Did I pay too much ?

[Spoolin]

^^^^
That’s the truth. I have a mechanic at the local GMC dealership on the payroll and needed some work done to my 2000 Yimmy: both front wheel bearings, upper ball joints, and all four shocks. He used to be able to do random side jobs at the dealership, but since it changed owners, he said it had to have a ticket to be on the rack. He said come in and pay the $99 for a brake job and I’ll put the rest on for $80. Told me to get the stuff from rock auto and figured I’d also grab some new rotors too. Had it all in the back along with a envelope stuffed full of Jackson’s. Well.......four of them, but I had them folded so it looked thick!



And shhhhhh don’t tell the ladies my secret. Haha

 

[Derick]

^^^^
That’s the truth. I have a mechanic at the local GMC dealership on the payroll and needed some work done to my 2000 Yimmy: both front wheel bearings, upper ball joints, and all four shocks. He used to be able to do random side jobs at the dealership, but since it changed owners, he said it had to have a ticket to be on the rack. He said come in and pay the $99 for a brake job and I’ll put the rest on for $80. Told me to get the stuff from rock auto and figured I’d also grab some new rotors too. Had it all in the back along with a envelope stuffed full of Jackson’s. Well.......four of them, but I had them folded so it looked thick!



And shhhhhh don’t tell the ladies my secret. Haha

Wow, that's brilliant. I generally dont get a chance to see the techs when I go to a stealership....they usually have those baffoon 'service advisors' as a buffer. I assume to prevent stuff. exactly. like. this. haha

 

[Spoolin]

Well I worked at a local car audio shop and he and another tech would come in and hang out and shop and stuff and I got to know him pretty well. We’ve kept in touch for going on 20 years now. I knew the old service advisor as well and he was cool. He’d always “find” one of them $39.99 27 point inspection, oil change and tire rotation coupons that the dealership would mail out when he rang me up for the Yimmy and my ‘06 Tahoe Z-71. Sadly, He’s no longer there and the new guy is not hip to program yet. Hopefully he’ll come around and i can see some of them cheap oil changes again. But I found that they have some coupons on the website.

 

[BG1988]

Front Shocks - $492 parts, $342 labor
Replace spark plugs and wires $224 parts $189 labor
Replace rear shocks $296 parts $119 labor
Replace Lower Ball Joints $296 parts $594 labor

I think I paid high retail for the service.

The shop is excellent and the Tahoe drives like new.

(2011 127k miles)

Not much I can do about it at this point.

Thank you

you should ask said questions before buying I have a good service shop i take my car to

I would have paid way less then that labor wise $90 hour and he combos everything together = paying less


so say if it actually takes 3 hours for all the items i only pay $270 labor ....

he knows i don't have a lot of money so i get a super fair deal.

 

[Derick]

Yeah that's a good point. If you have the time, also, make them allow you to observe. It would be very hard for them to explain $1000 in labor for a job that took 3 hours while you were monitoring them.

I mean, as an amateur doing it on my garage floor, yeah it takes a good amount of time. With guys who have experience, it takes like 20 minutes to replace a joint. I watch a lot of the south main auto guy, and yeah I know its edited sometimes, but a lot of times when hes pulling this stuff off, it's all real time. Again, hard to say with experience and the right tools that it should take any more than half an hour to replace a ball joint.