kwik fit robbers-or so they thought

hi group, i had a puncture on my vehicle. i stay in glasgow and decided to take it in to my nearest kwik fit. i did not request a price before they did the job. so chating away as one does to the young fitter he proceeds to fix the puncture. he was just about to put the wheel back on the car when i noticed he had fitted a new valve which was ofcourse a short reach valve of no use to man nor beast. i told him if i had noticed it earlier he would have been fitting a long reach valve. so he gets the wheel back on the car and secures my wheel trim with a tie strap. we then go in to the office for payment. he was on the till as much time as it took him to fix the puncture. he then says...wait for it...that will be £15.99 please sir. i immeadiatly told him i was not paying it and told him to get the manager which he did. the manager then wrote me up a bill for a new valve at £3 and a wheel balance at £5. total cost £8. i still consider this a rip off and dont think all this carry on of new valve and wheel balance is nessessary. to avoid wheel balance all one has to do is mark the tyre on the wall and rim and aline the marks when putting the tyre back on. i did not think it critical that a back wheel/tyre need be balanced. no more kwik fit for TBM...comments invited please...rgds to all.

Reply to
tbm
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"tbm" wrote in news:HK3Kb.607$ snipped-for-privacy@newsfep1-win.server.ntli.net:

Had similar but not at KwikFit. Told them I'd pay their extortionate charge provided I got a fully itemised receipt so I could take it straight round to Trading Standards and the local paper, or they could take my £5 cash and we'd part (forever) as friends. They took the latter.

Derry

Reply to
Derry Argue

in to my nearest kwik fit. i did not request a price before

proceeds to fix the puncture. he was just about to put the

ofcourse a short reach valve of no use to man nor beast. i

reach valve. so he gets the wheel back on the car and secures

he was on the till as much time as it took him to fix the

immeadiatly told him i was not paying it and told him to

new valve at £3 and a wheel balance at £5. total cost £8. i

valve and wheel balance is nessessary. to avoid wheel balance

when putting the tyre back on. i did not think it

TBM...comments invited please...rgds to all.

Reply to
Christopher Macleod

Don't top-post, there's a love.

Si

Reply to
Mungo "two sheds" Toadfoot

You should do this with anything.

All tyre firms seem to have a policy of fitting a new valve what ever they do, if I know the age of the valve I say do not change unless faulty.

Usually best to have a tyre balanced, but if you do not want it doing say so to them.

Kwick Fit do the actual puncture repair free, so I see nothing wrong with your 2 charges, I paid these several times.

I've allways found Kwik fit have done the jobs for me quickley and got me on the road again asap.

Only a week ago I had a caravan tyre go down, they replaced the inner valve and inflatted the tyre for me straight away and no charge made.

Reply to
David

in to my nearest kwik fit. i did not request a price before they did the job.

Drive In Plus Centre, puncture repair last February. I just checked the itemised bill- Parts £0. Labour- £8.47. Vat- £1.48. Total £9.95. Additional Information. P.P (don't know what that is). No mention of valve or balance. A main dealer charges a minimum of thirty minutes labour just to lift the bonnet- about £25, so I suppose it's not extortionate. Forty years ago a puncture repair was 5/- (25p) on average net wages of £15. At that rate a puncture repair should cost no more than £5. Drive In Centres have comfortable waiting rooms with 'free' drinks and newspapers, so we're paying for that. DaveK.

Reply to
DaveK

What's with this top posting? It always seems to be a lot better to me. Saves having to scroll to the bottom of each message. I've noticed once or twice a top poster gets asked to desist, but I prefer it.

Rob Graham

Reply to
Rob Graham

Kwik-Fit in Bury told me in 1996 I needed a new set of shocks on my Citroen BX ...

Not been in since.

Mike

Reply to
Mike P in Brazil

Nice :)

Reply to
Dan405

And a Citroen agency at Serignan, France tested the suspension on my old Xantia by pushing at each corner and finding it hard, stated the spheres needed replacing...- with the engine off. DaveK.

Reply to
DaveK

Rob> What's with this top posting? It always seems to be a lot Rob> better to me. Saves having to scroll to the bottom of each Rob> message. I've noticed once or twice a top poster gets asked Rob> to desist, but I prefer it.

For some reason a number of Windows based newsreaders seem to look beter when top posting. Everything else doesn't. However, it is standard usenet eqiquette, and has been for twenty years or more, that top posting is bad manners.

AndyC

--

+-------------------------------------------------------------------------+ |Andy Cunningham aka AndyC the WB | andy -at- cunningham.me.uk | +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+ |
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- Everything you wanted to know || about the P38A Range Rover but were afraid to ask. |+-------------------------------------------------------------------------+"And everything we want to get/We download from the InternetAll we hear is/Internet Ga-Ga/Cyberspace Goo-goo" -- from "Radio Ga Ga"/"We will rock you"
Reply to
AndyC the WB

LOL take a reliant robin down and ask the youf to check the tracking on it.. bet half of em would have the tracking gear out and half on the car before realising

Reply to
CampinGazz

Heres why.

formatting link

Reply to
sQuick

Some of the NG's, refuse to acknowledge top posters.

HTH tox

Reply to
tox

my nearest kwik fit. i did not request a price before

to fix the puncture. he was just about to put the

ofcourse a short reach valve of no use to man nor beast. i

valve. so he gets the wheel back on the car and secures

on the till as much time as it took him to fix the

immeadiatly told him i was not paying it and told him to

valve at £3 and a wheel balance at £5. total cost £8. i

and wheel balance is nessessary. to avoid wheel balance

putting the tyre back on. i did not think it

TBM...comments invited please...rgds to all.

I can understand your irritation at the valve, but complaining about a bill of 8 quid for removing a wheel, fixing a puncture and refitting the wheel seems a little much.

They didn't charge you anything for the puncture repair itself so I think that a bill of 8 quid is more than reasonable. If their intention had been to rip you off surely they'd have tried to sell you a new tyre?

Additionally, since they've changed the weight distribution of the tyre by adding a puncture repair 'plug' (or whatever) and fitting a new valve I'd suggest that the balancing was appropriate.

How much do you think would have been a reasonable fee? My view is that you're complaining about very little since they've already halved the bill following your complaint.

Reply to
deadmail

It's probably a plug'npatch, which is what they repair tubeless tyres with nowadays. It's a mushroom shape with a patch on the inside of the tyre and a stem which is pulled through the hole and cut off flush with the tread.

Steve

Reply to
shazzbat

To remove a wheel, tyre, fix puncture, balance and re-fit - how long? 20 minutes minimum? And what's the cost of the jack, tyre removing machine, balancer etc? Then of course there's 'rent and rates' on usually high street premises. Before you even start paying the staff. And that they're unlikely to but one job hard up against the next all day every day so there's down time to be payed for too.

Most hairdressers charge about a tenner round here for maybe 20 minutes work - with minimal equipment costs. So I'd say 30 quid an hour is about the least you'll pay for *any* 'walk in' labour only service.

Of course, if you're buying goods then the profit on them pays for the service.

Reply to
Dave Plowman

I only paid £30 for an hour at the dentists this morning! (Although it would have been about 10 minutes if the dental nurse had been there)

Reply to
Duncan Wood

Try the 24 hr tyre/car wash place next to the fire station on maryhill road they repair for £3

also 24 hr tyre place on possil road same price , both in North Glasgow

Reply to
Bluesky

If you use an archive such as groups.google.com, then bottom posting makes it much easier to scan through an entire thread as this can be put into one window.

Johannes

Reply to
Johannes H Andersen

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