 subscribers.

RouteOne also announced it has struck a deal with MenuVantage.

The partnership with Black Book is designed to help dealers and financial sources "speak the same language" as they are valuing trade-ins and collateral during the financing process, officials indicated.

"Our goal is to make the financing process as easy as possible for our dealer and finance source customers," noted Mike Jurecki, chief executive officer of RouteOne. "Our partnership with Black Book enables a seamless valuation tool in the dealership process where it adds the most value."

According to officials, the weekly and monthly Black Book product subscriptions will be available through the RouteOne program.

RouteOne users can also access a 30-day free trial to the weekly guide, available through March 11.

"Our integration with RouteOne will bring our dealer and lending customers greater efficiencies within the valuation process," explained Tom Cross, president of Black Book. "We are pleased to be able to offer an additional level of service to our users."

Moving on, as part of the company's deal with MenuVantage, RouteOne's nationwide dealership base has free access to MenuVantage's Provider Exchange Network.

PEN was designed to improve the F&I process as dealers have direct integration to more than 50 providers. PEN can assist dealers in reducing errors and improving their customer satisfaction index rankings, officials stated.

PEN helps dealers achieve this by electronically rating products, printing documents with electronic signatures and automatically sending registrations to providers, according to the company.   

To check out the PEN home page, dealers simply go to RouteOne's "F&I Exchange" tab. Those who are already MenuVantage customers can access PEN with an ID and password. New members must enroll through the Web site.

"Our integration with best-in-class providers such as MenuVantage promotes our open integration strategy, which is a key tenet of our dealer support model," Jurecki added.

"RouteOne continues to offer dealers the solutions they need to streamline their sales processes and drive efficiencies," Jurecki continued. "Now dealers can access MenuVantage's Provider Exchange Network through the RouteOne platform."

Added Phillip Battista, MenuVantage's co-CEO: "We are very excited to join with RouteOne to offer our network to all RouteOne dealerships at no cost. Our network gives dealers the real-time ability to integrate seamlessly with their chosen service providers all at the click of a button."

"It is a well-known fact that 30 percent of all service contracts that are registered nationally are found to have errors, and our electronic processing fixes this very issue while improving overall CSI," Battista added.

In other news, RouteOne announced that it has reached more than 5,000 dealers who subscribe to its Vehicle Values program. The product was introduced in late 2006.

"The sheer volume of dealer subscriptions in just over a year demonstrates that our dealers and finance sources find great value in this service," Jurecki commented. "We strive to provide our dealers and finance sources value-added tools that will help them process and fund applications as quickly, accurately and easily as possible."

For more information, visit www.routeone.com, www.menuvantage.com or www.blackbookusa.com.