Just paid $456 for a trans service

[Jason94sport]

I could have done it myself, I was expecting to pay a little but not $456 worth. I even supplied the filter & gasket. Christmas time I didn't want to deal with it.
Good news someone must have did it before in 75K miles since the drain bolt was stripped. Shop could get it off but needed a new one. $19 as no one had it but a dealer 100 miles away.
And then to my shock they charged me $14/quart for Motorcraft fluid. 13 of them!
I understand inflation & all but WTF? Guess it's a wash since I did install my front hubs & brakes myself.
Likely never using this shop again. Sucks where I moved too. Not much in terms of good anything. Not like the big towns I used to live in.

 

[Josh P]

I could have done it myself, I was expecting to pay a little but not $456 worth. I even supplied the filter & gasket. Christmas time I didn't want to deal with it.
Good news someone must have did it before in 75K miles since the drain bolt was stripped. Shop could get it off but needed a new one. $19 as no one had it but a dealer 100 miles away.
And then to my shock they charged me $14/quart for Motorcraft fluid. 13 of them!
I understand inflation & all but WTF? Guess it's a wash since I did install my front hubs & brakes myself.
Likely never using this shop again. Sucks where I moved too. Not much in terms of good anything. Not like the big towns I used to live in.

You got financially sodomized. I'd expect to pay $300 to $350 for a shop to service the transmission. Some of the best service I've gotten from shops was from small towns, hopefully you find a better place.

 

[fordysenior]

I've priced out a trans service on my vehicle -- they pretty consistently come in around $400. At least, that was about 18 months ago. With inflation and higher prices, it's bound to be more expensive. That's the dealers price and independents. Signed, small town Northern California.

 

[94Eddie]

I could have done it myself, I was expecting to pay a little but not $456 worth. I even supplied the filter & gasket. Christmas time I didn't want to deal with it.
Good news someone must have did it before in 75K miles since the drain bolt was stripped. Shop could get it off but needed a new one. $19 as no one had it but a dealer 100 miles away.
And then to my shock they charged me $14/quart for Motorcraft fluid. 13 of them!
I understand inflation & all but WTF? Guess it's a wash since I did install my front hubs & brakes myself.
Likely never using this shop again. Sucks where I moved too. Not much in terms of good anything. Not like the big towns I used to live in.

Always ask for an estimate and hold them to it for the work they quoted.

 

[donalds]

Sounds close to normal considering they had to mess around with your oil pan and drain plug

 

[410Fortune]

they allowed you to supply the filter? Wow most shops won’t allow customer parts because they would have been able to push $500 w the sale of the filter



Fluid is crazy $$$$ right now
Pays to shop around
Remember when this was $100? Lol

I’m off the beaten path.. Mercon v is $9-14 a quart depending on which store and good luck getting 10 quarts let alone 13. The ford dealer is where I go to get it here, it’s closer to 8.5 a quart but it seems I always need it when they are closed.

 

[Jason94sport]

The estimate was $275. Before they had to get the plug out & get a new one. It's done. I may not even need to do it again since it's a 2nd vehicle. In a year I only put on 5K miles.
Impressions are the shifts are smoother. Used to kinda shift hard into 3rd & 4th when on it. Haven't did a full stop run to 70 yet. Going easy for a little.

 

[94Eddie]

The estimate was $275. Before they had to get the plug out & get a new one. It's done. I may not even need to do it again since it's a 2nd vehicle. In a year I only put on 5K miles.
Impressions are the shifts are smoother. Used to kinda shift hard into 3rd & 4th when on it. Haven't did a full stop run to 70 yet. Going easy for a little.

Look at it this way, $456 is a lot less expensive than replacing the transmission and dealing with a striped drain plug could easily up the estimate. At 5k miles a year, I agree that this should be the last service it will need. Also, 410 Fortune is correct. Trans fluid is crazy expensive these days.

 

[Josh P]

they allowed you to supply the filter? Wow most shops won’t allow customer parts because they would have been able to push $500 w the sale of the filter

Some shops charge a customer supplied parts fee which is about what the filter and gasket would cost.

 

[boominXplorer]

Like 410 said, transmission fluid has gotten EXPENSIVE. Used to be able to walk in to any parts store and get it for $5 a qt. Now your lucky to find it under $10. A drain and refill should only take 7 qt, did they do it 2x dealing with the plug issue? That would make sense for the extra $$$

 

[410Fortune]

It’s common to use 10-15 quarts when they do a flush
Fluid should be bright red and brand new now, with no dipstick it would be hard to tell!

 

[Josh P]

Kiss behind the ear sold separately.

 

[donalds]

I'm so happy I'm mechanically inclined
Some may think one would be mechanically inclined naturally but this is not the case it's out of necessity for most people

I'm broke lmao

 

[410Fortune]

Tell me about it
1988 bronco ii 2.9l 5’speed that barely ran on 5 cyl for $500…. That’s what started all of this. I needed to get back and forth to work

The good news is when you can fix things for people you are very valuable especially in a down turned economy gotta keep the ol junk runnin

 

[swshawaii]

In all fairness to the OP's dealer I had a complete 5R55E transmission service done by Windward Ford in July 2011 that cost $200 total. Included 20 quarts of Motorcraft Mercon V ATF, filter, and gasket. Service tech used a BG PF5 flush machine that has no power and uses the vehicles own transmission pump to exchange fluid. 5R55E transmission does not have a drain plug. IIRC, I shopped for Motorcraft Mercon V and found the only local parts store that stocked it besides our local Ford dealers was O'Reilly's at $5 per quart. Doing the math I would have spent at least $150 in fluid and parts doing it myself. Tech was very cool and invited me to watch him do the work from start to finish which took close to two hours. He even called me over to look at the sediment inside the pan. Factoring local shop labor rates at $100-$125 per hour in 2011, I gave them the go ahead to do it.

 

[Josh P]

I'm so happy I'm mechanically inclined
Some may think one would be mechanically inclined naturally but this is not the case it's out of necessity for most people

I'm broke lmao

I can tell you this is true. I started doing a lot of the work on my big trucks cause the shops like to charge me for the time they stand around and talk. Half the time the work isn't done right so I'm redoing it after paying to have it done. Most shops consider a warranty a 5 lb bag of sugar to help eat it. $456 seems a bit much for the transmission service but inflation has made everything cost more than it should.

 

[94Eddie]

I'm so happy I'm mechanically inclined
Some may think one would be mechanically inclined naturally but this is not the case it's out of necessity for most people

I'm broke lmao

My first car, at sixteen years old, was a 1971 Chevy Nova with a 250 straight six with a two two speed automatic. I didn't know much about fixing cars then and it needed the valve seats/stems done over. I didn't have the money to pay a shop so I just dug into it myself. Keep in mind this was in the mid 1970s and there was no YouTube. I bought a Haynes Manual to get me through it. Luckily, the 250 engine was about as simple as it gets and I got the head off and had a machine shop work it over and got it back on the engine without any trouble. After this, I did any work needed myself. My second car was a 1976 Triumph Spitfire and I swear I got a PhD in car repair owning it. I don't think there was a part of that car that I didn't have apart at some point. I drove it all through college and well into my first job. I stopped driving it when the Rust Belt winters took a toll on it and the front wheel literally fell off the car. At this point I tapped out and factory ordered a 1987 Mustang GT with T-tops.

The necessity of learning to work on cars morphed into a hobby of modifying them for fun. I still like to work on my vehicles but not for the major stuff these days. I will be retiring soon and I plan to pick up modifying my '89 Mustang again to keep me busy. I want to do a fuel injected, built 392 stroker motor. This would likely to never have happened if it I hadn't needed to pull the head off that '71 Nova. Also, I think my time spent working on cars helped push me to get an engineering degree.