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The ad is old. Title history shows the car was purchased in AZ back in March 2015 ans asking price was $25k.
I had a similar issue and felt compelled to warn the owner but alas I'm too late. Looks like the owner got duped and lost out on $15k. Very unethical of the shop to let an employee buy the car at the heavily discounted price. Typical scam and another shop also tried that with me.
I'm sure AutowerkesBruce will be along any moment now to explain why the pretty much unanimous opinion here is wrong and why his shop really didn't screw either the seller or Slakker like it currently obviously appears they did.
This is absolutely disgusting and unconscionable behavior by AutoWerkes. Seems like the classic scam whereby an unsuspecting customer is duped into a costly repair or selling their car at a heavily discounted price. The shop finds metal shavings or some other sign of imminent catastrophic failure and an overhaul is recommended. Foregoing that expensive repair there's an offer to buy the vehicle dirt cheap. Profiting from a poor or even fraudulent diagnosis is an abhorrent practice and speaks to the lack of integrity of this business.
If they allowed Slakker to buy the car I wouldn't take too much issue except for a questionable diagnosis. But the fact their employee benefited outright from this deception is appalling. We certainly cannot allow this sort of unethical practice to exist in our community. As such I've contacted the California Bureau of Automotive Repair to file a complaint. I urge others who are equally offended by this shop's practices to do the same. Slakker or the owner should also file complaint as they suffered directly due to this shop's actions.
You guys are tossing around opinion here like it's fact.
Yes, it's a weird/distasteful seeming conflict of interest for a shop that made a preliminary diagnosis of engine failure to purchase the car from the customer. It is MORE distasteful that the seller (allegedly) reneged on an oral agreement to sell the car to one party and instead sold it to his mechanic.
The seller elected to offload their car based on the ASSUMPTION that the IMSB was going bad. There is no indication here (or anywhere I see) on the Internet that there is a pattern of deception or fraudulent behavior by the mechanic...or ANY indication that the shop has ever been accused of perpetuating fraud.
If the seller had ANY inclination that the shop was being anything but honest, why would the he have reneged on the agreement to sell the car to Slakker? Rather, the seller opted to sell the car to his long-time - and trusted - mechanic so he would not have to do business with someone he didn't know / someone who might potentially not be completely legit.
There is a TREMENDOUS difference between doing something that appears unsavory or in poor taste vs. committing outright fraud. If the seller felt he was being defrauded by his mechanic - or even thought that they were being overly concerned about the contents in the filter, he could have taken the car elsewhere for a second opinion. He could have posted the results of the diagnosis online and shared pictures of the debris (which the mechanic DID save for the purposes of justifying the diagnosis that the IMS bearing was likely failing). He could have requested that they pull the sump - but he did none of these...presumably because he didn't want to spend more money on diagnostic work. Seller based his actions on the fact that metal was found in the filter.
Upon seeing metal in the filter, MANY Rennlist members (based on the opinions of certain sponsors) would want the engine split for proper diagnosis, exhaustive cleaning, and replacement of ANY components that might have been compromised due to metal circulating throughout the oil passages. My ASSUMPTION is that seller and his mechanic both felt that it would cost $5K - $10K to tear the engine down, make any necessary repairs, replace potentially compromised parts, and clean the engine thoroughly enough to feel confident that both the root cause AND any problems resulting therefrom would be eliminated. My guess is that the seller didn't want to spend that time, or the money, or take the depreciation hit when disclosing this to a potential buyer in the future, on a Cayman that has not yet finished depreciating.
What would YOU say if a seller mentioned during negotiations for you to buy his car that - by the way - "during the Q3 2016 service we found metal in the oil filter, but we ran another 27 quarts of oil through it and it has been fine ever since."That would send most people running - and you can be certain the comments on Rennlist would all say "RUN - don't walk - away from this car!" Seller cut his losses and walked away...admittedly, blowing off Slakker in the process.
TLDR: We have no evidence that the mechanic is anything other than willing to purchase a car that MIGHT be a time bomb. We DO know - according to Slakker - that the seller agreed to sell the car to him and then blew him off...the only REAL impropriety that took place (assuming the preceding sentence is factual) was on the part of the seller.
I promise to get back to being unreasonable immediately. It just raises my hackles to see people accusing someone else of gross impropriety without any evidence to support it. Just waiting to see what comes next...maybe "I heard they kill kittens" or "pretty sure they also punch babies. In the throat!"
(Slakker, no disrespect - just trying to get back to properly derailing threads)
Something is terribly terribly wrong in the forum when Schnelly is the voice of reason!
"I felt a great disturbance in the For-UM, as if millions of keyboard warriors suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced. I fear something terrible has happened. Where is Schnell and what have you done to him?!?!"
Well, as I said, I am certain that AutowerkesBruce will come in and set us straight to explain the following uncontroverted fact:
He allowed his tech to buy the car out from under another customer who hired Autowerkes to do a PPI on the car.
There is no conjecture WRT that issue.
Now, let's get into the gray area:
2. He allowed his tech to buy a car from a longtime customer at a very deep discount based solely on the diagnosis made by his shop. And, as I understand it, Autowerkes itself admitted it was a preliminary diagnosis. They even told him to get another diagnosis (which was the right thing to do). As raised by a couple of commenters, if Autowerkes' initial diagnosis was wrong, are they going to financially compensate the seller in some manner, who is a longtime and valued customer? If it's not the IMSB, won't it be more than a little awkward explaining that they screwed up the diagnosis yet profited at the customer's expense from that diagnosis? Wouldn't it be better to just not purchase cars from your clients right after you give them a catastrophic diagnosis? Wouldn't it be better to just have a policy that you buy other shops' catastrophic diagnosis vehicles if you want to get into the repair & resell business? Wouldn't that solve the ethics concerns raised herein? Wouldn't that have avoided all the conjecture caused by the obvious eagerness by the diagnosing tech to undercut Slakker and convince the customer to sell to him instead? There is a clear conflict of interest evident here even if there is no wrongdoing. Many other professions have dealt with similar situations by adopting simple rules. Gonzo pointed out the real estate industry. Attorneys have such rules. Here at the auto museum, all employees and board of directors members have an ethics code that prevents similar deals.
Hey, I've got no problem with Autowerkes' tech taking a car and fixing up and selling it to make some extra money. I buy cars and flip them myself (I have a dealer's license). But this deal just wasn't done right. So Bruce should come on here and explain.
And Schnell, I tend to agree with you regarding the seller - it does make sense why he'd want to sell to someone local who he knew rather than to slakker. Even though he backed out of the deal, I haven't criticized the seller. The shop should know better than to allow what happened though.
I touched on this briefly a few pages ago. I have a good friend who owns an auto repair business. I ran this scenario by him and he was very clear that he would not allow any of his mechanics to purchase a car from a customer after giving such a catastrophic diagnosis.
The bigger question for him was that the mechanic was willing to gamble $10k on a car that may need a new engine. Granted, labor costs would not come into play...just sweat equity...but if the current engine was toast, the cost of a replacement engine made that a mighty ballsy wager.
He doubted he ever had a mechanic work for him who A) had that much cash lying around much less having that much cash lying around to put at risk and B) would have made that gamble without hedging his bet...
Blue dress:
That is the reason a reputable company would have prevented this happening. Even if it is innocent (?) it looks really,really bad.And you have to ask that for all the resulting debate here, was it worth taking such a hit to your reputation?
Answer= you'll never know. Customers will just quietly avoid you.Dumb business move and no amount of 'splaining and whining will remove the stain .It sticks like .....
08-28-2016, 01:17 AM
