Xtime: What It Does and How a Dealership Uses It

A plain buyer's guide to Xtime and the service scheduling category, plus the customer layer LeadLocate runs beside it: calls answered, missed calls texted back and service customers turned into sales.

Xtime is a fixed operations software brand that Cox Automotive offers to franchise and independent dealerships. It is best known for service scheduling: the booking tool a customer uses on the dealer website or a manufacturer site to pick a time, a service and a transportation option, with appointments that respect the shop's capacity rather than simply filling slots on a calendar. Around that core, the Xtime family has covered service lane tools such as appointment check in, service menus and pricing presentation, multipoint inspection workflow, and service marketing aimed at bringing customers back for the next visit.

Product names, packaging and module boundaries change over time, and each store buys a different mix. Treat this page as a map of the category rather than a spec sheet, and confirm current modules, pricing and terms with the vendor. What matters for a buyer is understanding which job Xtime is doing in your store, because that tells you where the gaps between departments open up.

In most stores that run it, Xtime sits between the customer and the service department's system of record. The appointment is made in Xtime, the repair order is opened in the dealer management system you run, and the customer's service history lives in both. The advisor works the drive with the lane tools, and the service manager watches capacity and hours. That is a well defined job, and a store that has it working should keep it working.

Picture a typical morning in a store that runs Xtime. The appointment list was built overnight by customers booking online, by the BDC booking on the phone, and by advisors booking the next visit at the counter. Each appointment carries the customer, the vehicle, the requested services and the transportation choice, whether that is waiting, a shuttle or a loaner. Because the scheduler understands shop capacity, the store avoids the classic Monday problem of forty oil changes and no room for the diagnostic jobs that actually pay.

When the customer pulls into the drive, the advisor opens the appointment, confirms the concerns, and presents recommended maintenance from the service menu. Once the technician finishes an inspection, findings go to the customer with photos or notes for approval, and the approved work moves onto the repair order in the dealer management system. After the visit, service marketing handles the reminder for the next interval and the campaigns that pull lapsed customers back to the shop.

The service manager's view is capacity and hours: how full the shop is, which advisors are booking, and how much of the recommended work customers approved. That is the job Xtime is bought for, and it is a real one. Now notice what that morning leaves on the table: the customer who called at seven forty while every advisor was on the drive, the customer whose repair estimate is larger than her car is worth, and the customer who mentioned that his lease ends next month. Those belong to the customer side of the store, and that side is where LeadLocate earns its place.

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A service scheduling contract deserves the same scrutiny as any other system that touches every customer. Bring these questions to the demo, and ask to see each answer working on a store your size rather than on slides.

• Capacity model. How does the scheduler decide a slot is full: by hours, by technician skill, by bay or by advisor? Ask to see a busy Saturday.
• Booking sources. Dealer website, manufacturer site, phone and walk in. Confirm every source lands on one calendar.
• The connection to your DMS. Who maintains it, what it costs, and what happens to the appointment when the repair order opens.
• Data export. Can you pull your full customer and appointment history in a usable format whenever you want it?
• Messaging consent. Where is a customer's text consent stored, and does an opt out in one tool carry into the others you run?
• Pricing and term. Per rooftop, per module or per advisor, plus the length of the term and the renewal notice window.

Confirm current pricing and terms with the vendor directly, since packaging changes. Our guides to dealership service scheduling software and online service appointment software go deeper on the scheduling category, and the service department switching checklist helps when the scheduling decision is part of a wider system change.

The cleanest way to think about it: Xtime owns the service appointment, the dealer management system you run owns the repair order, and LeadLocate owns every customer conversation that happens around them, on the phone, by text, on the drive and after the visit. The service calendar stays exactly where it is. LeadLocate runs on its own login with DMS access not required, so the store adds the customer layer without touching a single appointment.

The split works because each system is excellent at a different thing. A service scheduler is built around bays, hours and technicians. LeadLocate is built around people: who called, who replied, who is sitting in the waiting room with a trade worth money, and who has not heard from the store in fourteen months.

Service phones ring hardest between seven thirty and nine, exactly when advisors are on the drive. A call that rolls to voicemail during that hour is often a customer who books the next visit somewhere else. The fix begins with routing, and LeadLocate's phone system is built for it. The IVR call flow builder lets the store design its own menu, with uploaded audio and saved revisions, so a caller who presses the option for service reaches the service team and a caller asking about a vehicle reaches sales. Business hours routing sends after hours calls where the store wants them, and call forwarding rings a list the store builds from its own users.

When a call still goes unanswered, missed call text back opens a text thread with the caller from the store's tracking number, so the customer has a conversation instead of a voicemail greeting. Every call is recorded and transcribed, with the transcript one click away on the customer record. Call Alerts with Alert Keywords watch those transcripts for the words the store chooses, such as trade in, payment or cancel, and flag them to a manager who picks All Calls or Alert Calls Only. A service caller who says she is thinking about trading in stops being a remark lost in a busy drive and becomes a flag on a manager's screen.

The service lane is the best source of used cars and replacement buyers a dealership owns, and most stores leave it to chance. LeadLocate turns the handoff into a routine. A salesperson or advisor taps New Lead on the LeadLocate mobile app, scans the customer's driver license into the record, and tags the lead to a Service Lane source built in Lead Feeds Manager, so the store can measure every lead the drive produces. In-Store Now flags the customer as physically in the building, and the sales manager sees it from the desk.

While the car is on the lift, the trade-in form captures the VIN by scan and photos of the vehicle, and the used car manager sees them on the same record. The salesperson texts a specific unit from live inventory with the vehicle button in the composer, photos and price attached. If the customer wants numbers, EZ Desking builds cash, finance and lease structures side by side with the 50 state tax matrix, and a PIN protected customer deal page goes to her phone with e-signature on the same page. If she wants payments first, a SecureWebX apply link collects the credit application while the repair is still in progress. The full sequence is laid out on the service lane to sales handoff page.

Xtime's service marketing speaks to the service relationship: the next oil change, the tire rotation, the lapsed customer. LeadLocate carries the sales relationship that a service visit opens. Follow Up Processes run multi step drips per lead type, so a Service Lane lead who said not today gets a thank you text the next day, the trade value again in two weeks, a call task on the salesperson's Workspace, and a check in before the next service interval. Automated Templates answer inbound replies on the same feed at any hour.

For list work, the store imports contacts, such as customers with a large repair estimate or customers whose vehicles have aged into trade range, and reaches them with bulk texting or bulk email. Messages go out as RCS with automatic SMS fallback, so the rich version lands on phones that support it and every other phone still gets the text. The phone validator and email validator clean the list first and show validity dots on each record, and the DNC Blacklist runs a live do not call lookup before a number is contacted. Scheduled sends let a manager write Friday's message on Tuesday, and trackable short links report who opened the vehicle page. Our page on declined service follow up covers how to phrase those messages so they read as help rather than pressure.

Every call, text, MMS, email and voicemail for a customer sits on one communications timeline on the lead record, with recordings and transcripts attached. The Reports dashboard shows the Service Lane source next to website, campaign and phone leads, so the general manager sees how many service customers became sales, by salesperson and by advisor. Manager Lead Copies put a manager on a feed so every service lane lead also lands in the manager's inbox. Team Chat keeps advisors and salespeople talking in channels instead of on personal phones, and Jax, the bilingual AI assistant inside the CRM, answers the rep in English or Spanish.

A store can run all of it on CRM Only from $199 a month, month to month with no long term contract. Stores that also want new customers add exclusive local leads: every lead in your zone is delivered to you and only you, prescreened at capture with the questions you choose, and backed by a replacement review. Seller leads from local owners who asked for an offer on their vehicle feed the used car department alongside the trades that come off the service drive. We cannot guarantee lead counts, close rates or sales results, because those depend on your market and your team; every plan is on the pricing page. Keep Xtime doing what it does well, and let LeadLocate make every customer conversation around it count.

Should we keep Xtime if we add LeadLocate?

Yes. Xtime keeps the service calendar, shop capacity and the service lane tools your advisors already use. LeadLocate runs beside it on the customer side: calls, texts, service to sales handoffs, trades, deal pages, credit applications and follow up.

Do Xtime and LeadLocate need an integration to work together?

An integration is not required. LeadLocate runs on its own login with DMS access not required, so a store can start the same day. A store that wants a daily list from its service tools to land in the CRM asks for it, and our team puts it in production for your dealership.

How do service customers become sales leads in LeadLocate?

An advisor or salesperson creates the lead from the mobile app with a driver license scan, tags it to a Service Lane source in Lead Feeds Manager, and flags the customer In-Store Now. The trade, the texts, the worksheet and the deal page all build on that one record.

Can LeadLocate text back a missed service call?

Yes. When a call to the store's tracking number goes unanswered, missed call text back opens a text thread with the caller. Calls are also routed by the IVR, recorded and transcribed, and Call Alerts flag the keywords a manager chooses.

Is it acceptable to text a service customer about buying a vehicle?

The store owns consent, and LeadLocate is built to respect it. The first text should say who is texting and why, a reply of stop is honored on the record, and the DNC Blacklist runs a live do not call lookup before a number is contacted.

What does LeadLocate cost next to an Xtime subscription?

CRM Only starts at $199 a month, month to month with no long term contract. Plans with exclusive local leads include the CRM and are listed on the pricing page. We cannot guarantee lead counts or sales results. Confirm Xtime pricing and terms with the vendor.

Watch the recorded demo or call 844-376-2274 for a walkthrough on your own store. Xtime keeps the calendar, and LeadLocate turns every call and visit into a conversation that sells.

Prefer to talk right now? Call or text 844-376-2274.