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Online reviews are still the best overall view of those businesses you aren't familiar with. Yeah, yeah, I know, "they only have good reviews"---NOT. I am a constant Yelper, and I am articulate in my critique of those I feel didn't do me right. Restaurants, auto shops, even dentists and doctors. We have this marvelous utility at our fingertips and most shun it because of myths. The other thing that is worth mentioning is that the dealers are the most familiar with their own brand cars, diagnostics is often based on the heavy repeat of common problems, so getting to the meat and potatoes is usually a bit more expedited. No guarantees, but again read what others have to say..
I'm surprised noone has said anything about the fact that the car overheated.. First off, around here, I'm surprised someone hasn't piped up and said "Head Gasket" yet, but..
The light could be totally unrelated to their work, it could also be completely related to the fact that the vehicle overheated.
Now, $650 for a radiator hose and thermostat is excessive. Big time. So, I'm not defending this shop.. But.. Someone comes in and tells them the problem.. They shouldn't take that as gospel. They should listen, but they should be doing their own diagnosis. The odds are that the tech working on the car never got that note anyway.. Would be my guess. Still inexcusable that they didn't catch a leak. What happened, the tech was told it overheated, he replaced the thermostat, job done.. Didn't run it up to temp to test at all. By doing that, the leak would have been apparent.
What you cannot do is blame this light on them.. Not yet, at least. Find out what the light is first, and I certainly agree with those who said they shouldn't be the ones diagnosing that.. They've failed pretty miserably so far.
You get the results of that light and it's a temp too low or something.. yeah.. A stuck open thermostat that, supposedly has just been replaced.. Then you can blame them. You get a misfire code or something like that.. You start looking at whether that overheat did damage, which I would not blame that shop for not catching. Or, it could be something totally unrelated.. It comes back as an Evap leak.. That's most likely not caused by the first shop, and likely wasn't caused by the overheat, either.
People like to complain about dealerships.. And, look, I don't use them for normal run of the mill stuff.. But, a few years back, I had a MAP sensor problem that just turned me around and upside down.. I tapped out and it took them an hour to diagnose and fix it.. Intermittent wire break running to the sensor. I had tested that three times and missed it.
As for recouping.. Good luck with that. Just.. Let it go and don't use them again.
I'm surprised noone has said anything about the fact that the car overheated.. First off, around here, I'm surprised someone hasn't piped up and said "Head Gasket" yet, but..
Possible I guess but I did pull over right away and nobody caught any signs of this being the case.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Labonte18
The light could be totally unrelated to their work, it could also be completely related to the fact that the vehicle overheated.
Now, $650 for a radiator hose and thermostat is excessive. Big time. So, I'm not defending this shop.. But.. Someone comes in and tells them the problem.. They shouldn't take that as gospel. They should listen, but they should be doing their own diagnosis. The odds are that the tech working on the car never got that note anyway.. Would be my guess. Still inexcusable that they didn't catch a leak. What happened, the tech was told it overheated, he replaced the thermostat, job done.. Didn't run it up to temp to test at all. By doing that, the leak would have been apparent.
This extra charge was due to their mishap which pisses me off. Not sure how I could have handled it differently though. They said it was fixed and I wanted to get my car out of there.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Labonte18
What you cannot do is blame this light on them.. Not yet, at least. Find out what the light is first, and I certainly agree with those who said they shouldn't be the ones diagnosing that.. They've failed pretty miserably so far.
You get the results of that light and it's a temp too low or something.. yeah.. A stuck open thermostat that, supposedly has just been replaced.. Then you can blame them. You get a misfire code or something like that.. You start looking at whether that overheat did damage, which I would not blame that shop for not catching. Or, it could be something totally unrelated.. It comes back as an Evap leak.. That's most likely not caused by the first shop, and likely wasn't caused by the overheat, either.
People like to complain about dealerships.. And, look, I don't use them for normal run of the mill stuff.. But, a few years back, I had a MAP sensor problem that just turned me around and upside down.. I tapped out and it took them an hour to diagnose and fix it.. Intermittent wire break running to the sensor. I had tested that three times and missed it.
As for recouping.. Good luck with that. Just.. Let it go and don't use them again.
Good points and I guess there is not much I can do to recoup. Threatening not to do business with them will not help because I am sure they know I don't trust them anyway.
I should have went to the dealer to begin with. I did have it towed to the dealer originally (this other place was right down the road and their diagnostic fee was practically nothing compared to the dealer who wanted 120). So I either go back to this dealer with egg on my face (in addition to having a run in with them a couple months ago due to their work on a recall). Maybe I will just go to the next closest dealer and see what they say. I don't know of another independent shop nearby that I trust.
You’ve already been taken advantage of by the shop that did the work, and I think it’s a pipe dream to believe you are going to get any money back from them. I would take it to the dealer and get it fixed properly, the logic being it sounds like you still have things that need taken care of and there is no way the local shop should see you again.
You’ve already been taken advantage of by the shop that did the work, and I think it’s a pipe dream to believe you are going to get any money back from them. I would take it to the dealer and get it fixed properly, the logic being it sounds like you still have things that need taken care of and there is no way the local shop should see you again.
A friend said I should go back to them as they might be embarrassed and want to make things right. They were polite and seemed like decent guys personally but it's difficult for me to trust them at this point. Maybe they are incompetent or maybe they are not the nice guys they portray themselves as.
If they do have good intentions and more competent than they have shown so far, taking it back there could save me a good chunk of cash. If not then the results could be even more disastrous. I guess I should have went to the dealer to begin with.
Ok so I was going to follow the advice given and take it to the dealer but the dealer was all booked up today.
I went ahead and took it back to the shop that replaced the thermostat. They took a look and said it was a bad PCV valve. Apparently, there was damaged due to the coolant splattering when the car overheated. They asked for 130 to replace that.
The part will not be in until tomorrow but they said the car would be safe to drive in the meantime. I would just have to watch when stopped at the lights as the car did stall a couple of times.
He is confident that this will be the end of it. I'm still not happy about the extra 250 I was charged. His reasoning was that he could have charged me 800 up front but didn't want them to have to do work that wasn't necessary. I guess I can buy that although I am still not happy about the way the first two trips were handled especially when they were told up front that it was the thermostat AND hose.
Lesson learned: next time I receive a quote, oo back and have them put it in writing so I know everything they plan to do. I assumed they were replacing the hose the first trip but I guess I should have confirmed.
Where is the math here? Your first charge was $400 for, basically a thermostat.
Then $250 for a radiator hose.
That's $650. The PCV valve, which I won't even weigh in on the coolant splatter theory.. They didn't know anything about the first go round.. Where is the $800 coming from?
I'm starting to think that math isn't his strong suit, either.
What kind of car is this anyway? I just can't see the $650 for a radiator hose and thermostat.
The odds are that the tech working on the car never got that note anyway.. Would be my guess.
I run into this all the time. Sometimes I know exactly what the problem is, or more often, I know exactly what it isn't. Sometimes I ask them to give me the form and I write in all Caps X IS NOT THE PROBLEM DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES REPLACE X. I WILL NOT PAY FOR REPLACEMENT OF X."
I come back and they say "Well, we replaced X we think that will solve the problem, you will need to drive it a while and see."
I'm surprised noone has said anything about the fact that the car overheated.. First off, around here, I'm surprised someone hasn't piped up and said "Head Gasket" yet, but..
The light could be totally unrelated to their work, it could also be completely related to the fact that the vehicle overheated.
Now, $650 for a radiator hose and thermostat is excessive. Big time. So, I'm not defending this shop.. But.. Someone comes in and tells them the problem.. They shouldn't take that as gospel. They should listen, but they should be doing their own diagnosis. The odds are that the tech working on the car never got that note anyway.. Would be my guess. Still inexcusable that they didn't catch a leak. What happened, the tech was told it overheated, he replaced the thermostat, job done.. Didn't run it up to temp to test at all. By doing that, the leak would have been apparent.
What you cannot do is blame this light on them.. Not yet, at least. Find out what the light is first, and I certainly agree with those who said they shouldn't be the ones diagnosing that.. They've failed pretty miserably so far.
You get the results of that light and it's a temp too low or something.. yeah.. A stuck open thermostat that, supposedly has just been replaced.. Then you can blame them. You get a misfire code or something like that.. You start looking at whether that overheat did damage, which I would not blame that shop for not catching. Or, it could be something totally unrelated.. It comes back as an Evap leak.. That's most likely not caused by the first shop, and likely wasn't caused by the overheat, either.
People like to complain about dealerships.. And, look, I don't use them for normal run of the mill stuff.. But, a few years back, I had a MAP sensor problem that just turned me around and upside down.. I tapped out and it took them an hour to diagnose and fix it.. Intermittent wire break running to the sensor. I had tested that three times and missed it.
As for recouping.. Good luck with that. Just.. Let it go and don't use them again.
Did they do a preasure check to see excatly were the leak was, if not they just guessed were the leak was. Did they give you a detailed invoice telling you what they done and parts used. I would take it to somewhere else and have them look at it and show them the detailed invoice. Get their results and a statement to what was wrong with the car in case you take them to court.
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