The Top Ten Car Repair Rip-Offs You Can Avoid In Las Vegas
1: The Oil Change
Even if you don’t know anything about how your car’s engine works, you can learn to change its oil. The process is simple, easy, and doesn’t risk damaging your car, so you can learn it and perform it yourself instead of taking the car to the shop. Don’t pay for this at a shop when you can do it yourself.
2. The Tire Change
Changing tires is a lost art. It is another simple repair once you know how to do it, so if you are buying tires don’t ever pay extra to get the old set changed out for the new ones.
3. Cleaning the Fuel Injectors
It might sound fancy, but you can clean your own fuel injectors using a very cheap product like Jectron. It couldn’t be easier to use– just put it into the gas tank– and you avoid paying bloated parts and labor costs from going to a shop instead.
4. The Inspection Surprise
It’s pretty common for mechanics to “suddenly” find one or more emergency repairs when doing a quick inspection, turning the bill from ten bucks into over a hundred. This is a good time to get a second opinion, because the mechanic may be trying to inflate your bill.
5. Air Filter Replacement
The air filter needs to be replaced regularly, but it’s actually an easy job to do. You can order the filter yourself and do it for free, avoiding the markup for parts and the labor fee. All you need to do is buy the new filter, pop open the hood, open the black case near the engine that holds the filter, take out the old filter, and drop the new one in its place.
6. The Intermittent Problem
This is a classic. A mechanic finds a problem and tries to fix it, but it doesn’t solve the problem. They bring you back over and over again, doing more and more work, until the problem is “fixed.” This can cost you hundreds for a potentially nonexistent issue.
7. The Upgrade
Another trick that mechanics have is they move up the repair one or more levels of severity. If a part needs to be fixed, they replace it entirely and charge you for the new one, for example. Make sure their repair is in line with the original concern.
8. Elevated Parts Costs
Nowadays, just about every part is available for sale online somewhere. You should always look up any part your mechanic wants to replace so you can see if their markup is egregiously high or if they are picking an expensive brand unnecessarily. That lets them overcharge you.
9. Brake Maintenance
This is a tough one. On the one hand, brakes are pretty easy to maintain once you know what you have to do. But brakes are really important, so it is understandable if you want to pay more and let a pro do it. Look up the process and see if it seems like something you want to do yourself.
10: Going Off-Schedule
Every car comes with a schedule of maintenance that the manufacturer believes will keep the car in good shape at reasonable cost. You should be concerned if your mechanic always has something to add to the routine appointments, especially if they always seem to need fixing right away.
Much of the key to staying savvy is in doing your research and being willing to shop around. Don’t be afraid to get a second opinion from another mechanic or an online community for your make and model. Mechanics can only rip you off if you are ignorant about the repair in question. You can avoid that from happening to you by entering any Las Vegas repair shop armed with knowledge.
