06 August 2010

Wasting money

Me: Oh hey, mechanic. I am having problems with my car. It shudders when it goes above seventy and when I stop. Maybe it's the alignment?
Mechanic: Yeah, I'll look at it.
(30 minutes later)
Mechanic: Okay, I aligned the right driver's side tyre. £29.99 please.
Me: Great, so the shuddering is fixed.
Mechanic: No, that's probably due to the buckled wheel on the back passenger side.
Me: Oh. (pause) So the problem's still there?
Mechanic: Yeah, you gotta replace the wheel. Gotta go to the dealer to do that. £29.99 please.
Me: Um, what now?

I wrote a curt e-mail that ends with this:
I am dissatisfied with this work because, first, I was not consulted before any work was done on the car. If I had been told that the work that was being undertaken would not solve the problem, I would not have agreed to it. Second, the work did not address my problem and there is no noticeable change to the problem I asked the technician to solve. I hope you agree that this is not acceptable.

I am requesting a refund of my £29.99 as I will have to take the car elsewhere to have the problem addressed.
I don't think I'm getting my £29.99 and I think that when I go to get the car serviced and MOT'd in October, I'm going to put another £500 into it. So much for saving money.