What's the most infuriating thing to happen to you at mechanic/oil change/tire shop??

[matthewb0051]

From the thread on Tire Losing Air, post by Porsche Gal:

Not saying this happened but:

I, once, took my husband's car to get an oil change. I know should have done myself but time was an issue. The shop tried to upsell me on nitrogen in the tires. I said no. As I pulled out of the parking lot, the tire light came on. Turned around. I lost it in the lobby when they tried to say this would not have happened if I had gotten the nitrogen (it's so much better, blah, blah). They purposely let the air out. By the time I was done in the lobby, 3 potential customers walked out without service.


It got me thinking about the crazy things I've had happen and thought I'd share one and see if you all had similar stories.

Here's mine:
I bought a 2002 Range Rover in 2020 and took it to a nationwide shop for alignment. The truck was in very good shape and but for the headliner the interior was great and everything was in tact.

I picked up the truck and drove to my local hardware store. When I started to get out I noticed the driver's door pocket at bottom of the door was gone and you could see where it had been. I thought back and was sure when I bought it the door pocket was present.

I went back to the national brand mechanic chain and told the guy at desk. He went out and looked. Then he had the mechanic come out and look. The guy shrugged his shoulders and claimed to know nothing. By then I was furious. I told both of them to go into the bays and look in the F'ing trash can because I knew that's where it would be. A couple of minutes later the manager comes out with my door pocket. They found it underneath a rolling tool chest. It had a huge black grease mark where someone had either hit it with their shoe or hand and clearly that's how they broke it off. Rather than own up to it, the culprit chose to attempt a fast one on me.

[cockerpunk]

i dont really take things to mechanics anymore. even the good ones id be in there doing something else, and go ... "huh, thats weird" and find something strange a previous mechanic had done.

[gacook]

I'd be furious, too. Did they make you right?

I've personally had no major issues...but know a guy who went in somewhere locally to get an oil change and they forgot to put in oil.

[LEAKYSEALS951]

Just got the 911 inspected. My summer tires were baloney skinned, so I put on a spare set of all season tires/rims. They had plenty of tread- in fact - they even have the "summer" "rain" and "snow" words written in them to indicate appropriate depths. I had almost worn through the outer "snow" word, but the summer and rain were as clear as day, as well as plenty of tread. I don't drive it in winter anyways.

Guy inspects it letting me know he's gonna let me off this time, but my tires are worn out, and he was going to be nice and pass it anyway and give me an estimate for new tires. I thanked him for his help, got the car back, and will now go drive the wheels for several more years until they need replacement. This has given me the motivation to go visit a DMV office and register the car as an antique to avoid inspections entirely.

[BK911]

Brand new titan at dealership for 3k mile free oil change.
Shop monkey wrecked it while driving into bay.

[GH85Carrera]

That type of thing is exactly why I do 95% of the work on my cars myself. I can't do a good alignment, and some things are over my limit of ability. I talked to a lot of my grey hair friends that have 1980s and older cars and asked them all who does your alignments. No way am I taking my El Camino to a tire store. Most don't have older cars in the computer database, and I do not want a stock alignment.

I finally found a guy that got two referrals from trusted picky classic car owners. I called and chatted with him a few minutes. I told him the guy that did the last alignment had retired and sold off his equipment. He said that is the guy that trained him! Bingo, he got the job.

I showed up with the El Camino fresh from a bath, and all detailed. I told him that I bought it in 1991, and he said he will treat it with care. He let me watch. I knew it needed an alignment and the upper A-arm bushings had worn out for the second time. Removing those giant springs scares the hell out of me. So I let a pro do it, and it was all done perfectly, and new MOOG parts were used.

I own old 1980s cars because a major part of the car hobby for me, is tinkering and maintaining it. Just this last weekend I did the 380,000 mile oil change and lube job on the Elky.

So no, I really don't have any of your type of stories.

[GH85Carrera]

One of my friends bought a brand new 2021 Corvette. He took it in to the same dealership for routine maintenance. That era of Vettes have a video record mode. He got home and watched as the car wash guy took his car down a major 45 MPH limit road at 110. He hit the entrance to the gas station hard enough to break the spoiler, and he curbed two wheels. He was filmed coming back to the car with a 6 pack of beer and drank them on the way back to the dealership.

Of course the guy was fired. My friend (a retired cop) filed a police report in case anyone had turned him in. The dealership replaced the spoiler, and bought him a new set of tires and wheels, and refunded his maintenance bill.

[fintstone]

Bought a new Lexus IS300 (daughter's car). Took it to the dealer for 10K mi service/oil change. A the end of the day when I called to see if it was ready, they told me that the bearings were bad (engine sounded awful) and tried to indicate it came in that way. Apparently, they drained the oil and then took it out for a drive.

[Eric Hahl]

It was 1988. Took my perfect 68 Mustang in to Meineke for new dual exhaust and brake work. After work was completed I paid and headed toward home. Got about 2 miles down the road the the right rear wheel fell off at 55mph. Basically the tire just went straight back, through the quarter panel flattening it.
I pulled over, gathered the wheel and called the shop. "Hey, my wheel just fell off". Radio silence on their end..."What are you going to do about it?" "Um, uh, we'll send a tow truck."

Did I mention this car was perfect? No rust, super straight now with a hugely damaged quarter. I was bummed and it was frustrating getting them to fix it. They did however, get it repaired.

[dad911]

Not to me but my sister.

She called me from a tire shop because they told her she needed new wheel bearings, a few days after they changed a tire, to the tune of 3-400$$. I went to see, and the studs were all chewed up. They claimed they would ruin the bearings pulling the hub to change the studs out. I pointed out if they rotate the hubs, there was a little hole to drive the studs through, and they better do it for free because they did the damage by not torquing the lugnuts.

[matthewb0051]

Glen: exactly why I also do a large portion of my own work too. If I can't I usually find a marque specific indy shop. Unfortunately, I hadn't found one in the DC area and was about to move and thought foolishly that a national chain could handle a simple alignment.

Guy: They offered to pay for a new door card as the pocket was mounted to the entire thing. Being a 2002 they were NLA and the secondary market parts were garbage. I finally fixed it myself and it looks great but I don't put anything in it and yell at people if they put anything in the passenger's door pocket.

Eric's story got me thinking. I shipped back a E34 M5 Euro when I moved back to the US from Germany. When I picked up from the company that did the final "conversion", I noticed a vibration while driving on I-10. Next day I went to my BMW Indy in San Antonio. Turns out the import conversion shop hadn't tightened one rear wheel properly and it was loose. They of course took no ownership of that, saying that they hadn't had the wheels off. Just lucky it didn't fall off.

[ramonesfreak]

took the 911 to Firestone for a NYS inspection. a month later i noticed my rocker panel trim pieces were flat/bent on both sides. hadn’t driven the car since so assumed must have been put on wrong lift. they were cool about it and asked how much $ to make problem go away. i was in a hurry and said $600. oops. got the porsche replacements and learned how to paint body panels. i even put that nice bumpy texture on. looks great but cost me way more including having to return ship the wrong parts i bought from PP. learned my lesson though.

back in 2000 i had a new VW golf that i brought back to dealer for something. when i pulled out i immediately noticed the steering wheel was cocked 45 degrees off center. went back and dealer closed as soon as i pulled off. went back next morning and they said it was my fault. so long ago i can’t remember what happened. this car turned out to be a lemon. had taken it in for some other problem and a week later looked under the hood and found a pair of pliers, the ones that are a foot long sitting on engine cover. still have them. good thing the guy isn’t a surgeon

[cockerpunk]

Originally Posted by cockerpunk

i dont really take things to mechanics anymore. even the good ones id be in there doing something else, and go ... "huh, thats weird" and find something strange a previous mechanic had done.

to be fair, i make plenty of mistakes and there are times i do plenty of things that make professional mechanics uncomfortable.

but 1. my mistakes are easier to tolerate than mistakes i pay someone to make. and 2. when i ask for something weird, its for a reason, and mechanics dont like that because they think they know more than me. but i know more about my own car and what it needs than any mechanic.

but then i do really strange things with cars anyway.

currently deciding how to cut up the front my 996 so it doesnt fill with snow ...

[oldE]

My SIL took her SL1 Saturn to a chain oil shop in Toronto. Paid for the oil change and got about 5 miles before the oil light came on. Drain plug fell out somewhere along the highway. They paid the tow and put in a used SL2 motor.

Best
Les

[ckissick]

Had a crack in my vanagon windshield. I took it to an autoglass place (before they came to you). They removed the windshield, and only then did they check to see if they had a replacement. I had to drive a few miles without a windshield to get to another shop.

[PorscheGAL]

This one makes me laugh:

Had a BMW X3. The back windshield wiper has a little plastic cover over the mounting screw. I lost mine somehow and bought a new one. The service guy asked if I wanted to set up an appt to have it installed. I invited him to follow me out to the car, took the cover out of the bag and popped it on. The look on his face was priceless.

[fastfredracing]

I was employed there

[stevej37]

Aside from the timing belt replacement on my Prelude....I have had no cars in a shop for at least 20 years.
Tire shops...yes...but no problems.

[wdfifteen]

This happened many years ago. I had replaced the left front wheel bearings and repacked and inspected the ones on the left in November. Sometime in the winter the car started making a "thumpa, thumpa, thumpa" sound - obvious tire belt separation. I took it to a Sears auto place and left it while we had dinner and shopping. Came back and they had repacked the wheel bearings, but the old tires were still on the car. "All finished" the guy said. I drove it around the parking lot and the sound and bumping ride were still there. I raised hell with the guy and he said, "Well, it may need new tires but it needed the wheel bearings packed too." I told him also needed new seat covers, but I brought it in to have the f^#% tires changed. I went around and around with the manager. He wouldn't give me the keys until I paid. I drove across the parking lot to the Firestone place and had them change the tires in full view of the Sears guys.

[Seahawk]

I don’t work on cars anymore. I hate it.

I do all the work on the farm machines so I’ve got that going for me, which is...

I have a friend with a repair shop and go to him for the serious stuff.

The local Toyota dealership has made one boo-boo in the over 30 years of our relationship on routine maintenance.

A lot of it is the number of vehicles we have bought and maintained there, but a lot is also the fact that the service managet went to HS with my son and she is just terrific.

It is much cheaper for me to sit in the lounge for a few hours doing emails and other work while they oil, rotate and inspect.