I took my wife’s 2017 Ford Edge into a dealer for a recall on both the front brake hoses yesterday. I can’t complain about anything at the dealer except one thing. It took 6 hours. I’ve done this job myself and I’d estimate 2 hours for me, without a lift, and without brake bleeding equipment. And it didn’t just sit on the lot, because they texted me after 20 minutes that they checked the alignment (which I did NOT ask for) and said I should get it aligned. I declined. I’m ticked off because when I was driving the car back I had to deal with torrential rain, an accident on the route, and rush hour traffic which I was hoping to avoid with a 10:00 appointment. Can any pros out there how long this job should have taken? I paid nothing, so that is not the issue.
Ask the service department why it took so long ? But you did not have to pay for this and the weather is not their fault. Maybe they had some emergency repair or had to wait on the parts . Such is life .
Yes I did, and they did not answer. And they verified they had the parts before making the appointment.
It is probably because there were a bunch of other cars in front of you. a recall comes out and you have a bunch of people going to get it done.
Recall? Have them pick it up and return it.
Not gonna happen, especially these days with manpower shortages.
This is a 2-year old recall. There were two other folks in the waiting room. I did enjoy the doughnut. Ford never even informed me about it. I found out on the Ford website, and called the nearby dealer (I moved 8 months ago) and they checked and said the parts were available and made the appointment. Remember … they managed to get an alignment check done immediately.
Your 10:00 AM appointment was with the service advisor, not the technician. What was the “promise time” on the work order?
If a technician must perform 10 recalls each day, one customer is going to ask why it took all day to finish their vehicle.
Alignment inspections are performed during check-in, not necessarily in the shop, they have driveway alignment inspection equipment.
Just like the DR’s office, they overbook. better to have the cars waiting in line to be worked on then having mechanics sitting around waiting for the next vehicle. it sucks to wait, but that’s just the way it is.
My dealership has a shuttle service, I drop the car off, they take me home. When it’s ready they come and get me.
I actually did not sit at the dealer for 6 hours (hallelujah). They drove me home and picked me up. This is my first visit to this dealer.
Did they delay my car because I refused an alignment? Did they delay because I wasn’t in the waiting room? Or are they so incompetent that it takes 6 hours to perform a 2hour service? Just looking to future service. This is a real small dealer. And there is one not much further from home that I could try.
Delay? The word they use is “prioritize”. Customers in the waiting room have priority over those who got a ride home.
My dealer is 60 miles away so no taking me home and I have always been pleased with the wait. I don’t remember if it was for fluid changes or shocks but I had planned about a four hour wait. I barely got done with my breakfast and on a little walk and they called me to get my car. But yeah I was waiting and not home. It’s been probably 40 years since I did brake hoses though but it was a struggle to get the old ones off.
At any rate I just don’t remember having to wait much if I make an appointment. Last time it was for alignment. 12:30 appointment and I was there 10 minutes early. Car was done in less than an hour. Didn’t even get to finish my DVD.
I guess my advice in these crazy times is for everyone to just calm down a little. I for one am happy just to have someone I can take the car to.
Given Covid complications to most every aspect of life, I expect the only way to avoid this sort of problem is to replace the hose yourself in your driveway. Other than that you are at the mercy of the dealership shop’s schedule. Next time ask them if there’s a particular time/day they won’t be super-busy, might help.
Other ideas
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Take bills, paperwork with you and do that job at the dealership. Ask if they could supply you a workplace. Donuts, coffee, and bill paying. Ain’t exactly a Manhattan stroll, but overall, not that bad.
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Any shopping to do? Leave the dealership in a cab if necessary, and do that. The dealerships in my area tend to be within walking distances of major shopping malls.
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Enjoy a long lunch. Especially if there’s a buffet restaurant nearby, eat a big, healthy leisurely buffet lunch. Maybe you can show up for lunch, pay lunch prices, and continue eating through the dinner menu. One problem with this idea in my area anyway, somebody in the gov’t decided buffet restaurants would be a good place to feed homeless folks. They were all given chits at those restaurants. In theory it was a good idea for the homeless to get a good healthy meal. But in practice the paying customers didn’t like the dining-with-the-homeless experience, and stopped going to those restaurants. The result: all or at least most of them have closed.
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Next time tell a sales-person you are interested in buying a new car. But you only have 2 hours. Ask if they can guarantee the shop will be done with your car’s service in 2 hours. The penalty to this is you’ll have to listen to the sales-person for 2 hours , presuming you aren’t really interesting in buying another car. You could try my technique to cut this experience short. Tell the salesperson you want a new car with manual roll-up windows. That usually gets them to find another customer for their pitch … lol …
This waiting time is one of the reason’s I prefer the diy’er approach myself. I also avoid the “if it isn’t broken when you bring it to the shop we can’t do anything to fix it” typical shop comments.
Your 10:00 scheduled time is planned for when the service counter can check you in, not when the mechanic can work on your car. The time from when you walk in to the time the mechanic is handed your work order can be half an hour. Same at the back end. From the time the mechanic hands in the completed order to the time to office processes it can be another half hour.
The mechanic may be finishing his 8:00 brake job when he is informed that the customer has decided to add on replacing the belts and doing a coolant flush. He is going to perform that work first since the car is already in his stall and your brake hoses will have to wait. When he does begin work on your car the guy in the next stall is struggling with getting a transmission up and installed and needs an extra hand. so he goes and helps him for 20 minutes.
Lunch time comes and your mechanic shortens his break to 20 min because Mr. Tomlin wants his brake hoses done ASAP. But now the 1:00 waiting appointment for an oil change is here so he has to do that first and replace the burned out headlamp he noticed. Finally back to your car.
Incompetent? No, just well-run. There is (or should be) someone in the shop that directs and prioritizes the flow of work to maximize hours produced and parts sold, because that’s how a business works. And that means constantly shuffling timeframes and jobs.
Now if they had given you a 10am appointment and promised the car back by noon, that’s a different story…
Well here’s what you do for six hour waiting for your car after being dropped off at home. Do the dishes, vacuum, wash the windows, check email, cut the grass, clean the garage, prepare supper, read. A book or take a nap until the van shows up. I keep a list.
Yeah, if they’ll bring you back home and take you back to the shop, seems to me there’s always an endless set of tasks needing doing. Just re-organizing the bookcases would take a couple hours. Crossword puzzle, another hour. Almost there already … lol …
Did you look at hoses?
What a great explanation!
So at this point you have absolutely no idea how long they actually spent changing the hoses.
You say you have done this job yourself in 2 hours sans lift but without specifying whether this was the same vehicle.
If the same vehicle then I question why 2 hose changes. If a different vehicle then it’s comparing apples to oranges.
Personally I don’t see a problem for the reasons laid out already. In an auto shop there are countless reasons for delays which are unforeseen and unavoidable; not the least of which is the car being done by noon and a swamped service advisor just not getting back to you until later.