How are you my friends! Wow, thanks so much for all the very valuable and experienced advice--you guys truly know your bikes, are very street smart as well as intelligent, and are also tough to boot--my kind of bikers! Well here's what happened. I called the owner of the shop (Laurel and Harley, Stratford, CT), and told him that I could not for the life of me figure out how the bill was 900 plus dollars. He assured me that he was not cheating me, and told me that he would better be able to explain things in person.
I drove there with my wife, and the first thing he did was to take us into the shop where he unveiled my bike by lifting a sheet off of it, and told me that he shined it up because it was dusty. He then told me to meet him out front where he would ride the bike to meet me. I immediately asked him if anything was broke on the bike, and he looked at me sarcastically and said "You still complaining about the Bill." I sternly replied YES. He then said "Look at the bike first; don't you admire the great work I did on your bike. I take tremendous pride in my work." I told him that I thought the bike looked great, but there was no way that it could cost me over $900.00. I wasn't impressed by his carnival like theatrics.
He then told me to come back inside with him so that he could explain the invoice to me. 3 hours for the 500 mile service, 2 hours for the front tire valve stem replacement(OUCH!), 2.5 hours for wrapping rear header pipe with heat wrap (OUCH!!!!!!), plus parts= $936.01 (Heart Attack!!!!!):lol: He then explained that he had to take great care, and thus more time to service my K9 without scratching or damaging it. He also said that it took a long time to secure the bike on the bike lift--he said that he had to use 2 layers of tape on the frame to keep it from getting damaged on the lift (perhaps he should buy a better cushioned lift to cut down on customer invoice shock?):bang: He then told me that "I didn't appreciate the pride he put in his work."
Now it was my turn. I told him that I not only consulted my Big Dog brothers on the internet; but also spoke to two local motorcycle mechanics, and could find nobody who thought that his invoice was even close to accurate or reasonable. He then implied that he was the best mechanic around and told me that "it's easy to talk when you didn't actually do the job yourself". He then told me that "nothing was going to change". He next tried to appeal to what he though would be my sympathetic wife, by asking her if she agreed with him, to which she responded with a screaming NOOOO! that caused both him and I to literally jump from surprise :lol:
Upset, I responded that although he did a good job on my bike, I thought that he spent way more time than necessary to wrap the header pipe, and to replace the front tire valve stem, even working extremely carefully, and that there was no way he was going to convince me otherwise. I handed him the key to the bike and told him that I had it with him. I then asked him if he was going to put a mechanic's lean on the bike. He then asked me how I planned to settle this. I responded that I was going to bring an expert mechanic to court with me in addition to an attorney that would cost me nothing since I come from a family of attorneys (My father was a judge, and I used to work for him as a paralegal for several years when he worked as an attorney--thus the "great in court" mention; No need to apologize Nukeranger, I was too upset and frustrated to mention all this in my previous post, and could see why you might have thought that I enjoyed litigation--YUCK:argue
I then told him that I'd like to see him justify his bill to a judge after my expert witness' testimony, and after my presentation of several estimates to the court that would be significantly lower than his. He responded, "How can we settle this; Would $600.00 end this?" I turned to my wife and whispered to her that it would cost me well more than $100.00 to hire an expert and enter the case in court; and to make a motion to possibly move the case to a higher court to make the trial much more expensive and difficult for him. I figured that his 3 hours of labor (at $95.00 an hour) wasn't bad for the 500 mile service; and the parts total was on target. I was also willing to give him an hour for removing the front tire, and about an hour for a "very careful' job of removing the mufflers to wrap the rear header. Thus, I pulled the trigger for $600.00.
I paid him in cash, he handed the key back to me, and even though I knew I was right, I am a man of honor and respect, and therefore I don't like to gloat or act like an arrogant asshole when I win something. That's why I didn't laugh at him when he told me to never come back--AS IF I WANT TO GET RIPPED OFF AGAIN!!:angry: I told him that it was nothing personal, and that I would only respond with what I believed was the truth if any body asked me about his business, or if I discussed the matter online. He did indeed do an outstanding job on my bike, and I do feel that he is an excellent and prideful mechanic. But I'm not Donald Trump you know!!
He ended by telling me that I would never find another mechanic as good as him, and how people beg him to take them back after making the mistake of leaving him. He also added that the other mechanics that I take my bike to would ruin it on me--WOWWWWWWW, arrogance abounds. However, I have faith that Connecticut is harboring at least a few honest, reputable, and skillful motorcycle mechanics--anybody know of any
He also had the audacity to tell me that if I wasn't willing to pay for top quality service, then I shouldn't own such a high level bike.:angry: Well I don't know about you guys, but I know many people who own high end bikes and cars who are regular people, and are not wealthy by any means. I know for a fact that there are excellent mechanics out there that don't see dollar signs when a high end vehicle pulls up--honesty and integrity are what build reputations, and what keeps customers coming back.
I wish I had the mechanical skill, patience, steady hands, and the time, that many of you guys have, as I would love to work on my beautiful K9 myself. The bike rides incredible now, and I really enjoyed cruising to the beach with it. I know that some of you think that I messed up by not getting everything in writing ahead of time--well I am guilty of trying to have faith in people sometimes; but ultimately, we are all responsible for our own actions, and all we can ever truly hope for in the end is for the truth itself to eventually come out to help to solve some of our problems preferably short of litigation. Indeed, I believe that the owner of Laurel and Harley's acknowledgement of the truth enabled me to solve my problem in the end. Once again my sincerest thanks and gratitude to all of the great people on this outstanding forum for reaching out to me and helping me so much. I hope to return the favor many times in the future. I am happy with the way things turned out, and will try to be more careful next time--Brock
