I hate reading these posts with unwarranted animosity towards repair shops... Be it a stealership or an indy, we have to make money to continue to provide you with a service. First off you have a line by line estimate of all repairs getting done, you can judge for yourself weather its fair or not. If you don't have a line by line estimate, drive away.
Second: Don't cry when they charge you 100 bucks to spend 3 man hours diagnosing, calling for prices, writing an estimate, calling you, then closing out paperwork.
Third: Don't buy your own parts. I buy my parts at a 20% discount of what you can get them for, then I mark them up 20% and charge you. So instead of the part supplier getting the 20% I do. If you bring your own parts, I wont warrantee my labor if the part you bring should fail. And if you think you are getting a bargain, you are wrong, if someone gives you a price of 1000 bucks for head gaskets, you are getting 1000 bucks worth, no cleaning, no checking for true, no machine work, no valve job, they just pop the heads off and put a new gasket in and put the heads back on. You can end up like the guy I had in my shop the other day, screaming about how he just had the head gaskets replaced 5000 miles ago at "we be fixin your car, auto repair" and now his car needs head gaskets again. But hey he got a great deal! 1000 bucks out the door!

 

The cost of doing business these days is staggering.The insurance I have to have to cover a vehicle while it in my possession. The EPA fees to dispose of the old fluids. I could have bought a used LR3 for what the Autologic cost.Hell, my power bill has tripled in the last five years. I won't even get into taxes, that alone makes me wonder what it is all for. And to offer a good warranty on top of everything else. The influx of cheaply made Chinese parts has to be dealt with on a daily basis. I only offer one course of repair, the correct one. And it cost to get there. I enjoying eating and this is how I buy my food.

 

For a job like this I would never supply my own parts.
Pay the price and be done with it.
This guy has two options, shop "A" and shop "B".
Shop "B" is a Rover shop and $400 cheaper, thats who I'd use.

 

$2800 doesn't sound that bad actually.

 

I can understand a shop receiviing a discount on parts, I just question whether most shops charge the effective retail price or mark the parts up further. In my experience, I think it's been the latter. That said, if you choose to take your car or truck to a shop, you should expect to pay a premium for the convenience and service.

But, what if you want to buy aftermarket stuff and have it installed? I wonder whether a typical shop can get OME or Terrafirma parts at a discount, and whether they'll pass these savings on to a consumer.

 

No, most shops have two parts supplier's and they can only get what that supplier carries.
Here they use NAPA as the first choice and then S&G Imports for their 2nd choice.
Thats it, if neither of those 2 carry what they need then they cannot help you.
NAPA wont carry TF, and I can almost guarantee the import supplier doesn't either.

 

I worked for a shop as a teenager. Mostly Honda and Acura. But also everything else including domestics too. We'd sell the OEM parts at MSRP, and we'd usually get 25% off at the local dealers, or up to 35% off at larger out of state dealers. We'd also use WorldPac and get really really good prices if they carried what we needed. If we bought from the local parts stores, we'd mark up 40% to 60% (unless that made it more than OEM, then we do some markup that was reasonable for the customer, but it was almost always way more than they'd pay at the counter). As was said before, this was part of the was we earned our money. The dealership also marks up parts... some as high as 100% markup.

We had no problem installing after market performance stuff that customer brought in, but we wouldn't warranty anything.

 

The reason I said buy your own parts is that the shop I deal with does not care... If I have a better part or prefer to buy on my cc and pay it off as I choose the owner does not care. he wants to make sure that the work done is the best possible, he makes his money either way. I also know him and do most of my own work. I mean no offense to shop owners... but lets face it I know I can get better parts in most cases than they can at a good price. that is why I suggested he look at doing that.

 

I don't blame you. At least with AutoZone, they give shop prices and suggested retail prices. The dealer price is actually the same as the price they give to everyone on the regular AutoZone site, and the prices they suggest the shop charge the customer is normally about twice the actual retail price they charge people directly. I don't know how other suppliers do it though. It seems a lot of the shops only see the site for shops and they really think they are getting a discount. At least that's how it was for a few techs I spoke to that dealt with AutoZone.

 

Finally, a technician speaks. I freaking hate it when everyone has a problem with repair shops. What people need to realize is that auto repair is actually still a trade. If it was that easy, then everyone would be diagnosing their own cars and this entire forum wouldn't exist. We as technicians don't come to your place of business and tell you what we are willing to pay and give you the supplies to do your own job.