Mechanic taking a "test drive"

[TommyH]

So here's a little rant and it's only in the Fabia 1 section as it involves my mk1 vRS.

While driving last week in the warm weather, I went to wind up the windows and heard an almighty crunch followed by the NSF window dropping out of sight and failing to come up again. Bit of research on here told me that my window regulator had failed. Fair enough, took it to my local garage to sort out as I couldn't be arsed with drilling out rivets etc.

So, after being asked for £134 for the pleasure of having a replacement supplied and fitted, I collected the car tonight. Got home and I noticed my MPG was in the low thirties (32.1 indicated). Checked the trip computer and 28 miles had been driven in that journey (I'd driven just 1 mile home). Quite honestly I'm failing to see how a new window regulator requires a 27 mile thrash to check it's working... To get the mpg down that low, over that distance in a vRS, it needs to be thrashed. I imagine if I owned a 1 litre Micra it wouldn't have required the same testing. I'm sure others have had similar or potentially worse experiences than that but I'm seriously unhappy about it.

Is it just me, or is that out of order? Like many others on here I put plenty of time and money into my car only for some **** to thrash the nuts off it while I'm not there. Won't be going back other than to make my feelings known to the owner of the garage - which I expect will be a waste of my breath!

[booke23]

32.1 mpg....he must have had the throttle on the floor the whole time. Completely unacceptable.....I'd be furious.  

[Toxicvrs]

Was he in 3rd gear for the whole test drive flat out?

[DanHam]

Don't think mine was even that low when I was out on the track!

[Chris Coates]

You make your frustration known to the owner, you name and shame, and you stop going. Done.

 

It's all about trust and if you can't trust your mechanic to treat your car with respect... Then it's bang out of order and you shouldn't be handing over your keys to them ever again.

[grr666]

I had a wheel bearing done once on my MarkIII Golf GTI

at a local garage when I lived back in Dagenham. 

Clearly someone borrowed it for the weekend as it had 500 odd extra 

miles on the clock when I collected it. 

I couldn't prove it as phones with cameras were in their infancy and

I never had one anyway, I just scribbled the mileage down on a scrap of paper.

I was told 'test drive mate' when I queried it but couldn't prove what they had

done. At least they replaced the petrol but I can't imagine they were particularly

sympathetic to my car when they were using it.

[Ally_bassman]

Name and shame!

Certainly out of order, it's time like this that a dash cam comes in handy. I'd love to see how these techs react if someone was thrashing their car??

[Toxicvrs]

I've seen on the net people with Mitsubushi Evos taking them in for services then leaving dash cams hard wired in and the garages have been breaking the speed limit etc when shown to the garage the mechanics are often cautioned if not sacked ( when a franchise) if there is solid evidence!

[Chris Coates]

This (and other things) may have given me an exceedingly good idea for uses for my skills...

 

...If I get anything together i'll let you know

[BossFox]

Don't think mine was even that low when I was out on the track!

 

18mpg ish.

 

OP, completely out of order, but not much you can do now.

Photo of the milage and a strict instruction not to drive it are the only answers really.

It's not like the repair needed a test drive, but they probably needed a car to pick up some parts etc... and yours was there.

[hutchysrs50]

A small test drive is needed if any at all for a window regulator.

I have used a customers car to collect parts for there own job but never more than a mile!

I had a customer complain 5 mile was added to his taxi, was in for rear discs and pads and a n/s/r caliper to be changed. I tried to explain the discs and pads had to be bed in over a few mile before being tested on our brake rollers to test the parking brake efficiency.

He never did return...

[RichardatWakefield]

Written complaint to Proprietor stating facts, cc'd to local Trading Standards Dept, and to any trade federation the garage belong to??

[RGKTSi]

Completely unacceptable, would be seriously unhappy if that happened to one of my cars which I cherish. Don't know how I'd react! Wouldn't be pretty I can tell you. I'd go and see the owner, name and shame and tell as many people as you can not to use them.

[Neily03]

Yes he may have driven it 27 miles but it then might have sat idling for 10 minutes which would murder the average mpg....

[Toxicvrs]

I'm not sure but does Fabia vRS have avg speed and max speed etc

[loki1066]

What about a petition from this forum to the dealership owners?

[@Lee]

Name and shame!

Certainly out of order, it's time like this that a dash cam comes in handy. I'd love to see how these techs react if someone was thrashing their car??

there's another thread somewhere that mentions the legalities of leaving a dash cam on in a garage/ workshop I think. Can't remember the outcome though.

[Toxicvrs]

Yeah they get up tight about being on public property

[TommyH]

Glad it's not just me thinking it's out of order! I respect that it could've been idling for a little while which brings it down. The journey time was 48 mins by the time I was sat on my drive checking the trip computer and I was annoyed enough to take some pictures. However, it'd be very easy to argue that they prove nothing.

Guess I'll have to learn to record the mileage etc like Bossfox suggested. I wanted to get a Blackvue before and now I think it's moved to the top of the list. If they're uptight about it recording them then they need to start behaving properly, then there'd be no issues for anyone!

Probably pointless to name and shame as it's a small independent garage but that may change dependent on the response I'm given when I ask why the car went so far to check the window closes properly.

[Toxicvrs]

I know of people who take photos of mileage with date and time stamp as well as location tagging on photo enabled!

[Jrjg]

As the majority of the above :

I'd go pretty much ape sh¡t and complain why it had done so much to test a window.

The left ticking over argument is valid however, I wouldn't suggest that to them at all though, and see what excuse they gave. It will make someone squirm anyway.

JRJG

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[grr666]

I know of people who take photos of mileage with date and time stamp as well as location tagging on photo enabled!

Funnily enough I photograph the dash of every vehicle I 

put in for work to be done now. I also did the same when I left 

my van with an off site valet parking service at the airport when I went

on my hols last year. 

These lessons teach themselves. 

[Auric Goldfinger]

When my car or the wife's visit the dealer I write the milage down and hand it to the service manager,  up to five miles is acceptable.

 

They also know not to wash them.  We seem to have an " Understanding "

[Jrjg]

I also did the same when I left

my van with an off site valet parking service at the airport when I went

on my hols last year.

These lessons teach themselves.

I have been told a story in which a car left at an airport car park was being used as a taxi for the two weeks whilst the owner was away, anyhow ... It was crashed into.

Can you imagine how pi55ed off you would be !? The audacity of some folk is untrue.

JRJG

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[fletch101]

Don't think mine was even that low when I was out on the track!

I Thoguht thats your daily mpg these dsys? :P

75 mpg last night fron manchester to Wales. ... just saying