Taken for a ride

From: Darrell Ramsell (daram@comcast.net)
Date: Mon Nov 15 2004 - 21:05:21 PST


Gents

 A while back I mentioned there was a shop called "Richard's Deisel" in
Livermore, CA (near San Francisco) that can do work on HMMWV engines and in
particular rebuild fuel injection pumps. I've picked up my HMMWV today and
mechanically everything seems to be running fine. Took it up and over the
hill with no power loss.

But when I went to pay the bill I received a bit of a sticker shock. The
first time I ever talked to him he quoted $1,100 to rebuild the fuel
injection pump. When I contacted him a month or so later to bring it in he
told me that it would be $1,200 and that the $1,100 price was a mistake.
Since there was no one else in my area that would rebuild my fuel pump I
said fine but it didn't sit well. He told me when I finally brought it in
that it'll be $1,200 but if it needed a new housing that it'll be $100 for
it but said that will be the top.

When I arrived he handed me a bill for $1,582. The extra was for the
housing and a throttle shaft. The housing was $168.44. I told him that he
said $100 tops. After a little stuttering on his part he reduced it.
However, he still wanted to charge $127.85 for a throttle shaft. He did
show me the piece when the pump was torn and said it would need to be
replaced but made no mention that there would be additioanl cost for that
piece. At that point I assumed it was part of the rebuld cost. When he
tried to charge me for that I complained. He knocked another $50 but
despite the reduction I still feel I was taken for a ride. My final total
was $1,432.

On top of that, it took him 2-1/2 weeks to fixed my vehicle.

Since I mentioned him on this list earlier I wanted to relay my experience.
While he did seem to do a very good job (so far), I felt I was low balled
then he tried to pad on the cost once the work was done.

Darrell



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