31 replies to this topic

[sledgehammer]

When on the spanners - years ago

 

had an old guy ask if we could adjust his new mini 

 

can you bring the pedals closer to my feet ?

 

had to explain it as easier to move the seat forward

 

to start with he was convinced we could move the pedals forward (cant remember what old car he had before - bench seat)

 

 

 

a friend of mine on service reception ...

 

lady comes in for mini head gasket

 

her husband 'is going to fit it tonight'

 

he gets it for her (off the hook at back of shop)

 

puts it on the counter

 

she picks it up

 

folds it neatly in two

 

puts it in her hand bag

[James_eaton_thewholething]

customer asked me while i was standing underneath the sign for the toilet just exactly where the toilets were

[peter-b]

Used to do road service, went out to job for a cut out. Told them it had a broken timing belt to which they replied, thank goodness, thought it wads something bad. Guess they didn't know it bends valves.

The others would say, "I turned it off as soon as I heard the noise, didn't want to do any damage". They don't realize the noise is the con rods trying to get out and it's all over.

[jaydee]

I have too many to list, this is one of the silliest:

Customer trailored a mini, said its got an hedgasket failure.

He told it was overheating and his mechanic 'changed the rad, car still overheating, it wont turn over, had to jump start it all the time'

I pop the bonnet open.. they fitted the fan belt with the cogs on the outside..rubbing on the flat side it wore out and broke.. 

New fan belt and away he went.

Still cant figure out how they manage to do that. 

[MrBounce]

Not car-related but I worked in a Menswear shop many years ago and a 30-something year old woman came in and asked for a blazer for her husband so I asked her what size he needed.

"Well a man's size!"

It took a while to explain to her that there are many different sizes of gentlemen. I eventually sold her one using my colleague as an apparently similarly sized model. One £70 sale later she went away happy. The blazer never came back so I am guessing that I got it about right!

Edited by MrBounce, 02 December 2015 - 05:52 PM.

[cambiker71]

We were asked to fit points and condensor to a misfiring metro years ago. I told the customer that it's more than points it's misfiring badly, reply was "isn't it always, just fit them!"
Fitted parts, car still misfired.
Customer comes back pays for points etc and labour drives away still misfiring.
Next day comes back in with the old "since you fitted those points my cars misfiring" slant.
Waving receipt about saying we ripped him off and another garage looked and said it was a blown headgasket caused by the points not being fitted correctly.
Demands we fix it for free, wants a courtesy car etc etc.
Boss asks him to read his receipt!
Customer throws it at him and shouts you f'ing read it.
Boss reads out...
"Fitted points and condensor due to customer demand, engine misfire appparent before work started, suspect head gasket problem but needs clarification"
Then tells him to leave and never return, and holds the office door open.
Customer snatched the receipt, read it himself and looked at me then the boss then just left without saying anything.
I've often wondered if he tried that scam out anywhere else!
I learned a lot from that garage about noting problems down before starting work!

[cambiker71]

I have loads and loads of motor trade stories!

[markyB]

Phone rings,
Hello how can we help you?
Hi I need a tyre for the car.
Ok , do you know what the tyre size is ?
Yes , it's a Vauxhall corsa .
Ok , but do you know the tyre size.?
Yes standard corsa size.
Ok , can you bring the car in so we can look at the tyre size ?
No I left t at home because it's got a flat tyre !!

[mini danny]

I had a women come into me and ask for me to replace her headlight bulb on her car....asked her what car it was....her exact reply it's a red one. Asked her what make and model it was to which she replied again it's a red car, gave up after that haha


Also had a customer come in to have the cambelt and water pump changed on there Audi A4 TDI so an inline engine front of the car need looseing and moving forward so gain access so a timely job......was on the job less than half an hour..... Guy walk in from the waiting room into the workshop and asked why I was taking so long.... The old boy thought the cambelt was the same thing as a FAN belt like he had on his 1960's beetle.

Have a whole list of them customer stupidity but don't have all night to list them aha

Ohhh another one I had which made me laugh, I use to work at a VW AUDI Specialist and we use to do a lot of tuning, big turbo kids ect had an old boy bring his skoda diese in for a turbo change now these turbos arnt big on them.... Bloke walks in and says I see you have my turbo already points out the GT35 turbo which was for a corrado VR6 to run 450-500 BHP and the turbo was 3 times the size of his.

[jaydee]

Love joking with stupid people.

Just had someone coming with a 998 mini claiming it is a 1275

Said it feels like a 1275

So i told him ''err this car is actually slow, its got a rare 1600 gt engine'' 

Now he believes hes got an uber-rare 1600 gt mini

[firstforward]

Had a lady customer come onto our forecourt at approx 8.00pm with a 3 week old VW Polo, filled up with fuel then lifted the bonnet and proceeded to top up the windscreen washer bottle or so I thought! After closing the bonnet and paying for her fuel proceeded to start the car and it actually turned over a few times with a rattle of a clunk to a stop. After some minutes the forecourt manager came to me to ask the best place to park up her car for the night as it will not run. First I thought I would give the car a look,  I lifted the bonnet up to see the washer bottle was still empty, yep she brimmed the oil filler on the cam cover with water and got a hydraulic lock.

 

For me the sad part was I got involved in many months of litigation with her husband as he claimed I never had the watering can labelled with any warning sign.

[1984mini25]

Had a female customer of Jamaican origin come in complaining her power steering wasn't working on her zafira and couldn't quire understand why I was replacing the aux belt. As not only had the old belt just snapped, but it had also shredded itself and wrapped itself round all the pulleys/engine bay for good measure.

 

Also had someone lese with a focus, also with power steering issues after he'd topped it up with plain water.Claiming its just the same as power steering fluid.

Edited by 1984mini25, 03 December 2015 - 12:19 PM.

[ANON]

had a customer once accuse me of doing 7,000 miles in his car!! was a clapped out scenic diesel of all things. needless to say it was the first and last job i did for him.

 

interestingly enough though it was about six weeks after he had the car back that he phoned me about the mileage...bloody muppet!!

[Shifty]

Not motor trade but work related.

 

I'm an engineer and we use a job note system for operators to report breakdowns on their machines.

 

One day an operator (not the brightest spark) handed me a job note and walked off, I looked at the note and it said "Machine on Fire"!!!

 

Luckily it wasn't on fire.....

[MaxAndPaddy]

Not car related, but back in my days of IT support, called out from an irate user that had LOST ALL OF THEIR FILES

 

they were quite an important professor at the university, so I decided to go over in person. Arrived in his office.

 

"I HAVE LOST ALL OF MY FILES, THEY ARE ALL GONE", 

 

me: ok, so where did you save them.....

 

VIP professor, "ON THAT DISK, I CANT FIND THEM, THERE GONE"

 

me: that disk there,, the one of the top of the disk drive?"

 

VIP: YES

 

[puts disk in drive]

 

VIP: oh, there back......