So I have a Mercury that is only 3 years old and the brakes started to sound like an elephant in heat.
Stupidly took it to Lincoln/Mercury dealer here in Las Vegas and they did the oil change and checked the brakes.
Told me I need front and rear brakes and would probably need work on the front rotory…total cost, “between $480 - 580”.
Luckily they didn’t have time to do the work on Saturday.
So I go to Midas (open on Sunday) and innocently had them check my brakes. Twenty minutes later they called and said, “You need front brakes but rear brakes are fine. It’ll cost ya $204.”
Car works just fine now, thank you.
My guess is that I am not the only idiot to be screwed by the dealership for repairs (luckily I got away from them this time).
But I have learned my lesson.
NEVER NEVER NEVER go to a dealership for repairs.
Well, dealer labor is always going to be billed at higher rate. So even the same exact thing will be cheaper at Midas. And Midas and the like aren’t exactly known for not screwing people over themselves. It might turn out that “Oh, BTW, the rotors were too thin to turn, so we had to replace them. That’ll be another $100”. Surprise!
The real insanity is going to the dealer for an oil change in the first place.
I agree that you should never go to THAT PARTICULAR dealership for repairs.
I took my new car to the local dealer for oil changes, etc., for a few years. The service manager was great – never talked down to me, let me know when something would be needing attention in a few months, and so on, and the prices were reasonable. I even followed him to the dealership 40 miles away when the local place was consolidated with it.
But then he left, and the new guys were morons and jerks. So we went back to the garage 40 miles away (in a different city) that we’d used when we lived there.
I’m sure the motorheads will be in here shortly to talk about overpriced dealer parts, price undercutting, and so on, and I defer to their knowledge. But I prefer to judge each place on its own merits. We’ve been screwed (and treated well) by dealers and independents alike.
Yet another reason to learn more about how your vehicle operates, and how to conduct some checks yourself. The dealer’s less likely to try (and less likely to be successful) to screw you if you know what you’re talking about.
I drive a Saturn and I prefer to take my car to them. Nice guys, clean facilities, and they seem to shoot straight with me.
Midas horror story…took my car in to have my squeaky brakes fixed, figuring it’d be the $69 special. I walked back to the garage a couple of hours later, they still had my car up on the rack with the wheels off. When I asked what was up, the guy fed me some story about something being frozen up in there and they can’t loosen it yet because they’ll have to get a special tool, and that’ll cost extra. Now I know jack squat about cars but I can smell when I’m being taken, so I told them no thanks. The guy says, "Well, legally, I can’t let you drive the car with brakes like this. " I told him “No, legally, you can’t steal my car. Get my wheels back on and give it back.” He had to talk to his manager to see if it was ok to give me my car back! I got it finally, took it to Saturn who changed the brakes for me with no rigamarole and charged me under $100. Cost a little more than I was going to pay originally at Midas but was cheaper in the long run.
Actually I think thats not too high for the front & rear. I would ask them to prove it needs to be
done though, also you didn’t say what you get in that. Do they change the fluid & rebuild cylinders?
Yeah, Midas can be pretty bad about trying to cheat you - it probably depends on how honest the manager is. I took my car there for a muffler, and they tried to sell me a new master cyllinder, claiming that mine was leaking bad and was almost empty when I brought it in (they even tried to show me the nonexistant “leak” with a flashlight, saying “look! Did you see it?” when a grease-monkey pumped the brakes and no leak happened.)
On the other hand, a Midas on the other side of town told my wife there was absolutely nothing wrong with her brakes, and told her to get a second opinion to make sure they were right. Ya never know.
As for the dealership, never take your car to a dealership for repair (Saturn being the odd exception). When my car was stolen and later recovered, the theifs had run it up on a curb trying to get away from the cops, and busted the oil pan and oil pan gasket in the process.
The dealership did the repair work (because the insurance company told us to take it to them) and replaced the oil pan (after a whole freaking MONTH of keeping my car) and returned it to me. Unfortunately, they neglected to install a new oil pan gasket after they removed the old one. I got about a half mile before my oil warning light came on (seems that all of my oil had been left in a long trail from the dealership) and I had to get them to re-repair my car.
Dealerships are highly attuned to preventive maintenance. If you’re an ain’t-broke-so-don’t-fix kind of person, the dealership probably isn’t for you. On the other hand, all-purpose shops often lack the tools and sometimes even the information they need to fix the problem. Somewhere I just read an article about how manufacturers are denying independent repair-shop owners access to their computer codes and other proprietary information.
I worked for a dealership that is probably considered pretty good, but even they had their serious ups and downs, from person to person and from week to week.
I did notice this. When a service center is busy, the team seems to be less interested in spooning on the gravy; when things are somewhat quiet, that can change in a hurry. Good service centers tend to stay busy more often, and therefore tend to stay more honest. Bad ones seem to get shadier and shadier.
Incidentally, my dealership had a notorious “brake bandit” amongst its ranks. A brake job on an old Mercedes was rated as a one-hour job, but one of our guys could knock one out in twenty minutes. Perhaps unsurprisingly, every car that came across his lift needed brakes.
ski is spot on about learning more about the mechanics of your car–knowledge is your best defense against those who would take advantage of you. Sometimes you may even discover that a percieved rip-off is in actuality solid, honest advice.
Hello…me again, the OP of this thread.
I have calmed down since posting my original rant.
However, I will still not go back to that dealer for repairs.
To answer a few questions:
I know nothing about cars - thus I guess I will always be the guy who may or may not get screwed when getting repairs (hey - I speak multiple languages and can create databases out of thin air - I just have no interest in cars/motors and stuff.)
My point was that it seems odd that Midas - in the business of selling brakes, would tell me I don’t need new rear brakes and also charge far less (front and rear with the rotory work was going to cost $370). Another Midas about 3 years ago told me my Saturn didn’t need anything and the squeak I heard is known as “desert dust” and would go away in a day or two. Sure enough, it did. Total cost $0.
So - maybe you guys are right - no, you guys ARE right - it all depends on the guys doing the repairs - Midas could screw ya just as much as any name brand dealership.
And yes, I guess if I sat my butt down and looked through the owners manual once in awhile, I might learn something and save a few bucks in the process.
An idea: for people like me, why isn’t there an independent chain (UnMidas) that for a fee will check over your car and tell you what is wrong. They wouldn’t - couldn’t - do repairs. They just would do diagnostics so people like me could then go to any garage and say I want ONLY this and this done.
just a random interjection here: you could have done the job at home for probaby $50. Midas usually is about 4x the parts price. i alway take (whatever vehicle) to midas for an estimate, then go home and do the work myself. (note to self: “hey, dumbass! that’s why they charge so much! they gotta recoup the labor cost for doing free estimates for assholes like you!” [me!])
not saying you should have, cause auto repair isn’t everyones idea of fun. just an observation.
my worst Midas experiance is when i took my car in * and they couldn’t identify it! They didn’t know what it was!*
M: What kind of car?
G: 1980 Fiat Spider
M: What is that? A Ford? Chevy?
G: Its a Fiat.
M: Yeah, but what make is it? You gotta know what make it is!
G: Its a FIAT! You know? ItS the (at the time) WORLD’S LARGEST AUTOMOBILE MANUFACTURER? They own Ferrari! Theres MILLIONS OF THEM ALL OVER THE GLOBE FER GOD’S SAKE!!!
M: Huh? (blank stare)
DMark, if you don’t know much cars take someone along with you who does. I do that for my
friends sometimes. I know how to talk to the auto guys. Or it seems so since they drop
their prices quite a lot.
Hmm. Thus far, I’ve always taken my car to the dealer. but–it’s also under warranty for nearly 4 more years, so most anything they find comes out of Honda’s pocket. This is also why I plan to keep the car for only as long as the warranty’s good.
Co-Worker’s Jaw-Dropping Jerk Mechanic Story:
She took her Ford in to a shop (unsure what it was) for an oil change. It was supposed to be $20; when she was called in to pick up her car, she was given come cock-and-bull story about how she needed special oil, special additives, special drainage, whatever, and thus golly, it cost more. My friend was livid and started ripping into them about how they had no right to do that, etc, so forth, and so on. She then said she had no reason to come back–that she could just go to the cheap Jiffy Lube around the corner and pay $15 for her oil change. This numbnuts response?
"Yeah, but they’re Mexicans! They’ll probably just piss in your fuel tank." :eek:
My co-worker responded: “For what you just charged me, there better be fucking gold flakes in it!”
She called the manager, got a very apologetic/ass-kissing letter, and some free oil changes. No idea what happened to racist mechanic dickweed.