Report review

Report review

Falcs.falcs reviewed Cardinia Automotive Repair Services

Stay away from this place! Took our car in for a "major service" a few weeks ago. When I called up and asked how much it would cost for a major service they first asked me for some details about the car, then said it would cost between $280 - $300. So I booked it in. When I dropped off the car in the morning there was a staff working there alone. I told staff that I also had a punctured tyre in the boot that I wanted fixed up. The punctured tyre was from the rear-left of the car, and a spare tyre was in its place at the time. The staff wrote this down and said will tell the mechanic. Also said the car would be ready on the same day and that they'd give me a call once it's ready so that I can pick it up. It gets to 30mins before they close, and I still haven't heard anything back from them so I decided to give them a call. They tell me that the car's ready to be picked up (so why didn't they call me?). When I show up to get the car they tried to give me a bill of over $500. Obviously I was not impressed considering this was over $200 more than what I was originally told and when I questioned it the staff looked again at my bill and said "Oh hang on, we charged you too much labour." So they brought it down to about $450. I asked them why it was so much more expensive then what I was originally told and they said it was because they had to replace the spark plugs with an "expensive type" due to the model of my car. The spark plugs were just under $30 each for 4 of them, so that added just under $120 to the bill. The car's just a standard sedan, why did it need such expensive spark plugs? Not to mention the car's not even on 100k yet. Unfortunately I didn't know anything about spark plugs at the time and I'm only now starting to find some answers on the net! Now about the punctured tyre. They didn't even touch the tyre that was in the boot (which was the one I asked to be fixed), but instead they "fixed" the spare tyre that I had on the rear-left of the car. I had been driving on this spare for over 2 months without any issues or air leaking so what exactly did they "fix"? I managed to get this taken off the bill. So that brought it down by about $30. So in the end I paid about $150 more than I was originally told. Otherwise I would have paid about another $100 on top of that. About a week after this, I noticed a light on the dash coming on when I use the brakes. So checked under the hood and found all the brake fluid had spilled all over the engine bay because the lid was not put on properly. Today I rang them up to ask about this and they said they don't change the brake fluid unless it needs it. Same with the coolant, and other fluids, so they didn't change any of that on my car. So what exactly is the point of a "major service"? All I got done was the oil, wipers and filters changed. Oh and the spark plugs just to throw the price up by $130. That's apparently a "major service".