Great Start with FRF Toyota - Advice Required

scottee · April 16, 2004, 09:51

Sent my car to FRF Toyota this morning to get my new TTE exhaust fitted. Just had a voice mail about an hour after dropping it off, and the guy said they have broken/snapped the manifold bolt, something about 'by the flange' (sorry guys, you know im not technical!)

whats annoyed me is that they are charging me 30mins labour (£30) for something they broke. Im going to cough up the extra money to get the car back later, but should I write to Toyota to get it refunded, or is it a lost cause.

My way of thinking is that they broke it, they should pay.... do you think I will get it? My mate said in the small print it says they are not responsible for any broken bolts, but i dont remeber signing anything (not that i can remeber anyways)

GSB · April 16, 2004, 09:58

Damn right. Tell them they're taking the piss. They're the experts, surely if they were the Toyota guru's they profess to be they wouldn't have snapped it in the first place. Just laugh at them and ask why you should be paying for thier mistakes.. Should you be paying if they puncture the tyres too?

On the other hand it took me 2 and a half hours to repair the exact same fault just the other night, so 30 minutes is pretty good!

scottee · April 16, 2004, 10:01

I think i'll have to remind them that I have a service comming up soon, so if they want my business, they better be nice s:)

s:)

Slacey · April 16, 2004, 10:22

I agree with Grant, I wouldm't pay it.. but then any decent dealer wouldn't try to charge you for their problem in the first place s:? :? s:?

scottee · April 16, 2004, 11:02

I think I will pay the garage, and take it up with head office. My argument is going to be.... If they could tell the bolt was causing a problem and was hard to take off, why didnt they call me, and say

'Mr Williams, we have a problem with your manifold bolt, it MIGHT snap, and we might have to take an extra 30mins to fix it, do you want us to go ahead and try it, it will be at your own risk'

not

'Mr Williams, we just snapped your manifold bolt and we need 30mins extra, now where is our£30' (ok so it wasnt put like that, but basically thats what he means)

I mean if it was some 2-bit cheap garage, I might of expected it, but not a Main dealer that im paying 60quid an hour for

Anonymous · April 16, 2004, 11:04

You'll get nothing out of head office apart from grief. Take it up with the dealer.

Comer · April 16, 2004, 11:12

Whoever is asking for the extra dosh just go above them. They should have used penetrating oil and it's no way your problem.

Anonymous · April 16, 2004, 11:15

Standard contract law - if you agree to something (in this case pay) then you are accepting the terms - no comeback.

Refuse to pay, and tell them you are taking it up with their head office too!

Anonymous · April 16, 2004, 12:54

MrT uses a standard schedule of time charges (note - NOT rates, only the number of hours) for any given job, and should only charge you that time, regardless of how long a job actually takes (sometimes it's more, sometimes it's less).

FWIW, when I had my TTE exhaust fitted (a long time ago), I seem to remember it took Jemca Metro just over 3 hours in total, but they only charged me for the quoted 1 hours' labour.

Slacey · April 16, 2004, 13:35

Same here, it took them 3.5 hours (it was their first one) and only charged an hours labour.

scottee · April 16, 2004, 14:16

Just had a mail left on my phone from FRF, from the original quote of £70 including VAT, the total was £130!!

I have not seen the bill yet, but they had to fit a rubber mount onto the bracket for the other exhaust, but that couldnt of been much, and im assuming the rest is labor for the manifold that they messed up... im going to the dealer straight from work to pick it up, and im NOT a happy chappy!

Anonymous · April 16, 2004, 14:28

Toyota World Birmingham quote 1.5 hours for fitting TTE exhaust. They will charge extra for any bolts/gaskets etc required and not supplied with the exhaust.
I paid £65/hour labour, making total £ 97.50 plus VAT (£114.56). This was the same price as quoted by Westlands Bromsgrove.
Did you supply 2 metal gaskets, 2 clamps, 4 bolts & nuts, 2 rubber mounts and 1 hook for drivers side tail pipe? If so there is no reason for them to charge you anything extra.

scottee · April 16, 2004, 15:33

supplied 2 gaskets and a hook, passenger side already had hook and rubber mount. Should all be sorted out come 5:30, will post an update then s;)

s;)

Anonymous · April 16, 2004, 15:36

Tell them that you aint happy, when they bitch, tell em to remove it all then and put your old one back on - that'll shit em!

scottee · April 17, 2004, 08:40

Well.... £130 and its a total botch job. Drivers side pipe is maybe 4-5inches out to far, its at a 20 degree angle and its about 2 inches to high! to say im unhappy is an understatement. Taking pics tonight, and writing to the dealership and head office, im gonna want it fixed and get some sort of compensation (03 vents would be nice mrt s;)

s;) )

The only thing is that its a brand new dealership, only been open 2 weeks, so im hoping head office will be watching them like a hawk, and action my complaint nice and quick s;)

s;)

God dam Toyota s:(

s:(

crankshaft · April 17, 2004, 09:08

Hi;

I know it's no consolation, but I fitted my TTE exhaust 2 days ago in 3 hrs, luckily my mate has a pit which makes it easier, but I can fully understand how a bolt could snap. I had MAJOR trouble with the Cat-Silencer 2 bolts (with the springs) and the O2 sensor and was expecting something to break, luckily nothing did.

Those 2 bolts took me more than an hour to get out after liberal spraying with WD40, each turn of the ratchet took maximum effort and the nut screeched as it turned, I was sure it was going to snap but luckily did not.

The final o2 (Cat) sensor also refused to come easily and took a lot of persuading even with the special tool which I was afraid would slip off and snap the sensor.

If you ever plan to remove the exhaust components again then it would be well worthwhile re-assembling the bolts & nuts with a hig temp ant-seize compound.

The alignment of my tail pipes is perfect and was really simple to align, I don't really see how they could be assembled so far out of alignment, as it seems to line up quite naturally, unless they tightened the cat-silencer flange bolts whilst pulling the silencer out of it's natural free-hanging position !

The extra steel bracket & rubber hanger is supplied with the TTE exhaust and simply bolts ontop of the rear sway bar mount, so I don't know what the extra bracket is they were talking about !!

Cheers

Pete Cruickshank