Is this an unreasonable price?

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10-17-2010, 02:10 AM
x2xtreme360

Is this an unreasonable price?

I'm by no means trying to rip anyone off here... but I work with a guy who I consider to be a friend. Last week, he wanted me to do a brake job on his 2002 Escort on the rear drums. He gives me the money and I buy the parts. The TOTAL cost of the job came to be $130 parts AND labor. I spent the better part of 5 hours doing the work because I wasn't using the facilities at school and the drums were beyond fused to the hubs. I ended up having to hammer a hole into the drum just to be able to pry it off with a pry bar.

That's not the problem. He was grateful for that. I ended up making a mere $45 on that job.

He wants me to do a basic tune up to the car since it's most likely 100% factory since the car rolled out of production. He gives me $100 to cover parts. Cost came to about $70 for spark plugs, wires, PCV valve, fuel filter, and air filter. Tonight at work, we are discussing what time I can do it tomorrow. I mention to him that I will need $20 more to do the job to cover labor (a total of $50 in my pocket for the job). He got pretty mad at me for that one. Claims that I'm supposed to be his friend and that I'm ripping him off. He said that just the other day he drove by a shop that advertised $55 labor. I told him "that's their HOURLY rate. They go by book time, which could end up being 3 hours for all you know. Not only that, shops like that mark up their parts and only have to buy them at COST." Then, he tells me that I'm not some specialized mechanic like they are and that I shouldn't be asking him for that much money. I told him that I'm going to SCHOOL for a bachelors degree in Auto Tech and most of the "mechanics" at those chain shops don't even have a high school degree.

We exchange some yelling... mostly I was yelling because I felt like he had no right to insult me like that and tell me that my SUNDAY time was not worth $50 to him. Icing on the cake here... the shop that is supposedly "specialized" charged him $600 to do his front brakes 6 months ago (I saw the receipt). When I was doing his rear brakes, he wanted me to look for the grinding noise he was hearing. I removed a front wheel and what do you know... he has NO pads left on his front brakes. I tell him this and he takes the car back to the shop to find out why the brakes didn't last. They charge him $40 labor and free parts to redo them... here's where it gets better. A week later, his fucking caliper falls off. They forgot to tighten down the bolts to the knuckle. And he tries to tell me these shops are "specialized"... yes, they're special all right.

Am I out of line for charging $50 for a fucking tune up? What a cheap bastard... he can pay a shop $600 for an easy as PIE front disk brake job but can't pay me $50 to install plugs, wires, fuel filter, air filter, and PCV valve? wtf!:(
10-17-2010, 02:22 AM
futurevr4man

i dont think you are being unreasonable.

but at the same time, arguing with him wont help the situation or teach him anything. let the numbers talk. tell him to take it to the shop. $400 later he will understand why you wanted a measly $120 for everything
10-17-2010, 02:25 AM
x2xtreme360

Quote:

Originally Posted by futurevr4man

i dont think you are being unreasonable.

but at the same time, arguing with him wont help the situation or teach him anything. let the numbers talk. tell him to take it to the shop. $400 later he will understand why you wanted a measly $120 for everything

I'm honestly considering giving him the parts I bought, throwing the extra $30 in an envelope with a note that says "take this shit to a shop and see what they want from your wallet" and putting it on his doorstep.

I think he still expects me to do the work tomorrow... but unless he plans on giving me that extra $20 he can forget it.
10-17-2010, 02:26 AM
Mean Green

cut your losses and tell him to take a hike. I would charge roughly just 100$ labor to do a tuneup on that car.
10-17-2010, 02:43 AM
kywhitelightning

Friends and family are typically horrible customers as they feel they "deserve a little break". Something for nothing is what I like to call it. Give him his parts and move on. You're not the bad guy at all for that and he'll get the satisfaction of spending the additional $$ on the specialized experience at the other shop and hopefully in the end learn to appreciate your work done at a very reasonable rate. Good luck to you as there are plenty of other great customers out there that really appreciate the "little guy" making side money on the weekends.

Jeff
10-17-2010, 11:22 AM
stealthee

Put the parts in a box, put it on his doorstep with a note that reads. "Take it to one of your specialized shops and then let me know how much they charge you for labor. Maybe next time you won't be so ungrateful."
10-17-2010, 12:13 PM
RealMcCoy

Book time:

spark plugs .6
plug wires .6 (overlapping labor with plugs open to interpretation by the service writer, most would probably just call it 1.0 for both)
fuel filter.6
PCV valve .3

1.9 hrs in my shop would be $142.50
A $20 an hour flat rate tech doing the work would make $38 (but probably do that job in less than 30 minutes, so he'd gross $76hr for that time period)
10-18-2010, 09:17 AM
j2k4

Quote:

Originally Posted by x2xtreme360

...I work with a guy who I consider to be a friend...

Start by re-assessing this ^.
10-18-2010, 10:24 AM
green-lantern

Quote:

Originally Posted by stealthee

Put the parts in a box, put it on his doorstep with a note that reads. "Take it to one of your specialized shops and then let me know how much they charge you for labor. Maybe next time you won't be so ungrateful."

This is probably what I would do.
10-18-2010, 12:04 PM
x2xtreme360

Quote:

Originally Posted by j2k4

Start by re-assessing this ^.

I did end up doing the work for him... but not before I explained to him why my pricing was so damn cheap. I asked him to feel free to contact a local shop to see what they would charge and he would understand. He declined the offer, said he was sorry for pissing me off, and gave me the other $20 right there.

I think us not being pissed off helped the issue.
10-18-2010, 12:06 PM
deemo99

You could also show him how to do the work (have him work with you once) as brakes are not that difficult. Perhaps if he understood what is involved he'd understand your POV?

Otherwise as suggested above, probably time to have him figure it out for himself.

Work and friendships is tough, no doubt.
10-18-2010, 06:59 PM
Hans@GZP

Just be glad it's not a Porsche or Corvette. Sucks to be me when the parents want work done on their cars for free. Just spent over $300 doing my mom's front brakes :(
10-18-2010, 08:18 PM
stealthee

Yeah, but you love your mommy. :p
10-19-2010, 01:58 PM
jba3

Next time, tell him you want $50 for labor, and he pays for parts. That way you haven't shorted yourself on the "up front" $100 that he thought it would cost him.

I'd bet he is more upset that you said $100 and then wanted $20 more later, than if he just paid $120 up front.

And $50 labor is pretty reasonable.
10-19-2010, 02:02 PM
x2xtreme360

Quote:

Originally Posted by jba3

Next time, tell him you want $50 for labor, and he pays for parts. That way you haven't shorted yourself on the "up front" $100 that he thought it would cost him.

I'd bet he is more upset that you said $100 and then wanted $20 more later, than if he just paid $120 up front.

And $50 labor is pretty reasonable.

That's the thing, I never told him it would be $100. He handed me a $100 bill and told me that should cover the parts to do the job... He must have just assumed that I would accept the remainder as the labor.
10-19-2010, 02:14 PM
i3igpete

tell him to take a hike. $10/hr on book time is more than fair.
10-19-2010, 02:27 PM
CoreyB

He's no friend of yours dude. You would not believe the amount of free work I have done for friends. These days I dont care to do much of anything for free unless its a back and forth deal where they help me. The hard part with that is my friends never get the opportunity to help me as I do everything alone, which is how I like it.
10-19-2010, 05:44 PM
jba3

Quote:

Originally Posted by x2xtreme360

That's the thing, I never told him it would be $100. He handed me a $100 bill and told me that should cover the parts to do the job... He must have just assumed that I would accept the remainder as the labor.

In that case, I'd re-evaluate the "friend" label, unless he does lots of things for you cheap/free too, or you just want the practice. Or if he controls your internet access at work. :lol:
10-19-2010, 08:15 PM
onebadmollafolla

Quote:

Originally Posted by kywhitelightning

Friends and family are typically horrible customers as they feel they "deserve a little break". Something for nothing is what I like to call it. Give him his parts and move on. You're not the bad guy at all for that and he'll get the satisfaction of spending the additional $$ on the specialized experience at the other shop and hopefully in the end learn to appreciate your work done at a very reasonable rate. Good luck to you as there are plenty of other great customers out there that really appreciate the "little guy" making side money on the weekends.

Jeff

This. I used to work on a friend's car all the time. One time he asked me to replace the brakes for the entire vehicle. After hours of work, I got a six pack of Natural Light. I have no problem helping others out but that was a slap in the face. I've since declined on every job since then which leads to his frustration, an attempt to fix it on his own, realizing he can't, then calling over a family member who is moderately mechanically inclined.
10-20-2010, 03:15 PM
MaelstromOC

I think the main problem with a lot of people as far as things like this go is they simply don't care to take the time to learn and do it themselves when they have someone they can have do it for them over and over. These same people also get really pissy when you start to ask for something in return for helping them out... I learned awhile back the fastest way to get people to stop asking you for help on things is to ask them for money lol. I started doing that with pc related things (troubleshooting, virus removal, hardware replacement, etc) and people finally got the idea that I actually value my time in the day...

You'd think with infinite knowledge on the internet far more people would be DIY'ers by now.