christian brothers automotive (Houston, Sugar Land, Howe: coupons, costs, shop)

[gsmj]

OP are you implying that Christian Brothers was not honest, or that the work was not up to industry standard?

[ryan in texas]

You did not get ripped off. You just paid full retail.

Don't use Autozone to compare prices. Most reputable shops use oem or decent aftermarket.


Mechanical labor can easily be 100 per hour.

CB has nice shops with fancy waiting areas. The price reflects that.

Use Yelp to find a good shop.

[NY to LA]

Originally Posted by gsmj

OP are you implying that Christian Brothers was not honest, or that the work was not up to industry standard?

I would have preferred to pay the full price at the dealer instead of paying it at an automotive shop.

[jasonamd]

Originally Posted by NY to LA

I would have preferred to pay the full price at the dealer instead of paying it at an automotive shop.

You don't necessarily get better service at a dealer. I'd take my car to Christian Brothers over my nearest dealer any day. Only used the dealer for warranty issues and I quickly found out I knew more about what was wrong with my car than they did. One particular issue took 4 trips to get fixed correctly and on the final trip I actually had to give them the TSB (Technical Service Bulletin) number and tell them that's what was wrong. Guess what...it was fixed right after I basically told them exactly what was wrong and how to fix it. Once car was out of warranty, never went back. Have used Christian Brothers and a co-workers son-in-law's shop and never had any issues or had to go back because something was done wrong.

[texsn95]

Yup dealers are hit and miss, and it's good to have a relationship with a service advisor. I have my M5 in for some warranty work and luckily my SA is familiar with the cars otherwise I'd find somewhere else. Their labor rates are crazy, around $130 or so but it's warranty work so I don't care.

[Dopo]

Originally Posted by chris_ut

Never do business with anyone that uses Christian in their business name.

I saw a truck the other day with a sticker on the side that said something like
"Jesus delivery company"
and had a mexican looking guy driving the truck
I couldn't stop laughing at it.

[carryyourbooks]

Originally Posted by NY to LA

hello,

I just had a problem with my car and as we are new in houston and my husband was out of town, so I took the car to christian brothers automotive. They changed the rear brakes pads and rotors and charged me $420 after discount. I googled this online and found the rotors are sold in autozone for about half the price they charged for them.

I already used them this time and paid whatever they asked for but I was wondering if I should use them in the future or not.

Originally Posted by Oildog

Never done business with them. But If you go through a shop you will pay a mark up for parts (higher than a do-it-yourself auto part store) and for labor. Because you are paying for their time and experience to get the job done faster/easier than you can do it.

Originally Posted by marksmu

I dont know if $420 is high for pads/rotors b/c I have never had to replace mine, BUT any shop that does work for you will always mark up their parts - its part of their overhead. All shops mark up their inventory - its a cost of business. You will always pay more for parts from a shop that also does the labor than you would if you bought them at the store.

Autozone sells their pads for more than they get them too.

marksmu hit it on the head. CB is like any other business you use. they wouldn't be there if they sold things to you for what it cost them to buy them. believe it or not, they probably paid a lot less for your parts than what autozone has them for. autozone and other retailers often provide discounts for volume buying. autozone sold them to CB for more than what they paid them for. this is how capitalism works. as long as CB did a great job for a fair price that you most likely agreed upon before they started, I don't understand your complaint. not pointing fingers at you OP, but there are still many out there who wants everything for cheap, but they when it comes to their paycheck, they go opposite. go figure.

[carryyourbooks]

Originally Posted by Bad Haggis

If you were able to remove 5 lugs and 2 bolts, you could've take those to rotors to O'Reilly and they'd resurface them for $16-20 a piece. Most likely you could've kept your old pads in the calipers and broken them back in again after some hard driving. Rear pads last forever.

Originally Posted by NY to LA

I would have preferred to pay the full price at the dealer instead of paying it at an automotive shop.

dealers aren't all they are cracked up to be. sure, they have specialized training in their particular make, but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to do brakes.

i'll give you an example. my vehicle's manual says to change oil every 7500 miles. when I took it to the dealer, they put a sticker on it for 3000 miles. I told them about the manual.......they still put 3000 miles on the sticker.

[oceangaia]

Originally Posted by mhfi12

Christian Brothers uses top quality parts and stands behind their work. I wouldn't go anywhere else. Brakes are a very importantant part of your vehicle and could in some cases mean life of death. I would never use some shade tree mechanic to work on my car and take the chance of being killed or stranded. The parts at AutoZone that you called on might not even be the same quality part that Christian Brothers used. Its like going to Lowes and buying a John Deere riding lawn mower VS going to John Deere. The mowers at Lowes are made with cheaper quality parts and engines than the ones at John Deere. They break down quicker. Always remember you get what you pay for!!!

Baloney. If you always "get what you pay for" there would be no need to be a smart consumer and comparison shop. Just pick by the price tag. Fact is, while it may generally be true that you DON'T get what you DON'T pay for, there are any number of shysters willing to give you less than what you paid for.

[GTRdad]

Honest service providers normally will show you the receipt for each item in the bill of materials. Sometimes to show you that they got the part CHEAPER because of their connection to the part supplier. IMO its only OK to mark up prices on items you keep in the inventory.
I do my own work on everything around the house and cars. I do get lazy or busy though and have paid fullprice a few times to get it done. It was not as painful as the OP though