Late night shopping.

Rogue traders

My husband is a sole trader motor vehicle technician, NOT a grease monkey mechanic, he specialises in engine management, electronic diagnostics and also does general servicing and maintenance on most vehicles from a 1960's mini to an AMG Mercedes also on his books are a1938 Austin 10 and a 1954 Rolls Royce Silver Dawn.

I guess I can safely say he knows his stuff.
So you can understand his total disgust and disbelief that a well known main dealer in York should stoop so low as to offer 'winter safety checks' in order to con unsuspecting and trusting drivers into having works done that are not needed.

The car he collected this morning had been for such a check at a York main dealer. Here's the list they came away with:
Near side front fog light not working... this car doesn't have front fog lights!!
Front brake discs pitted... hardly and certainly not worthy of comment.
Brake fluid has 3% water in it... the top was seized onto the reservoir, so had not been removed, not checked!
Bottom arm bushes perished... correct.

When this customer collected their car and drove it away the engine management light came on, fortunately they didn't have time to go back, instead they waited for himself to look at it this morning.
The things they missed were;
14 fault codes in engine management.
3 fault codes in ABS.
2 tyres close to legal limit.
Hand brake inoperative.

On opening the bonnet, himself saw that the Air Mass Meter was unplugged which explains why the engine light was on.... They - main dealer staff- had removed and hidden it the plug by jamming it underneath the battery !!

For the faults they found they quoted over £1000.00 to fix.

Needless to say the vehicle owner will be taking this further and my other arf is more than happy to meet with trading standards over this matter.

Why when there are so many honest small traders do people still trust these bigger bully boys?

On the plus side today we went to Judsons for a teatime pint and I got to take photos of the crowds of people being entertained by street artists at the Late Night Shopping event.

AND I've bought a new lens, a very nifty fifty 1.4.

For anyone interested, the car today is a Ford Focus C-max and I could perhaps throw a stone across my field which is an acre.