CHEEKY Fookers

[Roy Archer]

Not been on here for a while (since i sold my UK car 'R' last year, i need to vent anger!!!!!!!!!

Since selling my car, i have had a company car, then decided to go self employed so I had to buy myslef a car. Vovlo S40 (I know).

Been in for a service today and they want..............wait for it

£200 for front disks +VAT
£225.60 for rear disks and pads
£37 for a new arial
£18 to change a fooking light bulb
£84.30 for a new battery

Am I mad or right to be slighty pissed at this?

 

[KF79GTIR]

Your dead right to be angry did they ask prior consent to undertake any work that needed doing if so tell them to in and jump and the bulb they changed is only worth about a pound unless it was a head light. Kev

 

[John]

I'd go somewhere else or source the parts yourself, Volvos are generally never cheap to fix tho :doh:

 

[jjs]

try german and sweedish, or euro car parts , for parts to repair it your self, or buy the parts from them and get a local garage to fit the parts,

 

[Odin]

I agree German and Swedish is the best place to get the parts from, I don't think you should be paying much more than £50 for a set of discs.

I bought new discs and pads for my old Shitron for the pricely sum of £40, And even my newer shitron only cost me £140 for four new disce and pads.


Rob

 

[Roy Archer]

asked them NOT to do the work, just sourced new disks AND pada all round for £75 including delivery. Just need to sort out a garage to fit them

 

[GTi-R23]

Main dealers are a joke, would never take a car to one.

A good friend of the family has an S-type Jag, his pride and joy since he retired and spent a good wedge of his savings on it, he took it to a dealer and they charged him £45 to change a bulb (Not even a headlight) and of course he paid up thinking that it must be somthing special coz it's a Jag etc. I was nearly sick when he told me, felt like going down there and giving them my 2p worth ripping
an old man off like that. So I've told him to come and see me first from now on whenever there's anything needs doing like that.

Can't you fit the stuff yourself bud?

 

[Roy Archer]

Obviously i can do the bulbs, wouldnt know where to start on the disks and pads, i have just called a friends pal who said if they are a straight push on fit (?) he will do them for £60. No idea if there a push on fit or not??????????????????

 

[snoon]

Disks and pads are a piece of pi$$. I'm crap with the spanners and they are well within my capabilities.

If your unsure get someone who does know to 'help' you, or get a Haynes manual for the car, that will tell you.

 

[tomble]

Yes, changing disks and pads is extremely easy, unless you are lucky and get to change them on a rover 600, where the disk is located behind the hub lol.




Tom

 

[Fast Guy]

Discs are easy unless you happen to have one that seems to be welded to the hub. I had that on a previous car and it needed alot of persuation with a hammer to budge.

 

[azboy]

Main dealers are a joke, would never take a car to one.

A good friend of the family has an S-type Jag, his pride and joy since he retired and spent a good wedge of his savings on it, he took it to a dealer and they charged him £45 to change a bulb (Not even a headlight) and of course he paid up thinking that it must be somthing special coz it's a Jag etc. I was nearly sick when he told me, felt like going down there and giving them my 2p worth ripping
an old man off like that. So I've told him to come and see me first from now on whenever there's anything needs doing like that.

Can't you fit the stuff yourself bud?

not sticking up for main dealers but just saying if they charge lets say 0.2 of a hour to change the bulb at 115 per hour plus vat as some new cars r a right pain plus the cost of the bulb which arnt cheap crap u get from some motorfactors which blow all the time plus vat that would work out about the right cost, people think main dealers are con artests, but at the end of the day there there to earn money, i work for audi now and they need to earn 88 pounds per hour as recovery costs meaning no profet made even at 88 plus vat due to the massive overheads they have like specilist tools, equipment and premisis oviously so there not making as much as u think we have to earn 120,000 pounds in labour a month just to stay even with no gain just breaking even, just another view in how much these places cost to just turn over, in dec hit just 60, so thats a 60 grand loss in 1 month and by loss thats loss as in the red, these places really dont make as much as people think, other garages have small over heads and can charge less, but can be making the same profit, if not more, thats often why main dealers pay less then independant garages and relies on bonus to pay staff so if they dont do well u dont.

 

[azboy]

Discs are easy unless you happen to have one that seems to be welded to the hub. I had that on a previous car and it needed alot of persuation with a hammer to budge.

ever undone a wheel and just tapped the disc as the wheel fell, well if there ceramic they will crack and need changining at 600 per disc for the part lol something u wouldent want to do lol

 

[tomble]

Are you talking from experience, mate?


Tom

 

[pulsarboby]

Obviously i can do the bulbs, wouldnt know where to start on the disks and pads, i have just called a friends pal who said if they are a straight push on fit (?) he will do them for £60. No idea if there a push on fit or not??????????????????

dont know where you are in essex roy, but if you like il do the discs & pads for £70 if your mate dont want to do them.
if you take the car to my garage in westcliff (not gtir) then il get one of the lads to do them whilst you wait. pm me if that helps matey!

 

[owens]

Essex Roy, what volvo dealers was that as i share a workshop with volvo at land rover.

With those prices in mind, as above you must take into account the labour rate charges, we charge £100+vat and on a range rover supercharged, the stop light bulbs are £18+vat and we charge 0.2hrs labour so that would work out to be £38+vat which is just under £47 and a xenon headlight bulb is about £150+vat and 0.5hrs labour = £235.

I personally would reccomend having the car serviced at a main dealer (and have all extra work carried out elsewhere) if you dont intend to do a million miles so you have the stamps in the service book for when you sell it, but if you intend running the thing into the ground i would use a decent specialist or back street garage for servicing and repairs

 

[GTi-R23]

not sticking up for main dealers but just saying if they charge lets say 0.2 of a hour to change the bulb at 115 per hour plus vat as some new cars r a right pain plus the cost of the bulb which arnt cheap crap u get from some motorfactors which blow all the time plus vat that would work out about the right cost, people think main dealers are con artests, but at the end of the day there there to earn money, i work for audi now and they need to earn 88 pounds per hour as recovery costs meaning no profet made even at 88 plus vat due to the massive overheads they have like specilist tools, equipment and premisis oviously so there not making as much as u think we have to earn 120,000 pounds in labour a month just to stay even with no gain just breaking even, just another view in how much these places cost to just turn over, in dec hit just 60, so thats a 60 grand loss in 1 month and by loss thats loss as in the red, these places really dont make as much as people think, other garages have small over heads and can charge less, but can be making the same profit, if not more, thats often why main dealers pay less then independant garages and relies on bonus to pay staff so if they dont do well u dont.

Yeah fair comment, I've got nothing against the lads that work in these places, they've obviously got targets to meet like the rest of us, and I understand the labour costs etc, but on this occasion it just seemed really harsh on this old fella, I had a look how the bulbs fit and it was a 5 min job. I just have a deep distrust of main dealers, well any garage in general really, I've heard too many horror stories.

Brakes really are an easy job though mate, you should save the cash and have a go yourself, done loads myself, give everything a good wire brushing once the old discs and pads are off, clean it all up, stick the new discs on, use a g-clamp to slowly push the caliper piston back in (making sure it doesn't overflow in the brake fluid reservoir) bit of copper grease on the back of the pads, and bung it all back together, job done.

 

[Roy Archer]

Owens - i had it serviced yesterday at Stratstones (possibly where you work)

No chance of me doing it myself - will get pulsarboy to do as long as the bits turn up tomorrow

 

[tomble]

back to changing bulbs, i believe the new ford focus/ranger are complete twats for changing front bulbs. Apparently you have to remove alot of things, incuding the washer bottle!?

Why would a manufacturer do this? Do they use a newer type of bulb that is less likely to fail or something?




Tom

 

[owens]

Owens - i had it serviced yesterday at Stratstones (possibly where you work)

No chance of me doing it myself - will get pulsarboy to do as long as the bits turn up tomorrow

na its part of my company but im based in hadleigh land rover

tomble - manafacturers dont take into account how difficult it is to do a job when the cars are designed and built, and with reguards to labour times, they are worked out by having a technician doing the same job for about 2 weeks then time him to the job and that becomes the repair time, which in some cases the customer is better off as the job will take longer to do.

most manafacturers now charge about 0.5 - 0.8 hrs labour for front pads that in real time is 30-48mins that is quite a quick time to do pads (car dependant) but most do it yourselfers would struggle to get the job done in this time that is why you take it to trained technicians and also there are cars out there that require special tools for fitting brakes which everyday people wont have but the main dealers HAVE to purchase from the manafacturer.

im sure bob will do a good job, he's a nice fella that will help you out when you need it