It sounds very fishy to me too. I did not tell the whole story since it is long an I just wanted to get some independant confirmation on the pricing.
The short of it is this. A senior citizen friend of mine, who does not have much money but needs a car to get to work had this done recently. I could not get a good description of the problem from her other than the back of her car was making a clunking noise. She took it to a local shop who told her it was dangerous to drive and sold her this work for about $725.
It may be water over the damn because I did not see the car before hand to evaluate anything myself. I can only now get an idea if the price charged for the work done on the reciept was reasonable.
If she was overcharged I will try to talk to the mechanic myslef on her behalf and see if I can get anything money back.
I hate it when someone is an easy mark to a mechanic and they take advantage of them. I may be wrong, but it sounds like this is the case here.