Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Crooked Auto Mechanics and Shops....

I can't remember what tv show it was but they toured the country checking on mechanics. They'd pull off a vacuum line and drive in to see what it would cost to fix it. It ranged from 'no charge have a nice day' to a total engine overhaul.

Eye doctors aren't any cheaper. Grin ; )

There is also the driver who doesn't take care of his car and when it breaks down wants the mechanic to fix it for next to nothing. He then complains about the mechanic being dishonest.

If you keep an eye on the scheduled maintenance, you probably won't have too many surprises when you do have to take your car to the shop.

Hats off to all the honest mechanics out there!

our area is full of them... many came up from California and thought the job market was as good as where they left in CA, and got a real surprise....

so a batch of them go over to Sears, charge up a couple of grand worth of tools, rent a Shop and suddenly they are an A.S.S. "certified" mechanic...

charge by the hour and the longer it takes them to figure out how to fix the problem the more money they make...

was in a shop one day and some lady came in with her Suburban and had just got divorced and moved here... so she wanted to know if they could do an oil change...

they said yes and she asked how often that she should bring it back in....couldn't believe it... but the owner no less, tells her that it takes synthetic oil and if she doesn't use that it invalidates the warranty....

so the oil change was going to be $80, considering a new customer discount of $20....

and after that she needed to bring it back in once a month or every 1,000 miles for another oil change.... she was kind of shocked, but made an appointment...

I walked out in the parking lot as she was getting into her vehicle and told her, that those guys were lying to her and trying to rip her off.... I recommended she see another garage...

and the least likely place to rip her off in Hooterville here would probably be Walmart... and she wouldn't have to make an appointment...

she was pretty grateful, as she was trying to figure out how to afford an oil change for $100 every 1000 miles...

friggin creeps...I hate seeing them rip off women and senior citizens... and that is who they prey on the most...at least around here...

I am positive that they carefully selected the shops to target in order to get this kind of result. You look at the shops that have a bad history, target them and your likely to find a lot of bad eggs.

Between Google & Angie's List, finding a decent shop shouldn't be too hard.

My test is to see if they'll tell you what they wouldn't fix. If they're willing to forego the chance to get extra $, because a certain fix isn't needed, then you've found a good one.

I'm grateful to have found the guy I've used for the past 23 years. He passed my test flying colors.

FC

Google and Angie's list works for city dwellers.

If you're smart enough to not live in a city you well on the way to being too smart for some crook to scam.

I remember getting gas at a Texaco station in Henderson, NV, many years ago. I was driving a 98 Olds less than a year old. The attendant called me to the front and showed me where the shock had moved up and down and the mark on the body of the shock. He said that indicated the shocks were bad and I needed a new set. I looked at him and he knew that his scam wasn't gonna work.

Not an effort to cheat me but still humorous; we were leaving Lake Cit, Co. one day and got behind a rancher moving a herd of cows down the middle of the highway. There was a steep bank on the left side of the road and a ravine on the right side. He motioned me to pull beside him and he said that he was only going a couple hundred yards but if I was in a hurry I could just ease through the herd but if I wasn't in a hurry I could just hang back and I might see something interesting. I looked at him and said that I was in no particular hurry but that I was from Alabama and had seen a cow's ass many a time and it wasn't all that interesting. He just laughed and waved.

Thanks.

It's not just the tough physical work we do and the skill necessary, there's much more. Our equipment today is mostly computerized and very expensive, including updates to same. We need expensive diagnostic aids, again very expensive, which must be updated on the computer monthly(like the old auto repair manuals). Like other businesses we pay rent, insurance, taxes, payroll, govt fees like EPA-Fire Dept-etc-etc-etc.
And that's just a little bit of it.

I've worked in my same location for 48 years and own it 35+. My customers are like my family & more times than not I tell people that they don't need the work they thought.

IMHO a rule for any business: Help people and you will be successful.



-Ken

Brakes went on my truck one time over the weekend. Really needed the truck back on the road Monday morning, and a Goodyear shop was the only thing open. After a complete, total brake job front and rear was quoted at over $1,200.00, I decided I didn't need it on the road that bad. It could wait until Monday when I could get in at my regular shop. Dropped it off over Sunday night-no appointment made, just showed up with it.

He found the back brakes were fine, and the front rotors could be turned one more time. None of the parts actually needed replaced. Goodyear claimed I needed everything-a total replacement. The actual brake assemblies, pads, rotors, calipers, the whole 9 yards.

My mechanic called me by 10:30 on Monday morning. The brakes were done, and the total was a little over $100.00. I told him I'd pick it up that night. He showed up with my vehicle 15 minutes later, and told me to just stop by when I could to pay him. Whole job with a $50.00 tip cost me just over $160.00.

You are kinda funny. I have owned a shop for 35 years and have been in the business since 1968. Most men spend more money on their cars because they come into the shop and tell us what it needs, not what their problem happens to be. It is too macho for you to let an expert tell you what you need. A lady comes in and tells us the car's symptoms and ask us to check it out. I have no employees that have been with me less than 25-30 years other than my Grandson. He has been with me 7 years.
Being this is a campfire forum I need to start threads on terrible docs., lawyers, a/c repairman, plumbers, roofers, remodeling contractors,landscapers, investment brokers, and well, my fingers are sore. If you do your do diligence you will find a great business to do business with.
Crying never helped me either.

Being semi retired, I have been taking some of the automotive courses over at the local community college with my son over the last few years... I have gotten him to take one a semester, so he can learn to work on his own car and know what to do when it breaks down on him....

He has learned a lot and has been well worth the cost.. the younger kids over there think it is real cool that I take the classes with my son.. there are also guys in their 30s, 40s and even early 50s who take the courses, for their ASE certification... My son and I just audit the courses, so we don't have to worry about a grade.. the instructors don't have to worry about we have passing test scores.. we are the only two folks that they have had audit the course, since anyone of them have been there...

I do admit, one of the thing tho, that bugs me, is that in training the students, they orientate them to the flat rate manual....if the manual shows a job to take 5 hours, they will show them how to short cut it, and doing it in 2.... so the dealership can bill it out at the 5 hours, and they can get their percentage cut for 5 hours worth of labor, accomplishing it in only 2...

call me old school, but I have issues with that...I've always been paid by the job, not by the hour in life...in the things I have done...performance based....

When I lived back in MN, I had a mechanic's shop that was near my home in 1980.. he worked on Volvos among other things..so if I couldn't do it myself, I took it there....

Scott had the highest hourly rates in the area, matching a dealership....yet he was one of the cheapest garages at the end of the day, because he charged how long it took him to do something.. not using the flat rate manual... more than once I would get a bill, that said it took him 5 hour to do a job, and charged me for 3 hours....I'd ask him why was that, and he would respond that I should have done it in 3, so that is what I am charging you...

I admit, when I moved 40 miles away, when my car still needed work I couldn't ( and I do all of my own routine maintenance), then I'd still take my car 40 miles over to White Bear Lake to Scott's place...

I highly admired the guy.. and he was someone you could always trust... if he needed to replace a part, the old one was always put in a plastic bag and put in your truck... and shown to you...
after you saw it, he would gladly dispose of it for ya...
yeah a good mechanic is worth his weight in gold...

around here, a HONEST Mechanic is worth his weight in gold...

It isn't just related to the small shop either. The dealerships get right into the mix with their dishonesty. I think, especially if you are out of town and they don't expect you to come back.

I was out of town, but only by a couple of hours. My Suburban shut down and wouldn't restart. It only had about 15,000 miles on it and had always been properly maintained. I called the Chevy place for a tow and when they had a look at it in the shop, they told me the engine was seized up and that there was no oil in it at all. They did have a replacement and could install it and have me on the road in a few hours for only $3500. It wouldn't come under warranty because they had found no oil in the engine.
I called my local Chevy dealer to come pick it up and bring me a loaner. My dealer found that the engine was missing the alternator belt. Nothing else was wrong including the oil level.

Jesus... how blatantly dishonest can they get...

That needs to be reported to the Better Business Bureau and the State Attorney General's Office...

I've always said...

if you point a 38 at some one and rob them, you're looking at jail time....if you have a wrench & a signed repair order, one can rob a person for all they care to... and legally get away with it...

It's good thing that we have the CaptEds and the butchlamberts in business, and on here. Sensible folks know that there are top-drawer businesses, and low-life cheats, in almost every field. Human nature at work, and that is not going to change.

However, what CAN change? A person can improve his/her chances of finding a good/honest perfomer by becoming more knowledgeable about function, and quality. For example, those who invest the time/effort to learn about the function and design of their internal combustion equipment, fix anything they can and search for an expert to deal with what they can't will dramatically reduce the chances of a ripoff experience. The same goes for appliances, roofs, ceiling fans, firearms and you name it.

Folks rarely get ripped off in areas where they have some working knowledge and skill. All of us eat, drink, sleep, etc. and the individual ripoff horror stories seem rarely to occur with food, beverages, mattresses, and the like. Those who don't take their minds past such basic necessities and use much of the remainder for entertainment/personal wants tend to make themselves ripe for picking by the occasional, but ever-present, crooks. Exercise of intellectual curiosity and personal effort can play out in many positive ways. Do our homework.

I don't know Paul, I see a lot of stories about folks calling 911 because a place is out of McNuggets. miles

It was a good dealership and it turns out I knew their lawyer. I think that their repair department had gotten out of hand and when the owners found out about it some serious changes were made.

I don't know much about autos, comparatively speaking, but I do know some. I knew that the engine had been using oil since I bought it new. It had been checked out by the dealer and found to be within specs. I kept an eye on the oil and had checked it since I was taking it out of town. I guess the guy in the repair dept tried the trick one time too many.

This kind of stuff is very commonplace even in large dealerships. Lithia.

Couple of you have mentioned being charged flat rate hours for your repair. Flat rate protects the consumer as much as it benefits the shops. It establishes fair times for jobs to be done by an outside party and doesn't leave it up to individual shops. Protects the mechanic working in the shop as well so that he gets paid for his skill and time. It rewards skilled and organized mechanics and punishes the guy who spends twenty minutes looking for a wrench in his tool box or hiding behind the hood on his cell phone. Theres plenty of times it takes an extra hour or so that the customer isn't charged for. I grew up in my dads pontiac / cadillac garage and years later spent eight years as a Ford Parts and Service Director. I feel I ran an honest shop and my customer approval rating was over 96% for 28 of the 32 qtrs I ran the back end. I have seen it all the good bad and ugly of automotive repair. I left that business in 2001. So I see things from both sides of the counter.