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Topic in Las Vegas, NV

Mobile Mechanics? In Las Vegas anywhere?

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Posted by Zoro - 9/10/09 1:44 PM Location: Las Vegas, NV 89108
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Posted in Business Recommendations

I love the concept of mobile mechanics and used one successfully in Seattle for my RV. But I have tried for days to find a reputable mobile mechanic that isn't a poorly mannered fly-by-night. The only two I've found so far have manipulated the yahoo ads to appear like there are MANY and they are all 2 people. 2 "dispatchers" - basically who have contracted with a couple of older retirees - which, one sounds good and I might be hesitantly "trying" - but who charge nearly twice what I paid in Seattle (when everything else in LV is 1/3 the price I was paying in Seattle - so this is way out of whack/over-priced and monopolized here) and the first guy "dan" was an absolutely rude incompetent con with all kinds of hidden fees and doesn't know what he's doing, lives in AZ and then hires non-master mechanics to "dispatch' and take a cut of their fees - again - expected, but the fees are WAY high for the area - or even for a more expensive place like Seattle where I was paying $75 hr for a mobile mechanic. So what I want to know is - are there any private master mechanics out there who are honest and wants to make a few bucks. You have to be fluent in English (I mean it - I don't mind of course what ethnicity you are from, just as long as we can clearly and easily comunicate about the car and what is being/needing fixing). If so - OR yo know someone who wants to help a guy out - PLEASE FEEL FREE TO COMMENT HERE OR CONTACT ME ASAP! Thanks!

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Vegasified - 10/18/09 10:09 AM Report this

Try A Grease Monkey. Nice guy, honest and fair. I think he was about 75 for labor plus parts..not sure if he has altered his hourly. But he is VERY honest and won't rip you off or charge for stuff he doesn't do.

Zoro - 10/18/09 1:48 PM Report this Location: Las Vegas, NV 89108 Contact

Thank you! Do you have a phone number or email or know where I'd find his contact info?

Sharptooth - 10/18/09 7:02 PM Report this Location: North Las Vegas, NV 89031

702-354-1091 IS HIS CELL #

Marianne - 10/20/09 6:50 PM Report this

The nice guys name is Jeff and I decided to call him after I read the reviews and glad I did. Great job good deal. He didn't look like A GREASE MONKEY to me! Just a nice guy who works on cars.

Reply posted at 4:10 PM Nov 25, 2009 was deleted by its author.
Zoro - 6 days ago Report this Location: Las Vegas, NV 89108 Contact

Well, I'm the originator of this post/request, and so - given the other responses here, *if they are REAL* - I will follow through with my experience. Unfortunately my experience was this:
Called, made an appt. Seemed like he knew what he was talking about and agreed to fix the car the next day - would charge $85 for "diagnostic". When I said, "Ok, but what do you charge for hourly to fix the problem, (he said he's never had to be there longer than an hour to get a car fixed (his specialty and my need was electrical).So he himmed-and-hawed a bit and then settled on $75 hour, "But again, I've never had to stay more than an hour." I found this odd words to say since he'd not yet even seen or assessed the car. What if he needed to order a part? Who does that - him or me - and if him, where does he get his parts and how does he charge for them? Anyway. Came out the next day - but was in a hurry - I asked why, because I thought he'd be there the after noon actually FIXING the vehicle. But said, no, he'd diagnose it today and he has to run up to another place he started yesterday, to finish something up there. (clearly he had not finished in an hour up at that place(!). So he wanted his $85 before he left, for the diagnosis. He DID seem honest and he'd come out and he DID seem to know what was going on, so I paid him in faith he'd be back the next day - and re-iterated our agreement that tomorrow would be a straight $75 hr - to which he agreed. He did come back - with some begging on my part, but when he arrived, said he had another job across town he had to get to by a certain time. I said - wait a minute? I thought you were going to fix this "in less than an hour yetsterday" and now you're back and indicating you'll have to leave at a certain point to service someone else's vehicle? What if this one isn't done?"
Then the real fun started! He said "Yes, and I thought about it last night and was thinking that if you took this into another shop you'd be charged at least $3-400 for what it needs so I'm going to charge only a flat rate of $150 (equal to two hrs of work according to our agreement).

Ummm. That was not our agreement. Now he's wanting $150 flat fee up front. The conversation deteriorated my faith in him (because he'd assessed it already - the **only** reason someone would charge a flat rate after a diagnosis is because he's seen what it needs and thinks he can get it going and be out of there in LESS than two hours - upping his profit. I'm not a fool, and was very disappointed. I went into the reasons you don't charge according to what you THINK another shop would charge (and if you do - you don't give that as the reason for your fee) AND you don't CHANGE the fee agreement from an hourly to a flat rate when the agreement had even been clarified and double checked twice the day before! (and on it went, to where I now felt while he was a "nice guy" AND probably (I assume) DID know how to fix it, he'd become so dubious in how he was going about doing things - I could no longer trust him. What if he got in the middle of the job, I've already paid him, and decides he now needs to run over to the other job he had lined up. (It wasn't about the money - I had planned far more than he was charging now and would have had no problem paying him for how ever long it took - I just NEEDED it to get fixed so I could get back on the road!

So I don't know how this guy normally is - or if there was something he didn't like about my job/vehicle or me - that made him set it up so that I would eventually decline his work - since he would not budge on ANYTHING and gave **no reasons** for wanting to change the agreement. So I was extremely diappointed and felt he was very unwise - because I had money to pay him, it COULD have been over in an hour - and he spent nearly an hour (for free!) standing there as I tried to talk through it with him - so he wasted all that time - and got NO money for it and then sped on his way to his next job (I GUESS he was going to a job as he said - but it WAS friday afternoon!).

So it was a bummer, but in the end, I ended up figuring it out and fixing the whole thing by myself - for the cost of about $30 (Plus the $85 I spent on his 1/2 hr assessment!). So I'm back on the road. I went through FOUR different "mobile mechanics" - everyone of them a screw up professionally and some mechanically. So I feel if I have any more problems - I'll have to just check a book out of the library - and fix it myself - or take it over to Purump (if that's possible). I just had too many rotten and unpleasant experiences with "mechanics" in LV.

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Las Vegas Area > Neighbors > Mobile Mechanics? In Las Vegas anywhere?