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Price Gouging Mechanics and some kudos

E

enduro

CEG'er
Joined
Sep 26, 2005
Messages
364
Location
Calgary, AB
I have to replace both lower control on my 96 V6 Tour. The alignment shop wanted almost $475 each side ..... and that was on top of their $105/hour labour. Total would have been $1500 easy.

I resisted the urge to tell the owner to f ... himself and went internet shopping. Once again, Bill Jenkins of las Vegas ford came thru. I've ordered from him in the past and he is a pleasure to do businees with. I got the parts at just over 1/4 of what the mechanic was charging.

I asked the first shop if they were still interested in installing the LCA's and was told they wont install even OEM parts because there is no money it it for them. I guess at $105/ hr they still cant make a profit ... without a $350% markup on their parts.

Anyone else here had any siimilar dealinghs with a dishonest repair shop or dealership.
 
I was quoted 800 for labour for doing the lca's , but the guy was straight up, said that it takes a mechanic all day because of the issue on the drivers side, and when I told him for that price I'd probably do it myself he said he'd do the same. Can't get mad at a shop for wanting to make a profit. That said, 475 for parts, gtfo.
 
What issue is that? Loosening the bolt so you can get a sawzall on it? Find a local CEGer to do it if you don't want to.
 
Well they are the best alignment shop in town and the guy indicated that he would put the LCA on if they were OEMs. Kinda backtracked after I found some though...

Almost no mechanics here will put on customer supplied parts . And I cant really blame them for that. As lots of idiots bring in wrong parts wasting their and the shops time.

I live in Alberta and there probably isnt a good shop in the entire province that charges under $95/labour nowadays
 
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Here is a quote from my shop. We use Mitchell manager plus and On Demand estimator.

3.40@ 65.00 CONTROL ARM - Remove & Replace - [DOES NOT include alignment.] - Lower,Left $221.00
1.30@ 65.00 CONTROL ARM - Remove & Replace - [DOES NOT include alignment.] - Lower,Right $84.50

So labor here is 65.00 an hour so labolr total would be 305.50. On top of that there is a disposal/supplies fee which is a couple bucks and then the alignment which would be 49.99........not bad considering we paid about 50 grand for an aligner and the rack.!!!!!!!

As far as installing customer supplied parts..........rarely do we do it. Several reasons for this include people bringing inferior (cheap) parts they got off ebay which may be prone to failure or fitment problems and as was mentioned before......wrong parts which in some cases means down time (car stuck on my rack) and consequently loss of the little bit of profit that we might have made in the first place. My biggest rant is when I am asked a price on a part and then am told that they can get the part at the parts store down the road for 5.00 less. Do I go into walmart and complain that the milk at the dairy is cheaper......or do I take a burger patty into McD's and ask them to cook it for me?????????????? Nobody ever takes into consideration the fact that I spend MY time researching these parts, finding them, ordering them, in some cases pick them up AND take care of the warranty on the part when the part fails........but no one considers that.

We have started a new thing now where we charge 1.5 times the normal labor cost if someone does bring their own parts (and we decide to do it) as this covers many of the things I just mentioned in the last paragraph.

Sorry if all that came across as a little agressive but as a shop owner this is something that aggrivates us every day and I wanted to voice my opinion on the matter.
 
enduro, where are you located? I'll do them for $50 and you can hang around and watch. I just did both of mine when installing my new suspension and they aren't difficult at all, just a little time consuming (not $300+ time consuming). I got lucky and didn't have to use a hack saw because all of my bolts broke, so they came out easy, but just had to buy all new bolts and nuts.
 
Thanks I might take you up on that. Do you live within a 100 - 200 kn of Red Deer. It'll be next week at the earliest before the LCA's arrive. I'll probably do the easy side myself . Not sure if I want to tackle the other side though. Did you put in your headers . That'll be my next upgrade.

I really gotta get on things, I still havent even installed my Pudmunkie heatsheild yet
 
limeyscott said:
Sorry if all that came across as a little agressive but as a shop owner this is something that aggrivates us every day and I wanted to voice my opinion on the matter.
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What about if they bring OEM parts that they have? Sometimes people get deals from other like Steve at Tously Ford.
 
Honestly in cases like that elraido it all depends on the person. If some guy comes in and wants a quote and then gets pi$$ed about my quote and tells me how he can get the parts cheaper elsewhere.......then I may not take that job but if a guy walks in and explains that he has oe parts that he would like installed and asks for a labor quote then I am more apt to do it. Some parts that aren't "critical" to the safety of the vehicle are no big deal but some things that ppl wanna get cheap on their lives depend on those parts and yet they still wanna cheap out on them. You see where I am coming from?

I have a customer that brings me after market performance stuff all the time for his cars......and since I don't deal after market performance goods I usually instll them for him with no questions asked.

Sum up:if you come in and get a quote and later show up with crappy cheap parts and expect me to put them on......hit the road, but if you come in with the parts already and they are known to be correct and of a high quality then sure.....I'll take care of you but just remember I am running a buisness.....not a charity!!(and I swear some people want actual charity work done for them as if am bored or something)
 
Personally I dont mind a reasonable markup from a mechanic on parts but it my case it was near 400%. I can only imagine what the local stealership would have been asking.

I also wouldnt expect a mechanic to put on some ebay crap. I'll almost always get OEM for that reason.

Last year I needed to get a coil pack, IMrc and wires ( all OEM). The prices I was quoted were $450, $725 and $125. Of course i got them somewhere else for much less.
 
enduro said:
Personally I dont mind a reasonable markup from a mechanic on parts but it my case it was near 400%. I can only imagine what the local stealership would have been asking.
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You might be suprised that it is much under what this garage quoted.
 
My markup on parts is between 60 and 70% unless part is over $200 and then the percentage starts going down the higher the price goes.....BUT I get parts cheaper than what the general public does since I buy in such volume.........and also when there is a sale, I pass the savings on!!
 
The garage I go to when I can't fix something is really good on prices with me. If a part costs $50 they normally charge like $55-60 if I don't have it. I went to another place a long time ago, and they had to change spark plugs....charged me $5 a plug for copper plugs. :nonono:
 
.......and unfortunately there are some crooks out there, for instance Jiffy Lube and I imagine you have all viewed the video on shoshop.com (i think thats where I saw it) and then TV shows like dateline NBC make this stuff public and just because of some bad apples, all of us shop owners and mechanics get quizzed all the time about ripping ppl off.......forget innocent until proven guilty........we have to prove ourselves innocent because of crap like this we are assumed guilty from the start!!
 
limeyscott said:
.......and unfortunately there are some crooks out there, for instance Jiffy Lube and I imagine you have all viewed the video on shoshop.com (i think thats where I saw it) and then TV shows like dateline NBC make this stuff public and just because of some bad apples, all of us shop owners and mechanics get quizzed all the time about ripping ppl off.......forget innocent until proven guilty........we have to prove ourselves innocent because of crap like this we are assumed guilty from the start!!
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i remember a freind of mine brought her car to a mechanics place to get fixed. After they "fixed" it, it started making all sorts of noises.....turned out they put a bunch of screws and bolts into various parts of the cars to rattle around when she went over bumps.
 
elraido said:
i remember a freind of mine brought her car to a mechanics place to get fixed. After they "fixed" it, it started making all sorts of noises.....turned out they put a bunch of screws and bolts into various parts of the cars to rattle around when she went over bumps.
Click to expand...

OMG......I have heard it all now......thats insane and believe me when I say I am not that bored nor do I need the work THAT bad! geez!!!
 
Years ago, I had a Taurus MT-5 wagon. A Ford dealer in Missoula, Montana had it for two weeks doing a clutch job. They kept putting me off -- "Oh, it'll be done tomorrow" -- day after day.

When I got the car back, I found that they'd intentially buggered the water pump pulley. It sounded like an unbalanced washing machine. More interesting was that the entire engine bay was covered with yellow dry chemical from a fire extinguisher.

It was very shortly after that that I was driving the car from Montana to Massachusetts. After pulling into a Quik-Trip in La Crescent, Minnesota, just over the river from La Crosse, Wisconsin, I witnessed the blackest smoke I think I've ever seen. What's more, it was rolling up the windshield from under the hood -- all this as I'm parked next to a fuel pump -- the malfeasance started right as I turned off the ignition.

Opening the hood revelaed a warm, roaring fire, conveniently right below the fuel injection system. I had two choices: Push the car away from the pumps and hope that, during that endeavor, the lines did not catch and send the car into full fiery engagement, or run like hell into the store and get an extinguisher. I went with option B.

"I need an fire extinguisher now!" The clerk had it ready, and I took off in a sprint back toward the flaming Taurus, thinking, "Funny. I've never actually used one of these before. Time to learn fast." I pulled the pin and let 'er rip, successfully dousing the flames with, ironically, dry chemical. I pushed the car away from the pumps, possibly with the help of some kind folks who were not among those who peeled out of there like Richard Petty on a victory lap at Bristol upon seeing the smoke. Oil was everywhere.

The backside of the valve cover had completely let go, covering the very hot exhaust manifold with oil. From there, it had easily ignited. I was never able to prove the extent of the wrongdoing of that dealership, and the evidence is long gone, now, as I junked the car at Shiftar's Auto Salvage in La Crosse and flew home.
 
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