Finding a garage you can trust...

the http://www.goodgaragescheme.co.uk/ is not worth anything IMHO. After working for a motor factors delivery items its amazing how one garage can do something properly and another bodge it while both being "good" garages.

IE one of the GGS charged for a full cambelt kit ~£75 but only took a belt ~£30, apparently they do it a lot!
 
Ggs is a load of tosh and any cowboy can sign up

Only one way to be sure diy as much as possible failing that anything I don't have time/space/skill for goes to my mates garage even then I still always check it myself afterwards



Top tip do an evening class in vehicle maintenance start doing your own basic work services brakes etc saves you money and you know it will be done to the standard you want
 
I go to me, as a whole I find me to be fairly trustworthy as I have yet to rip me off, would certainly recommend me to others.


I dont trust any of the garage schemes, have seen plenty come and go over the years and they are all complete tosh. We have recently left the bosch car service scheme after a dispute with bosch over them spending the £2k a year we have to pay them on hookers and blow*






*possible not, but they cant account on why they haven't spent any of that money doing the things their advertising spiel said they would so H+B may be a valid option.
 
Seems it really is a minefield and there is no sure way of finding a decent place :(

So...anyone in the Coventry area know somewhere decent ;)
 
redeye_uk said:
You can always sign up to a members forum and get advice that way too.
Click to expand...

I hope that's a joke!

Anyway, ask friends and family. Trial and error will be inevitable though - ask for quotes for work and talk to them. Go with someone who sounds decent and offers a good price. If they let you down, lather rinse and repeat. If they don't, keep going back - they will treat loyal customers better.

I'd always do some research on the problem first so you can sound like you know a bit about what you're talking about. "there's a squealing noise from my clutch release bearing, I'd like you to fit a new clutch kit and inspect the flywheel" makes you sound more plausible than "my car's making a funny noise :("
 
Local village garage.

Bloke's had it 10-15 years now, got it when he left the RAF. Him and family go to the village Church, etc etc.
There's an Auto-Electrician place attached to it, where our French cars are made to feel welcome! Also use a bodyshop that the garage bloke reccomended.

Only problem is that they're a normal village garage, so the stupidly complicated E60 goes to the main dealer. The Westfield goes to the village garage for MOTs, but everything else on it we do ourselves.
 
Dad has used the same local small indie garage all his life, I've been a bit dismissif of him, tried a few garages elsewear, but will now use him again. Had used big indies with all the equipment under the sun yet seem to struggle to do the simples of things.
 
I haven't read a good word about the Good Garage Scheme. Its basically set up to sell their Forte products through the garage outlets - anyone can join if they put up the cash. I've also heard of a garage being kicked off the scheme as they weren't selling enough of their products.

There are quite a few of these schemes about and I trust none of them. How are the 'codes of practice' enforced and who monitors and controls the quality? If someone sees a huge banner outside a garage saying they are a member of a scheme you would probably think that the service provided is better then most? This is not always the case.

I also noticed the GGS has no negative feedback. This makes out the garages on their site are near to perfect! They came off really badly in a Which? report done early this year saying their garages performed worse than the other schemes. Bosch service was the better scheme.

A friend of mine runs a site where you can leave comments and negative reviews of garages. Its a non profit site and is purely there to provide help and information.

This is the link www.findmeagarage.co.uk (sorry moderators if you're not allowed to post links)

After being ripped off a few times myself I was recommended this guy who has been looking after my car for years. He's cheap, reliable and honest. Need I say more?
 
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