How can they Regulate Main Dealers that take vehicles in, Charge the customer £600 to fit parts that may or may not have been required, Then tell the customer that they have 2 choices, Pay the £600 and tow the vehicle away or fit more parts at a further £1000 which may or may not cure the Vehicle. ?? ( on a vehicle that is worth about £1500 )

Fair enough, A lot of this Problem has been brought on by the Car Manufacturers themselves, by them making components one time programmable, ( Which is ridiculous and purely a profit making scam ) BUT:-

The Situation has got so bad that The Manufacturers themselves ( i,e a certain French Company ) Will not pay for Diagnostic time on vehicles that are still under warranty, ( As they don't like it when the boot is on the other foot and they get the bill for fixing the crap that they turn out ) The Customer has to pay the Diagnostic time to find out if the fault is covered and still has to pay even if it is.

Who Says what parts can or cannot be tested fully without substitution. ?? And if the Dealer cannot test the component, should the resposibility be put onto the customer to make the decission to fit the parts or not. ??

It's OK paying Top Whack Prices to get the So Called Professionals to look at your vehicle, but when they then charge Ridiculous amounts of money to NOT Diagnose the problem, what can the customer do then. ??

I cannot see how Any Person sat behind a desk can know what problems the Garage has come across when working on a vehicle, or how much the job could or should have cost.

I had a Customer ring me last week with An S Type Jag with an ABS fault and he wanted me to diagnose the fault as the Dealers said that they couldn't. And they wanted to fit an ABS ecu at around £800 to see if it cured the problem, ( But couldn't remove it if it didn't ) I said if the Dealers cannot diagnose the Fault or substitute a new or used part to prove whether it does actually cure the job then what chance have i got. ?? ( i was thinking the worst with CAN faults etc and not having something to plug in ).


I think theres more to this Regulation job than just being part of a body, Something needs to be done to protect the customer And the garages, But No one is yet big enough to stand up the the Manufacturers and tell them what they should or shouldn't do.

We know that the Dealers would condemn 3 or 4 parts rather than spending time checking the vehicle out properly as they cannot afford to waste time in their type of enviroment. But this usually ends up with the customer footing a £1500 + bill. Is this practice Good enough. ??

I have had Customers in that have taken Vehicles to the Main Dealers, Left them there for 3 weeks and had Estimates for £1800 upwards to fix an immobiliser fault that turned out to be a 15 minute job locating and repairing a broken wire that was easily found. ??

Will the OFT or whoever the body is look into these sort of problems. ??

I Doubt it very much.

I dont ask any customer to bring their cars to me, I just try my best to fix them at a reasonable price if they do, I have very few complaints other than the odd airbag light that keeps popping back on etc, and Traders wanting everything fixing for £20.00 or less, So should I be forced into spending money joining a scheme that will end up being another cost that will be passed onto the customer. ? Like the P.R.S. and any other idiot schemes that some Brainstorm comes up with. ??


Tony.