The auto repair industry reputation ranks right up there with used car salesman, insurance and attorneys.  OK, maybe not as bad as attorneys but needless to say it has gotten a bad rap.  This bad reputation has the honest repair shop struggling to compete with all of the ” too good to be true” advertising on the radio and television. 

Good rule of thumb is if it is too good to be true, it usually is!!  There are fair deals to be made out there but be careful how good a deal you are being offered.  When a shop offers a low price, lifetime warranty with in and out service something has to give.  No one is in business to lose money so how are those shops making money?  They either bait and switch with a low advertised price or they use cheap/inexpensive low quality parts and charge premium for them. 

Quality parts are not hard to come by if you know what your looking for and trust your vehicle to a competent shop.  There are cheap parts out there and honestly they are pretty scary!!  Amazing as it may seem auto parts are not held to any quality control regulations like you may think.  Don’t mistake a warranty for quality.  Most poor quality parts have a lifetime warranty.  Shops using these parts will happily replace these parts and charge labor each time.  What good is a lifetime warranty if it continues to wear out or fail and requires replacement.   Take brake pads for instance.  you may think a safety item like brake pads would be federally mandated to pass some kind of testing procedure.  Wrong.  They require no testing what so ever.  Scary stuff. 

Key is to ask questions when quoted a repair.  Find out where shops are buying parts and if they are OE equivalent parts (original equipment).  Understand that Autozone, Orielly, Carquest, Napa, etc do not manufacture parts. Not even the manufacturer makes these parts.  They just bolt them all together.   These parts are manufactured by someone else and distributed through these retailers or distributed to the manufacture to assemble.  Parts from these mnanufacturers are OE and will be labeled and marketed as such.  Parts come by many names and descriptions so you must rely on an honest shop to find quality parts and perform a quality installation.  A shop that offers premium parts and labor with a warranty will never be the cheapest shop, but you will pay a price that reflects what is actually going on your vehicle.  So ask questions and be careful of the “Too good to be true” deals.