Garage haven't fixed my car, do I pay?
Discussion
So my car started mis-behaving a week before Christmas, juddering and hesitating a lot. A local garage has had it since the 16th Dec and been trying to fix it, even including the local main dealer for the make in troubleshooting and resolution.
However here I am a month on and the problem still isn't fixed and I've not seen my P&J for a month. I've asked for it to be returned by the end of the day so I can get it move to a specialist indy near my home who I have faith in.
The question is, what do I pay, if anything? They've not provided any costs, despite asking. They've changed god knows how many parts, again no quotes. I work in the IT industry and we have the same issues with IT problems, but there is always a maximum I can charge a customer and I would certainly keep them in the loop on costs.
To be fair to them the problem is intermittent, but from my perspective why should I pay if they haven't fixed it?
However here I am a month on and the problem still isn't fixed and I've not seen my P&J for a month. I've asked for it to be returned by the end of the day so I can get it move to a specialist indy near my home who I have faith in.
The question is, what do I pay, if anything? They've not provided any costs, despite asking. They've changed god knows how many parts, again no quotes. I work in the IT industry and we have the same issues with IT problems, but there is always a maximum I can charge a customer and I would certainly keep them in the loop on costs.
To be fair to them the problem is intermittent, but from my perspective why should I pay if they haven't fixed it?
I suppose you should pay because you've asked them to spend time investigating an intermittent fault. If they haven't fixed it, they may well have removed a lot of the possible causes, wittling it down closer and closer to the true issue.
Go and have a chat with the mechanic who has been working on your car, ask him what he looked at, why he changed this part and that part, why he ran such and such test and piece together the puzzle with him. Then you might be able to work towards another possible solution
Go and have a chat with the mechanic who has been working on your car, ask him what he looked at, why he changed this part and that part, why he ran such and such test and piece together the puzzle with him. Then you might be able to work towards another possible solution
I recently had a garage have three goes at diagnosing a misfire on my car. I asked them to call me when the labour bill got over £100 and to call before spending any money on parts.
Is it annoying that I have to pay for them guessing wrong? Yes. But at least I've managed the costs and it never goes over budget.
Is it annoying that I have to pay for them guessing wrong? Yes. But at least I've managed the costs and it never goes over budget.
Ahhh, cost management and problem identification. A subject close to my heart!
The "call me if you go over X", where X is your comfort zone, is a good idea for future work. As mentioned above, it's a great idea to speak to the mechanic too, get an idea as to what was done, and why. If there's something that doesn't look necessary, you could discuss that part of the bill?
If I have an intermittent problem to diagnose, it's much, much harder. I try to google up / ask a forum for a list of possible issues, and then speak to the garage -- if they all sound plausible, I tell them to do all the jobs in order, from cheapest to most expensive, until it's fixed (if that's what I'm happy to pay to get the car fixed). They can also give a rough idea of costs on labour and parts.
The "call me if you go over X", where X is your comfort zone, is a good idea for future work. As mentioned above, it's a great idea to speak to the mechanic too, get an idea as to what was done, and why. If there's something that doesn't look necessary, you could discuss that part of the bill?
If I have an intermittent problem to diagnose, it's much, much harder. I try to google up / ask a forum for a list of possible issues, and then speak to the garage -- if they all sound plausible, I tell them to do all the jobs in order, from cheapest to most expensive, until it's fixed (if that's what I'm happy to pay to get the car fixed). They can also give a rough idea of costs on labour and parts.
you took your car to them to diagnose the fault with your car, that takes time and you have to pay for that. They could not find the fault, well you choose them to do the work and if its because they were cheaper, its not now. For every hour that garage spends diagnosing your car is an hour that could have been spent on servicing where the customer will know the cost up front and wont complain that he is being charged 3 hours labour to diagnose and intermittent fault, which are the worse faults to diagnose. So many people expect a mechanic to spend half a day diagnosing a car faults for free.
Edited by TLandCruiser on Tuesday 14th January 10:09
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