Car service at your own risk

I can't beleive what I am reading. I am a self employed HGV mechanic. I work at the roadside, usually on motorways, mostly M6 M58 M61 M65 M57 M56. I repair at the roadside and if I can't do a repair I normally don't charge. When I do a repair the truck drives away without paying me a penny piece. The customer gets a month to pay and a years g'tee for the work, and at least 6 months on parts......... Why you lot pay and pay without getting your motors back is beyond me. In fact if I'm repairing a truck, say at the motorway services, and a car driver asks me to help him I never charge, I only charge an actual callout if I'm wrung up and asked to come out.

In the mid 90's I was a manager of a small car repair shop and every customer was treated as if it was my own car. I NEVER fitted parts that were not needed, as I feel this is unlucky. One day an old boy brought his Metro in for a brake check, rear shoes and front pads. I checked them and told him they were fine and lots of life left in them, they were not even 50% down. The owner of the shop pulled me to one side and he told me that if anybody else comes in and asks for a "free" check I must fit pads and shoes as a matter of course. That was on a Friday. I asked him how many days notice I needed to give him, he told go when you want. I slid the shop keys across the counter and walked out. I went to the newsagents and paid full price for yesterdays paper, got a job in Saudia Arabia for 2 years! The shop closed down very soon after. Now I have my own business and I'm happy, just like my customers!

Bought a Zafira from Bristan Motors in West Drayton £3500 cash, new MOT on purchase when I collect next day, 2 days later breaks grinding down to the disk, took it back they fixed it and said mechanic overlooked it, I told him it should have been picked up on the MOT, but it was repaired free.
Had a new stereo fitted from Halfords £130.00, week later car broke down near Heathrow had kids and wife in the car, got a lift home and Bristan arranged to collect it and sort it out, told me the ignition stuck on and burnt the starter motor out, charged me £132 and paid by card as to obtain a receipt, but no breakdown of the work done or parts, got in the car and the stereo don't work or the clock panel, he put a fuse in which had blown, drove home 2 min away.
Came to start it at 0430 as I work as a bus driver and the battery was flat, used an instant engine starter and down the road found radii not working and the panel not lighting up, fuse had gone again.
Took it to Halfords they checked the radio on a board and it worked, told me the fuse was blowing from a bad wiring in the dash, took it back to Bristan and he told me it was the radio and didn't even look. Halfords then changed the stereo with a new one, went for 1 hour and blew again, Bristan won't touch the car now and says it can't be the car.

I service my nissan car at autotrade in Dominica in the west indies , which is the official nissan garage,but the mechanics there are very incompetent I an have problem after problems my car is a 2008 model I purchase it in july 2009 I think this is something the nissan company in japan should know I am thinking of getting rid of it to buy a toyota .

I had my car serviced on the way home it started to smoke when I put it in my driveway it stuck on full revs ihad to open bonnet and press the cut out ther was oil every where I phoned them and explained thay came and took the car and brought it back an hour later it dossentfeel right now will thiscause any more probblems to my engine in
future as my engine was on full revs for about 4miniuts and a trail of black smoke to much oil
after service

They deny everything!
Took my LPG Mercedes V280 to "in'n'out" in bristol for MOT. It failed on tyre & emissions so we said go ahead and do the work.
Went to collect the next day and the car was blowing the radiator cap off due to them damaging the gas regulator which was leaking liquid LPG into the cooling system and pressurising it to 200bar!
They have denied everything and said they dont even do repairs! so why did they charge me £45 diagnostics for emissions?
I have taken the car to the LPG installer to put right and will submit the bill to their head office along with a strongly worded letter.
So it seems national franchise garages are just the same when it comes to lying about damage they have caused. I'll stick to small back street ones next time.

I've been driving for 33 years and have never met an honest garage since.One of the worst things
was paying for a new thermostat and finding 2 years later that the car didn't have one.But the
crafty garages always ask for your car early in the morning and while they work on other cars
they slowly inflate your bill.

I think if the garage had anything about them they would of picked up the tab for this, sometimes they are a law unto themselves. I recentley had all the valves replaced on my smart car, while the head was removed I was told I also needed a new turbo/manifold, this took the bill from £800 to £1500. I approved the job and 2 weeks later got my car back.
Drove it around for a while light footed then went to use the engine with full throttle to overtake a lorry oneday and the lorry just pulled away from me, cutting a long one short when the "official network dealer from oxford" fitted the new turbo they had to reflash the ECU unit, this in turn wiped out a £300 remap on the car hence the damn thing gets overtaken by seagulls now it so slow. When I complained about the lack of power they had the car back in to check it and said everything was fine but they could spend a couple more hours checking the exhaust for a blockage (@ £75 an hour) " Forget it" was my reply. Car returned to me I found out it required 2 7 lts of oil in it the next day, 6 months later and hundreds of calls and emails the car is burning oil at a rate of 1 ltr per 200 miles with possible turbo death and new valves burning out already. Smart did all they could to back the garage so just out of principal in having the engine rebuilt and documented by a proper smart service agent not in the "official network" !

I agree you not have to pay a penny for this they should sort out the problem, I know how you feel I had a accident 5 months ago and the garage gave me the car back 3 times not road worthy the first time the wheels almost came off when I was driving the 2nd time they broke my hand break cable and the 3rd time the wheels still not right ! I now have car sitting out side my house that can not be used and I can not even sell it as it would not even pass an MOT and no one can help because I didn't cause an accident great !

My partner took her car to Robbins & Day for a service and has done before. The problem is is that they refuse to stamp the log book and upon inspection I noticed the oil had been filled up to over flowing and the brake fluid was empty. My partners mother also had her car serviced there recenlty and had to pay another garage £500 to fix an electrical fault that they caused but will not admit to yet the car was fine before they got there grubby hands on it, an idepentant mechanic can tell the faulty parts had been messed with but proving it is a different matter. My farther has an old 1990 406 and that drives massively better than these 2 cars, but then he wont take it to Robbins & Day (cowboys were his words)!!

Read this one then,
I took my car to a local garage for an mot, they told me that they would contact me within the hour, 24 hours later they telephoned me and told me my car needed £350 worth of work, a bit of welding and a fitment for a seat belt. I instructed the garage to do the work. A week later I contacted the garage and then they told me I needed a new windscreen and a tire also they couldn't get a part for the seat belt, So I contacted a main dealer and got the part for the seat belt dropped it off at the garage only to be told that its the wrong part and they would get it instead. So another week went by and still nothing, so once again I conctacted the garage and they told me I had to get the windscreen done seperatly, which I did Cost £120. so yet another 3 days went by and still on car, yet again I got intouch with them and they said they are still waiting for a tire ( after 2 weeks) I informed the garage that I must have the car by friday because im going on holiday, once again they promised me this would be ok, friday arrived, still nothing so I went to the garage and they told me that they havent got the tire, and I couldn't remove the car without an mot. GREAT they also said that the work involved was now £600 and the car was not mot yet, so I had to leave, But as I couldn,t get to the airport on time either ( a 500 mile jorney) it stuffed my holiday up, in turn upsetting my wife and chirldren all because the garage claims that it takes 3/5 weeks to get a tire, when I got to the garage to try to sort this out they were closed for the bank holiday weekend. BRILLIANT

After spending a small fortune on paying garages to service my car so it has a full service history I've decided to do my own servicing. Is it still possible to have the car's handbook stamped for a small fee to maintain the service history?

I had taken my car into a garage and they told me my wheel bearings were gone in the left rear. I paid 580.00 to repair it. That was last july. A month ago it was acting up again and I took it back . They worked on it again and said it was fixed. 2 weeks later I took my car to get new summer tires put on. I was told my left rear bearings were going. I couldn't believe it. So back to the garage I went .. I left the car there they told me it was the hub assembly and they would replace it. Picked my car up the next day and it is worse now then ever. Another machanic looked at it and said there are deffinately no new parts in there. The hub is not new. He figures all they did was tighten it up which is making the bearings rub. He said with driving it will heat up and once again the bearings will be shot. Is there no place a person can go to charge these people? Or do I have to go to another garage pay again and hope the job is done right?