$1100 A/C Line!!!?

Curmudgeon wrote: But here's the thing: if it started out at $1100 and dropped to $350 that sounds like some serious padding going on; a 'shotgun' repair.

This is what was getting me. At $1100 I decided to not have it fixed for now and drive one of the other vans. When I had the time I would fix it myself. To have him call back in less than ten minutes with a price that is $750 lower is just a little fishy.

Then explain to a customer why their $1k repair took 2 actual hours with a $200 part total? Greatly exaggerated example. Or why customers ask how long the repair takes to arrange rides then arrive back and wonder why their POS isn't done yet. Yet, you have someone else walks out for a $400 bill for the same amounts.

It is a no win and to me the customer is wrong.

Ranger50 wrote: How am I wrong for charging someone a price based on an established labor rate, dealer posted, and another established labor time, alldata btw? So what if I can do it faster then the guy next to me. The guy next to me is charging the SAME price. I don't see the problem in trying to PROFIT based on your skill set, especially when it is customer pay.... No two vehicles for the same repair are the same.... So I can't charge more for your rusty bucket of bolts you haven't upkept for years compared to the one that is?

The corollary to this argument is that if I do take care of my car, it isn't rusty and all the bolts come out nice, why should I have to pay as much as the guy with the rusty POS? Because your book says so?

If I do something that makes the job legitimately easier, like pull skid plates for an exhaust repair, does the flat-rate mechanic give me a break for saving him time on the job?

Of course not, the flat-rate guy is going to charge me the same amount no matter how easy I make it for him. The result?: I only go to flat-rate guys with the worst, nastiest, most PITA job I can find, and usually after I've broken or stripped out a bolt or two.

For everything else I'll do it myself or find a mechanic who respects my time and energy spent making things easier for the both of us.

ummm actually skid plates pay .2 each normally and a respectable shop will not charge you for it.

Curmudgeon wrote: I got bitched at so many times over the years that I developed the following method of quoting a repair price: quote the total cost of the job, parts/labor/tax. If the customer asks for a breakdown, I say X parts, Y labor, Z tax. I leave the whole flat rate thing out of it. I always have that information instantly available if the customer requests it, though.

This seems to be the right answer. You get the flat rate for the job without bullE36 M3ting the customer on how hours and hours are not the same thing.

and umm old opel guy how do you make sure no bolts rust and they all come out nice by taking car of your car? i live in oklahoma and take rediculously good care of my cars. didnt stop one of my tierod ends from siezing onto the inner tierod. and it didnt stop my hubs from siezing themselves in the bearing to the point i had to cut the bearing and hub apart with a torch.

In reply to KATYB:

Apparently OldOpelGuy is very good at polishing his nuts and bolts!

Wow, you guys are getting mad. Let me see if I can summarize the "book hours= no" folks.

Yes, you should make a profit. That should be counted into your hourly charge. That means that if you want more profit, you charge more dollar per hour as measured by a clock. Folks here are getting defensive. We don't mean that you can't earn a profit, and charge per hour according to your skillset, just that a book rate in hours is stupid. If you can do job X in 2 hours, and charge $50 per hour but the dummy dum dum head at the Jiffy Lube down the street can only manage the same job in 10 hours at $40 per hour, it's obvious to the consumer where to go. It's also obvious to you, the superior mechanic that you could charge as much as $200 per hour (in this fictitious example) before chasing away the potential customer.

In reply to tuna55:

Thank god that is fictitious example... Real world says Jiffy Lube, in the example, is the better choice no matter the price because of the general population's attitude toward "stealerships". This maybe ancedotal, but in MY experience, the other places available to have my vehicles serviced at, I wouldn't take a dead dog to. The rate of comebacks is staggering. They all blame it's some cheap E36 M3ty part, which is about right 30% of the time, can thank the cheapass owner for that, when 70% is attributable to some hamfist that couldn't tie their own shoes and those shoes are velcro straps, yet alone diag and fix a vehicle.

Also on the flip side, it didn't matter if I finished that 3hr job in 2hrs or 4, I caught hell for it. Either from the customer complaining I am "gouging" them or the service writer bitching because they have other work that needs to be done. It is no wonder why you can't get people that have some skills above and beyond breathing and a pulse to work on your POS. Then don't forget about the back flagging that occurs. I've been backflagged for the same problem but requiring different solutions or what should have been a warranty claim on a failed part. Those suck ass to try to get corrected.

Ranger50 wrote: In reply to tuna55: Thank god that is fictitious example... Real world says Jiffy Lube, in the example, is the better choice no matter the price because of the general population's attitude toward "stealerships". This maybe ancedotal, but in MY experience, the other places available to have my vehicles serviced at, I wouldn't take a dead dog to. The rate of comebacks is staggering. They all blame it's some cheap E36 M3ty part, which is about right 30% of the time, can thank the cheapass owner for that, when 70% is attributable to some hamfist that couldn't tie their own shoes and those shoes are velcro straps, yet alone diag and fix a vehicle. Also on the flip side, it didn't matter if I finished that 3hr job in 2hrs or 4, I caught hell for it. Either from the customer complaining I am "gouging" them or the service writer bitching because they have other work that needs to be done. It is no wonder why you can't get people that have some skills above and beyond breathing and a pulse to work on your POS. Then don't forget about the back flagging that occurs. I've been backflagged for the same problem but requiring different solutions or what should have been a warranty claim on a failed part. Those suck ass to try to get corrected.

Dude, I get your anger totally, but you haven't responded to anything that I actually said. We're not attacking dealers, nor are we saying that we love Jiffy Lube. The OP was talking about a wildly fluctuating price of a repair and that's somewhat evolved into a question about hourly book ratings for jobs. Nobody is complaining right now, we're just presenting what we feel is a poor way of budgeting auto repair work.

But you are attacking dealers/service centers. Until people see the other side, there will be complaints about the price of auto repairs. Most of the time, it is a communication problem of the service writer trying to get the work out ASAP and not asking for or listening to the complete story from the tech working on it. JMO. The service writer knows the inner workings of getting paid, but explaining it to granny that came in for service is an exercise in futility. You should have seen the PITA I endured to explain flat rate "economics" to a loan officer to get a home loan. No amount of explanation makes it clear.

KATYB wrote: yes we do charge full book hours regardless of the time it took to do something (i used to avg well over 100 hours a week while never working more than 40) however as i told customers who did complain normally someone with a 80 something pos well ok ill only charge you the 30 minutes this time instead of the 4 hours but next time u come in for a 5 hour clutch job and i have to drill out half the motor mount bolts and retap the bellhousing bolts cause of rust im gonna charge you the 10 it takes me to work on your car ok?

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigghhht.

If it takes 30 minutes, charge me 30 minutes. If it takes 10 hours, charge me 10 hours.

Anything else is a BS rationalization/justification for not being honest.

If you charge people 6 hours of labor for something that took you less, you are a crook. Plain and simple.

Ranger50 wrote: But you are attacking dealers/service centers. Until people see the other side, there will be complaints about the price of auto repairs. Most of the time, it is a communication problem of the service writer trying to get the work out ASAP and not asking for or listening to the complete story from the tech working on it. JMO. The service writer knows the inner workings of getting paid, but explaining it to granny that came in for service is an exercise in futility. You should have seen the PITA I endured to explain flat rate "economics" to a loan officer to get a home loan. No amount of explanation makes it clear.

I am not attacking anyone. If you think I am, please copy and paste my text and I will explain.

I am saying that the book rate could better be utilized when used as an estimate rather than a bill, but that shops could (and should) tell the customer a different number as an estimate based on the condition of the car and their experience with the repair. The profit should be derived from misquoting the number of hours involved, but by the $/hour on the actual clock that the rest of us have.

For the record, I don't recall ever being told by a mechanic the book hours for a repair. They just give me an estimate. Most will get their estimate using the book-hours and multiplying it by their hourly rate. I don't believe it would ever be in the service writers best interest to tell the customer what the estimated book hours are. It's just "labor".

A possible senario for the OP is the first estimate was made strictly by the service writer using the book. After getting a "WTF???" reply, maybe he went back to the service manager and asked for clarification. The SM may have said, "No, no... those are the book hours... we've got some fancy tools and learned some short-cuts and can actually do the job in 1/3 of that time." OP gets a call back with a revised estimate. Yes, better communication may have been in order, but this would not surprise me.

z31maniac wrote:

KATYB wrote: yes we do charge full book hours regardless of the time it took to do something (i used to avg well over 100 hours a week while never working more than 40) however as i told customers who did complain normally someone with a 80 something pos well ok ill only charge you the 30 minutes this time instead of the 4 hours but next time u come in for a 5 hour clutch job and i have to drill out half the motor mount bolts and retap the bellhousing bolts cause of rust im gonna charge you the 10 it takes me to work on your car ok?

Anything else is a BS rationalization/justification for not being honest. If you charge people 6 hours of labor for something that took you less, you are a crook. Plain and simple.

Uhhh, NO!
Case in point. There is a common repair that needs to be made to a car. The "book" time, or average time says it should be 6 hours. (BTW, when this particular job was customer pay, we'd only charge 5 because we could always beat the 6 hours). After doing many of these I figure out a way to do this job in 2 because I have $40,000 in tools that the average weekend mechanic doesn't have. I also posses a skill set that the average weekend mechanic doesn't have. I also fabricated a special tool that allows me to do this repair without removing said component from the vehicle. I could continue performing this repair by the book, not buying the quality tools that allow me to work better and quicker and not fabbing tools so I can save steps....and possible broken bolts that would cost the customer more money in the end. Some folks seem to forget that while the customer is paying a set amount of money for the repair, I'm being paid a set amount as well. It behooves me to work quickly so I make more money. Anyway, back to the point. Should I really get paid LESS money because my years of experience, natural ability and professional tools allow me to do my job better AND quicker? Really??
Understand this as well. 99% of techs HATE flate rate. While we stand there, waiting for a job who's paying our Snap-On bill? When a job comes in and it pays 5 hours customer pay, or 2.3 hours warranty who's taking it up the behive now?
The shop I last worked at charged by the billable hour. That was nice. As long as we, the tech, had a reasonable explanation for the hours, the customer paid. Customers were happy, techs were happy. Flat rate is screwing the tech and customer alike.

I've said this before, and I'll say it again. From my experience if you are being screwed at a shop or dealer, it's usuallyl the service writer. The tech does NOT work the estimate up. He writes the book time and parts prices down, sometimes not even the parts prices.

z31maniac wrote: If you charge people 6 hours of labor for something that took you less, you are a crook. Plain and simple.

BullE36 M3. Plain and simple.

If it helps: For book jobs, you're paying by the job. Not the hour. The job has an estimated # of hours that allows a generally reasonable price to be set. Sometimes it takes more, sometimes it takes less.

The "book hours" are only a means of determining a reasonable amount of labor for the per job cost which is exactly what most customers actually want to know. They don't give a rats ass if it took you 2 hours or 6 hours that particular time, they care how much it's going to cost, and they want to know ahead of time. Book hours allow for that.

Sure, sometimes the mechanic comes out ahead. On the other hand, it sure beats your car being held hostage when it goes well over the budgeted time.

Are there specific examples where the book estimate is ridiculously out of synch with reality? Of course there are, but that's a separate and more focused issue.

I did freelance computer hardware repair for a while. I had my own price list for most common jobs based on estimated time. I never actually mentioned "hours" in the estimate though. So do I suddenly become a crook if I allow the customer to see where that price comes form?

For example, lets say I charged $60 an hour (because for that sort of work, I did):

Replace Power Supply: $60 Replace Power Supply: $60 (one hour)

Lets say this time it takes 30 minutes. Am I suddenly in crook in the second case, but not in the first one, simply because I provided more information?

Similarly I had an "interesting" time swapping out a floppy drive of all things once. Based on how long I expected it to take (30 minutes) I quoted the customer my standard $50 + parts. Broken down this was $30 for 1/2 hour of labor, $20 as an on-site surcharge + parts. Due to a couple of nifty headaches that sprung up that berkeleying drive took me hours of work and a trip to the hardware store and a bunch of dremel tool work on both the drive and the case.

EDIT: You can say you don't like it, you can say you won't use it, you can say the system is ridiculous. But claiming that it makes them a crook is too far and just makes you look stupid.

im one of the few techs that liked flat rate. i also liked it when we got rid of the hours designation and just started getting paid 20% of total ticket..... wooohooo that was nice untill i had the brilliant idea to take a year off. youd do shocks and brakes on 4 cars and make 1250 dollars in a day.

really sucked for labor intensive jobs tho. get a 1800 dollar job that may take you all day (customer carry in engines) and you get paid crap. back flagging does happy but it its cause of parts going bad charge the part house. if it to correct the same problem but cause by something else well you didnt diag it right in the right place. i used to get that from people all the time. theyd go to one shop theyd say one thing theyd bring it to me and id say it was that one thing and this this and this. theyd get pissed go get that one thing fixed and then it wouldnt be fixed then they would come back to me after realizing i had it right the first time, ive never once sold a customer something i wouldnt do to my own car. in fact most of the time i didnt even sell customers on things i personally do with my vehicles. things like replacing the suspension bushings and shocks every 30k. ignition coils every 30k along with plugs. rubber hoses every year,,,, because well rubber and hot engine bays dont get along.

someone calling my a crook is asinine. my customers were very loyal to me, and now ever that im not wrenching professionally a bunch of them still call me to get thier cars fixed. so what do i do. i tell them come on over. sit them down on my couch get them something to drink and work on thier car. still use book time. only charge 40/hr. did head gaskets the other day on a guys 350 vortec in a chevy truck. he used exchange heads so had new heads with him. i was done in 4 hours. guess what he had no problem paying me the 11 hours the job called for. he showed up at 8 am in a towtruck and left at 12 noon. who would be pissed about that,

KATYB wrote: he showed up at 8 am in a towtruck and left at 12 noon. who would be pissed about that,

Quality (I'm assuming) work and very timely. What a crook. I'm sure he would have been much happier picking it up a day or two later for the same cost.

Same work done, same price, less time spent without his car. What a terrible deal for everyone involved.

Me? In many cases, I'd gladly pay extra to get it done in fewer hours (provided the same quality applies) if that lets me get my car back before heading home for the day or similar.

KATYB wrote: someone calling my a crook is asinine. my customers were very loyal to me, and now ever that im not wrenching professionally a bunch of them still call me to get thier cars fixed. so what do i do. i tell them come on over. sit them down on my couch get them something to drink and work on thier car. still use book time. only charge 40/hr. did head gaskets the other day on a guys 350 vortec in a chevy truck. he used exchange heads so had new heads with him. i was done in 4 hours. guess what he had no problem paying me the 11 hours the job called for. he showed up at 8 am in a towtruck and left at 12 noon. who would be pissed about that,

That's the truth, I'd pay $500 for a HG job any day of the week on a V8 if I could have it back before lunch, people aren't looking at other economic factors when they see a bill, they only see money, if they factor in time, and it's not worth it, they should do it themselves...

And I sure as hell wouldn't mind making $500 for 1/2 a days work

Datsun1500 wrote:

DrBoost wrote: When a job comes in and it pays 5 hours customer pay, or 2.3 hours warranty who's taking it up the behive now?

The customer that has to pay 5 hours. Why should the hours (book or otherwise) change depending on who is writing the check?

Have you ever been to a doctor? Body shop? Parts store? Car dealership?

Lots of places charge different amounts depending on the contracts they've agreed to.

Bryce

In reply to Datsun1500:

Because the factories and their warranty times cheat time from the person fixing it. Reason I can now do/did do the Ram blend door in 15-20min instead of the warranty 1.4hrs. I had to work smarter rather then harder to get paid. I have yet to figure out how to drop out and install a new body style 2wd Jeep Liberty transmission in 3.2hrs. The only way to do that is to not count the time a tech needs to swap sockets, get sockets/wrenches/extenstions, etc.. That is common practice to the time study "engineer" on top of laying out all the tools needed and handing them to the tech.... If there was just a common or believable time to fix something, instead of scraping out every tenth of a second to do a repair, flat rate works ok and keeps techs "happy". Then there isn't a reason to "gouge" the CP customer.

I can answer that. The mfgs write a bullE36 M3 book which saves them from paying full cost for their mistakes. They do that on the back of the service tech. I had a VW rep tell me all their times were 'computer generated'. Whaaaa? Where the hell did THAT come from? Who programs the friggin' thing? Yeah, humans. What it comes down to is the guys writing their warranty flate rate manual are told to keep the times low on purpose.

I've mentioned it here before but I might as well beat this dead horse one more time. In every mfg I have worked with, the warranty flat rate to replace a radio is either .2 or .3 hour. .1 of an hour is 6 minutes. So if we take the high time of .3, that's 18 minutes. Now here is what is supposed to happen in 18 minutes: 1) diagnose the condition (even if intermittent) 2) boogie to the parts dept to order the radio 3) put the original radio back in if one is not in stock 4) remove the original radio and install the new one 5) verify the new radio corrected the problem (even if intermittent) 6) fill out their part of the paperwork including returning the defective radio to the parts dept so it gets returned to the mfg. Oh, and he's expected to fix it for free if this repair didn't correct the customer's complaint.

How many of you can do that in 18 minutes? I haven't even covered finding the car in the parking lot and returning it to the correct spot so the customer can retrieve it.

Yeah, I thought so.

So by decreeing these completely bullE36 M3 repair times the manufacturer has pushed part of the true repair cost for their screwups onto the flat rate for customer pay repair. Why would they care? It's not their problem.

By the way, for the longest time VW paid .8 (or 48 minutes) under warranty to replace the timing belt on a 8V engine.

Then there was Ford starting out with 13 hours to replace a short block on an Escort under the M30 program (premature timing belt failure causing engine destruction), which then got cut to 11 and then got cut to 9. The worst part? They demanded that all the ones done under the earlier higher times be backflagged to 9 hours. So if a tech did, say, 8 of them under the earlier time he got backflagged 32 hours. Yeah, right. The truth was the dealerships wound up eating the difference because the techs would have walked out en masse and no one could blame them. But that money had to come from somewhere. You guessed it- customer pay flat rate.

ummm radio replacement does not include diagnostics.

So, that AC line cost sure was outrageous! Did you get any competitive quotes from other shops?