North Wales
Mercedes: £105 ph (although I can get a reduction because I drive an old banger - more than 3 years old..)
Local small, indies (not make specific) about £30 ph
all + VAT
Edited by woodbines on 09/09/2009 at 10:59
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Last time I checked my local Ford dealer , west of London, labour was about £100 per hour.
When Ford prices were available to all on the web my local dealer appeared to be the most expensive in the UK.
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I actually think the Labour charges at most garages are ridiculous and why should Mercedes lower their Labour charges just because you car is more than 3 years old...what difference does that make. It also makes you wonder if there must be something wrong when repairs to a 5 or 6 year year old car can sometimes be more than the car is worth!
Sure I know the old expression, pay peanuts and get monkeys, but what about the relatively inexperienced guys who do a lot of the work around the car, they are still getting £60-100 per hour!!
My other gripe is even with such high labour rates for "expert", they nickel and dime you for things like oil by the litre, when you wouldn't buy it by the litre...the most expensive sundries on the planet and then slip VAT on top of their estimates. ...what's all that about, the majority of us pay VAT, why quote/estimate without it..
My last issue with all this and the most important one: You can take a car in and sometimes it seems they try and fix it by trial and error, you can end up with a massive bill even if they don't fix your car. If they do fix it for a £10 part after you have spent hundreds or thousands, they still charge you. If you pay for experts, your car should go in, be diagnosed and an firm fix price given. If the problem it went info is not fixed, you don't pay (whatever they have seen fit to try and fit to your car to fix it). If the motorist did not have to pay for the Diagnosis, that might also be a big help, although a small fee is probably unavoidable.
Now I know some garages are very good, Honda and others do some fixed price repair items, there will always be exceptions. In general though I do not think the motorist has enough legal protection, especially after reading many of the problems experienced with garages/repairs on the internet. So if they are going to charge such high rates, we should expect them to professional and provide some guarantees and protection for us. Not just nice places to sit, free coffee and a hoover and Valet for "free"?
P.S. No wonder they don't want all electric cars.
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I actually think the Labour charges at most garages are ridiculous and why should Mercedes lower their Labour charges just because you car is more than 3 years old...what difference does that make.
I agree. Ridiculous. I believe that Mercedes lower their charges to try to tempt the customer to stay with them for servicing after the warranty has expired.
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I used to drive a Lexus and now a Toyota. It was common knowledge that when you took your Lexus in for work, they would drive it 100 yards to the Toyota garage next door and the Toyota techs do the job, charging out a higher labour rate simply because they can.
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I used to drive a Lexus and now a Toyota. It was common knowledge that when you took your Lexus in for work they would drive it 100 yards to the Toyota garage next door and the Toyota techs do the job charging out a higher labour rate simply because they can.
Toyota make Lexus cars so it's logical that the same techs do the work. I'm not defending exorbitant labour charges but technical training is very expensive and often means residential courses, sometimes abroad. The equipment is expensive too. My son used to work in the bodyshop at a North London Toyota main dealer and often worked on Lexuses (very well built in his view BTW). Heated spray booths, airfed masks, subscriptions to online databases etc. etc. don't come cheap either.
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You can take a car in and sometimes it seems they try and fix it by trial and error, you can end up with a massive bill even if they don't fix your car.
Totally agree. They seem to think that's a reasonable & 'professional' way to go about things. If I even attempted that 'suck-it-and-see' approach with my customers they would simply laugh & say bye-bye. I know diagnosing isn't always easy - but hey, when I pay £100+ per hour I expect to get that level of expertise - it's only nuts & bolts & OBD codes after all.
Incidentally, I've got a Merc service booked for tomorrow - I gave them the heads-up on a few other minor faults I'd like them to look at at the time of service too - I asked the service person if I could speak to the actual guy who's going to do it, to give a bit of info & context on the faults - Gulp! was their initial response, but they 'kindly' acceded to the request eventually.
I think the old dollar signs go 'Kerchingggg!!!' whenever people mention other faults or items they'd like looked at in garages & they often think 'Ah, blank cheque time!'
I'll be asking for their best expertise & be saying I don't want to pay for remedies that don't work & will want to see anything they replace (if I agree to the work being done of course..) afterwards - not foolproof I know, but it shows intent at least.
..and definitely no screen-wash at a fiver a pop thanks!
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>>it's only nuts & bolts & OBD codes after all..
Even though I'm not a mechanic, and don't necessarily know what I'm talking about all the time, I beg to differ.
I'm not defending the exorbitant rates needed to pay for the franchise, plastic palace, and other nonsense, but there's more to fixing a car than nuts and bolts and OBD codes, as there are problems which don't give any code, or an appropriate code.
If it was as simple as reading codes, a car would stand a chance of being fixed first time, and there wouldn't be "un-repairable" cars either.
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>>it's only nuts & bolts & OBD codes after all..
Even though I'm not a mechanic, and don't necessarily know what I'm talking about all the time, I beg to differ.
Nuts & bolts = shorthand for all the mechanical stuff
ODB = shorthand for all the electronic stuff
Can't see much more than that really.
Edited by woodbines on 09/09/2009 at 19:23
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>>Nuts & bolts = shorthand for all the mechanical stuff
>>ODB = shorthand for all the electronic stuff
>>Can't see much more than that really.
My confusion - taking your answer literally.
You knew what you meant, but it wasn't what I thought you meant...
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Berkshire Audi £110 PH. The fact that they lower labour rates for cars over 3 year old is like them just saying to you, we are ripping you right off because you bought a newish car.
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Vauxhall Dealer near me Charge £75 to plug the car in, before they even will attempt to find out what the fault is by them selves
Last year I had a issue on my Astra, a relay in the engine compartment shorted out, disabling the lights, wipers and indicators the car itself drove perfectly.
When I phoned them up I told them what was wrong and they said it would cost me a diagnosis fee before the main charge of fixing the car (at the time I didn?t know that it was the relay that had gone)
The ECU had no fault recorded, the management light wasn?t on so as far as the car was concerned everything was fine ? it didn?t know about the relay fault.
However they still wanted to plug it up, and charge £75 for the privilege even though it wasn?t going to come back with any faults.
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in sussex main dealer for merc is £119 per hour indie merc man is for ml £60-70 per hour.welcome to ripoff sussex.
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My local Daihatsu/Ford dealer is £60 ph inc VAT, which in this day and age is mighty reasonable!
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