Lost Speedometer and Overdrive:

[Glacier991]

In truth... by the time you roll it in, the service writer writes (screws) it up... you get it to the mechanic on the lift, he finds the problem, walks to parts where the cheap part has been inventoried forever gathering dust and accruing interest, the parts guy looks it up on the fiche or puter, finds the part, the mechanic shuffles back and puts it on, test drives it and gives it back to delivery and they write up the final work order... they have an hour or so in it. $65-75 an hour for shop labor (in the USA) is cheap ....translates to about $100 there)....

I worked for FORD once...(long time ago in another life it seems) does it surprise you that the service department is a profit center?


ps. give em an out. Suggest they made a decimal place error. Show em pics of the clamp, and say used must have been $7.50 not $75.00 and you are sure someone accidentally transposed a decimal point. If they deny that, then explode.

 

[hermitrl]

Well--on the way back today i checked the price out at the dealer--56 bucks. NAPA had a pretty blue one for 45.
Thus informed I went back to the garage and like Glacier mentioned--asked if the wrecker may have made a mistake on the price. He was defensive as soon as he saw me. I told him the wrecker had overcharged him by a large amount--especially used. He said he had to charge for the time it took his guy to go get the part. I mentioned that he already charged me 50 bucks labour for that. I also mentioned a fast call to NAPA would have had it delivered for free. He then said it was just lucky they had the part in stock and the wrecker's price was ok to him. I said fine--just thought I would let you know he overcharged both of us--still trying to give him an out. He said he'd make it up to me by warrantying the part. I said fine and started for the door and he hands me 20 bucks to "make sure I was satisfied as a customer".
I would have been satisfied if he had given me at least 50 back. The wrecker should have charged less than 25 or a used part. He charged me 2 hours labour to remove and replace this part---seeing it now it should have taken a half hour tops.
Anyways--155 bucks to fix the VSS with a used one.
Thanks for all the help and advice. I learned to research before I leave it at a garage next time.

 

[elkhunter]

To bad you can't find another broken one and take it in and get your money back on the warranty.