Hi,
Many garages/shops have a sign indicating what the labor rate and 'rules' are for a car that is brought to them to "finish up".
Regards,
Alan

 

not the best way but it sure works gotta be ready to do time though

go get your car man...if it helps Ive never had one mechanic body shop be on time, ever.

Pay em for what they have done and move on, cant not pay them.

Why cant people just do their fn job!!!! They would be so busy they couldnt see straight

Were going through the same thing right now but knows hes just busy and customers with big bucks will always go to the front of the line

Sometimes you hear of stories similar but the owner wanted a "cheap buddy price" it never works out (not referring to you op)

Doubt all that will get done in a day or so

 

I put my 65 in a Corvette Shop in Jacksonville FL in 2005 and in 2006 almost had to resort to cutting the lock off the gate to get my car back. Long story and there is a thread on here somewhere about this.

I ended up getting the car back and writing him a check for his time and never looked back but will be the first one to slam him and his company if his name ever comes up in Corvette related conversation.

 

Bring the car to Texas. I can get this done for you in one days work. Super easy stuff. They just cant say no to money coming in the door, even though they know they are flat out to busy to meet your time constraint.

 

I took my vette to a mechanic/machinist to rework my heads and install my new Vansteel rear TA's with coilovers. It took him 2 months to complete my work. He never answered his phone. I had to show up to get an update. He would only work on my car in between other cars that were considered daily drivers for others to get them back on the road. He would come in on Saturdays when the shop was closed to work my car if he wasn't racing his dirt track race car that day. At first I was a little upset and after figuring out how he ran his shop, I understood. When I got the car back, OMG! He did a wonderful job and went the extra step to spot paint areas that needed it after the work. He even changed the oil using racing oil and top off the gas tank with racing fuel at no charge. When I got the bill, it was under what I expected. That mechanic is now a close friend and I would never take my car to any other mechanic. I learn to be patient to get a good quality job done. I'm not saying your mechanic is the same but, be a little patient and give a little more time before pulling your car out of the shop.

 

Here's an observation from a (non-Corvette) shop owners perspective. I'm not suggesting this applies to anyone here, but it certainly does seem to apply to enough of our customers (we're a truck and off-road shop) that we have to adapt accordingly.


Their vehicles are never as nice as they think are because they only look at the topside and interior. We work on the parts they don't see. We had one truck in for a lift kit install that should have been 6-8 hours of work but turned into 3 days because everything underneath was rusted frozen. Every single bolt had to be cut off.

We have a Jeep in the shop right now that's been there for almost a week. The owner wanted to get the best possible price so he bought the products we recommended on-line (instead of from us), then got upset when we had to put in extra time dealing with missing hardware and packaging that had the wrong hardware in it, as well as online sellers that didn't warn him about needing things like load resistors for their LED lighting products.


We now charge a higher hourly rate for installing customer-supplied parts and we bill for time spent chasing manufacturer tech support when those parts aren't right or don't come with proper instructions. We also refuse to give firm estimates on any vehicle we haven't actually seen underneath with our own eyes.


We do communicate, however. As soon as we become aware of a problem we call the customer. If we're going to run over on the schedule, we'll call and explain what happened and the schedule impact.


One thing we never do is hand the customer back the keys if the bill hasn't been paid and, if there's any reason to believe the customer is going to be difficult, we keep their vehicle inside so they can't use an extra set of keys to drive it away without paying.


Most customers are good people and fun to work with but there are enough people who will pull every trick in the book to get something for nothing that we have to be careful all the time. We had one customer ask if he could take one of our spline drive keys out to his car to see if it fit his lugs. It did so he hopped in his car and drove away with it. Now we have to accompany customers to the parking lot if they want to test-fit something or see how it will look on their vehicle.

I guess the moral of the story here is that the shop isn't always incompetent. They may be dealing with other issues that are screwing up the schedule or estimate. The one thing they can always control, though, is the customer communication and that, to me, is the biggest knock on the shop described in the original post.

 

Well put.
Customer service is 2 parts...communication and actual work done.
The OP's shop has failed on the first part but the 2nd part is unknown for now.

Good luck with resolving this amicably.
Don't be a dick, just because they are.
Your integrity is based upon what you do, not what others do to you.

Bman

 

Have we heard back from the OP on how it turned out. NOT YET.

 

That is so true, tommy who did my chassis swap was a very savvy wrencher, he was a super talanted painter and body man, sure he damaged stuff we could have gotten by that, taking 9 months and not finished when promised in a week, okay, thats bad, a great tech also needs people skills and the ability to set ego and emotions aside to be professional,
tommy did not, way too much ego to just talk to a person, admit he overbit and phucked up and then come to a friendly resolution, in this case years later i have to bash tommy when i would rather praise him.

 

As a former District Judge it sounds like the customer could be on shaky ground. What looks better to me? The customer should try his or her best to calmly work things out, follow up immediately in writing explaining your position and dissatisfaction. If you held back payment due I suggest you open up an escrow account in both names for the full amount due and held until an agreement is reached. If you used a major credit card you can file a dispute against the merchant and let the bank arbitrate. This last method can temporarily reverse the transaction. The customer is on a stay of payment for this portion of his total bill until the complaint is settled.

 

And this is why I don't work on other people's vette's and classics in my shop!

as stated in the other thread, you have no idea what other issues he ran into. non-mechanics always think the work is easier and should go faster than the real world.

not to mention maybe a tech got sick, the shop gets behind, emergency's come up, or you used wrong parts that need re-done, or some rusty bolt snaps off...

unless you had a contract stipulating a timeline, pay up. or risk a mechanic's lien...

and to those that say never use that shop again, I would also say the shop should never work on that customer's vehicle again...PITA mechanic's suck, but so do PITA customers...

 

Ignore the Rambos. Life is not a movie and you find out it does have consequences if you do that stuff.

So, go get your car. Show up with a trailer or flatbed because you need to assume it is in the same condition or worse.

Get the car and all of your parts together, verified everything is there, verify any work he claims to have done.

PAY your bill. You can try to negotiate it lower if it seems out of line, but don't be a stickler. The important thing is to get your car.

Dispute the charges with the credit card company. Consider that you may lose. Work was done, and credit card companies aren't car people who can't relate to loss of not having your baby with you.

Next step is small claims. Filing is cheap, and in many states, you don't need a lawyer but the business does. This ups his investment quickly and makes it look better to settle, take his loss, and leave.

Be prepared, stay calm, be factual. The judge won't like you getting emotional about what a jerk the guy is and how he lied about time and so on. Just tell the facts.



Whatever you do, DO NOT FIGHT THEM WHILE THEY HAVE YOUR CAR!

You'd be amazed at things than can go wrong with your car and no one can prove anything. Drain the oil, rev it to 6500 for 5 minutes, pour the oil back in. 200 miles from now, you seize a bearing.

Torch on the bearing housing of a trailing arm. 500 or 1000 miles from now, you seize an axle and melt the inner bearing.

 

This was and is a huge fear of mine, both tommy and or mike could have done anything to my car while they had it and were pissed at me,
Perhaps i will be hopeful the damage i can see was enough for them

 

I learned this a LONG time ago. My lawyer, who was in the same Corvette club, taught it to me. I had my '68 in to get the rear suspension aligned after we had rebuilt it all. Per their Rate book, $16 they said. Plus $10 for the shims I didn't have. (I told you it was a long time ago.)

I went to get it, $168. Why? They had to remove the trailing arm bolt to install the shims. Hey, that is part of getting the shims in. So I stomped out, called my lawyer, and he told me to calm down, cool off, take a steady calming friend, and get the car. Pay the bill, say nothing, and leave in the car.

THEN we would get even.

Never do anything while they have your car, not if you like your car.

 

In tommys case it wasnt entirely an option, a job he said would take him a week became 9 months, my car wasnt finished but damaged, he forced me to only have contact via text, replied when he felt like it,
He missed countless deadlines, and said he had no clue when he would get my car done, fed up i said i want my car i will come with a trailer, he said no, that other cars had mine blocked in and he didnt feel like moving them,
I let that go a week or so my nervious problems threw the roof, i texted saying i would contact both the sheriff and osha ( he had a illegal paint booth )
That i am getting my car, only then did he set a date, and even damaged and the work not finished i gave him the last 300.00 knowing if i barked he didnt legally have to give me my car,
So for my time trouble damage and wasted money i will always tell this story when i can,

I do not know a better way to have handled my situation.

 

I looked in the mirror this morning and was immediately reminded I'm getting old. I told myself to stop complaining, stop being the victim. Better get to work if I'm ever going to finish this....

 

Or take it to a independent one or two man shop that knows how to work on these cars.......
I work on at least one C3 Vette a year just because not only is the auto repair here an *** rape session on newer car....but because there is flat zero people here that work on Vettes....much less know squat about anything other than a Taco or BBQ.....nor do they care.
Conflict of interest is just that.....that last Vette I had in my garage.....I told the guy one month and $1500......well after peeling back the layers to find more bad stuff.....it went two months and $2500....but the car showed up on a flatbed and his specific instructions were to make it so he could drive it back to Sad Antonio......so I did...and he still bitched...even when told everything about what was going on and keeping in close contact.....I am not by any means saying you are at fault but being a pest will make a mechanic withdraw.....I am not that way but many are.
People are getting irrational these days and social media is half of where it starts....
NEVER put anything on FB that deals with ongoing conflict or a sense of it......
I do this as a hobby and a lot of people confide in me......a "professional" shop does it for a living and does not give a rats *** about your car......
The classic is a mechanic/engine builder takes in 10 jobs and gets deposits......then he finishes 3 and seven sit around never to be finished unless legal or physical threats are made.....seen and heard about this at least a thousand times....and everytime it is some guy who has never had it happen......like they cannot believe it...and they are the only one.

Bat's idea of the Sherriff and OSHA is a solid one.....the EPA is a good one too...as nothing can shut a shop down faster than OSHA or the EPA......

I will never do automotive work for a living as both sides absolutely suck to deal with......the proprietor and the customer.
It boils down to good ol' trusting and hard work.....and it is all but disappeared in these times.

Good luck....go get your car and bring it to someone like me who knows Vettes and does not need your money.

Jebby

 

I've seen people do this. I believe it's a felony in California.

For the OP, go to the shop in person. Be nice, pay the bill, get your car back.

It seems like a lot of companies live and die by Yelp reviews. That may be your only revenge.

 

Thats why i was in the nightclub music biz...Hah, it helped that tommys paint booth was 2x4s and plastic and a shop fan in a center not zoned for any auto painting...but also keep in mind tommy was 9 months into a week job.
11 days is mot that big a deal compared to hell ive been through.

 

I was service manager in a small auto shop, a good friend needed help, so I helped. I learned a lot dealing with the customers. The one thing that pertains to this thread is you legally owe for the work done. They will not release it until that is satisfied, legally.


And I'm not about to tell you to do anything, I'm telling you what I learned, in AZ about this situation.


I hope it turns out for the best for you, and you're happy when it's all said and done. Good luck.