What you describe is exactly why I take my car to the Toyota dealer. There are great mechanics in McAllen, but you have to drop you car off and wait sometimes for many days. With only one car, that is not an option.
I realize if I ever have a major breakdown, I will be renting a car. But, so far, nothing like that.
Also, they use brand new parts, which is what I want.
@Jakey never came back to give more info.
So we don’t know if the shop said that they can get to it in ten days and he dropped the car off and it sat until his appointment ten days later.
Maybe he didn’t need the second car until this trip.
No shop is going to tie up a bay for ten days while a mechanic piddles around.
yosemite
@irlandes I concur dealers are significantly faster. However on major repairs pricing an independent is best interest. I had a valve burn on my Legacy Gt unfortunately. The dealer quoted me at $5500 to repair it and two days. The independent performed the same task for $3000. I used the $2500 delta to get a monthly car rental for $240.(took 4 weeks)
My buddy who recently moved away to sunny Az., was always busy.
A two bay shop, one lift and only him to do all the mechanic work, parts running, and billing.
Some weeks he would have 5-8 cars parked there every day…other weeks it might be slow and
the lot would be near empty.
Many times he would call me to help him catch up. He’d work the lift bay and I’d work the other bay with jobs that didn’t need a lift. Or he’d need me for those big jobs that were better done with two people.
Some big jobs such as head gaskets or engine swaps might sit awhile until things slowed a bit.
Not every job was a first come first served basis, but he also knew most customers pretty well and knew if they had extra vehicles to fall back on.
Yosemite
I think that many independent shops, which do not keep parts on hand, are reluctant to order the necessary parts until the vehicle is in their possession. Just because a customer has scheduled the car to be brought in, doesn’t mean he will keep that appointment. So that 10 days could have been 9 days waiting for parts and one day doing the actual work.