I just had my waterpump/timing belt changed last week by a local mechanic (one who has a very good reputation and has often times let me know I didn't have a problem when I thought I did and was willing to pay for it) During my visit he suggested new tires but I decided to go to Firestone for them since they had a buy 3 get 1 free special. Well when I went to firestone they said I had a leaky CV boot and it needed replacing. I brought it back to the mechanic who did my waterpump/timing belt and he said if my CV boot was leaking he would have addressed it with me and doesn't remember seeing it. Upon inspection, he let me look under the car and said the cut on the boot is very fresh and that it is on the inner part of the boot when usually natural wear and tear would cause the split in the middle of the boot. Although I trust this mechanic, I'm wondering if Firestone would actually do somethign like that? I know they had brought up a CV leak before as well when i first bought my car and wanted to perform the work but fortunately my car was still under warranty. Anyone hear stuff like this from Firestone and I guess there is not much I can do is there if they did screw it up purposely?
I've had trouble with a certain Firestone before, but honestly who knows. Sounds fishy, I would just never go back there. Won't be worth the trouble to try and force someone who did this to admit it, if they did, and what would you want done if they did? More free work from such a place? No thanks. Lesson learned and move on.
60 Minutes or 48 Hours or Dateline or one of the above did an undercover story on this a few years ago. An amazingly large % of these places rip customers off in this manner on a regular basis and I suspect you've been screwed. There's probably not much you can do about it, though.
Firestone is the worst place. they ripped me off a few years back on labor charges on tires. it was twice as much as discount tire.
I honestly don't want to bother with giong there and having them deny it and say that the other shop is lying to me, etc etc..can i just report them?
I've found that it is necessary to be very wary of just about any of the chains (Firestone, Goodyear, oil change shops). If they aren't doing outright damage to your car, they will try to sell you some ridiculous service that you don't need. On the other hand, the single location private mechanic shops tend to be much more trustworthy. I'd recommend asking around for recommended mechanic and then sticking with them.
Silly.. just read your first post again, you already have a good mechanic. Well, in that case... discount tire is pretty good place for tires. And I stand by my statement that i've had some pretty bad experiences with those chain shops.
I've had nothing but problems with Firestone in the past...I'm convinced that they caused more problems than they solved with one of my cars. I'm not going into it, but I'll never go there again and will tell anyone else to steer clear of those places if they care even slightly for their cars... Just Brakes is pretty bad too...although not on the level of Firestone.
I had an issue with the Firestone near Memorial City Mall. I took my car in to get an oil change. When I came back to pick it up, the mechanic told me that I needed a new timing belt ASAP and he can replace it within 15 minutes. Funny thing is that just a couple of months ago, I had a complete tune up and replaced the timing belt. I declined the service, told him about my tune up but he persisted and kept telling me that the belt needed to be replaced. That was 4 years ago, I still haven't changed out the timing belt and the car still runs just fine. I'd avoid chain shops myself and bring it to a local trustworthy mechanic.
