My wife bought a used Jeep WJ many years ago. It had just received a two-axle brake job in Colorado somewhere and the receipt was in the glove box. $1600, and that was like 2006.

 

About $200 per hour here in the Tampabay area, fixed ops, service, is where franchise dealers are expected to and do make most of the profit. There's a lot of overhead and little profit selling new cars.

 

Do to the $200-$300/ per hour, the new car dealership service departments are getting, has carried over to the independent repair shops now demanding and getting $150/hr.

 

Back in 1973, Mercedes in Houston, owner told me that 70% +/- came from service dept. At that time rate was $65.00 @ hour. I would listen to customers ask how they were charged for 3 hours labor and were 'only' waiting 45 minutes. The replies would make today's politicians proud.
wj

 

"We charge book time." Usually book time is stretched -- a tech I knew claimed it was to allow for the jobs where the job was much longer than book. Supposedly.

I've looked up book time for a few of the jobs I've done. When I was renting a lift at my favorite DIY garage, who subscribed to a version of the book, I was about 2x book time for what the book claimed, which I assume meant to be the speed of a pro.

That said, "book time" can be whatever the shop wants to claim it is, unless you demand to see the "book".

Note this is in no way critical of the techs -- its the shop that decides the time used, whether based on the "book" or the shop manager's thoughts about his next boat payment.

 

hmmm hyundai… I can’t get the pony out if my mind…. I’m good, thanks.
I use a mobile mechanic at times. $120 an hour. The back of his truck has everything.

 

They're selling to lessees and those who can dump up to $120K for cars. Many renew their leases or buy regular replacements and never exit warranty. So luxury is visible to them and hourly costs are not.

 

Back then the good mechanics averaged @ 60 hours a week...several better and others as low as 40. Watching the dynamics from the sidelines I learned a lot @ social interactions. The service manager was a coach and had to take care of everyone in the shop, not a job I would ever ask for.
A customer wanted to sell his car to the Used car dept, the sales manager made an offer...the customer replied that 'book value' was xxx, sales manager suggested he sell it to the 'BOOK'.
WJ

 

JLR Albuquerque is $190/hour.

 

Yes I've found that indie mechanics these days are like 75-80% of dealer rates. They don't even help out on parts prices either, like can you spend 10 minutes crossreferencing the parts number so I'm not buying a Bosch part in a Jaguar box marked up 400%? When it's all said and done you'll be halfway through the job yourself once you finish negotiating the quote

 

Based on experience I can tell you the move from white boxes to genuine branded boxes does have merit and has become more common practice. First, it's more reliable and easier to deal directly with genuine dealer parts and secondly I've heard comments that aftermarket parts, though often times identical to the genuine part, sometimes fail more frequently or have fitment issues. Even independents can't afford the liability.

Just recently I replaced an expansion valve with a quite common aftermarket and it lasted only 1 year, so this time round I went with genuine JLR at 10X the price and there was a distinct difference in design and quality.

However, if you're DIY there's not necessarily anything wrong with sourcing your own parts aftermarket, just do due diligence.

 

The indy shops should at least offer discounted parts or let you source your own OEM parts. My local Jag indy would let me source OEM Jag parts ahead of the repair if I wanted.

 

At the end of the day it really all just comes down to "whatever the market will bear".

If xxx- shop (dealer or indie) has all the service bays filled, and consistently has 2-3 weeks of appointments booked, there's no overwhelming reason to do the work less expensively. It might be a really good shop or it might be lack of competition. Or maybe both.

If xxx-shop (dealer or indie) has mechanics standing around at noon with nothing to do, and hardly any appointments booked, well....they may be overpriced or perhaps they're doing a lousy job. Or maybe both.

Cheers
DD

 

From my experience, they don't offer to do it unless you specifically ask, and then once you do, they throw up static about not being able to warranty the work for you, we don't use aftermarket parts, blah blah. You basically have to sit with them on the computer and show them that it's the exact same OEM part.

I had a "reputable" indie shop quote me $3200 for 8 "Jaguar" fuel injectors. The actual OEM part is Bosch 0261500298, price is actually $80 new from pretty much any major, reputable parts source, x 8 = $640.

So either they were wasting $2500 of my money because they couldn't take 10 minutes to look up the actual part number, or they were pocketing the difference simply by ordering the part from a different place. This place deals with these cars all the time, I'm inclined to think that they knew better.

I did the job myself.

 

JLR Los Angeles is $290/hr.

A friend's small, independent shop with 3 mechanics focused on Chevy's is $169/hr and he is booked out weeks in advance.

Subaru dealer is $148/hr

i an shocked and have been living under a rock, I guess.

 

My Jag dealer let me do this as well. They wanted $700 for water pump and associated parts. I bought genuine Jag parts from a Jag dealer on the east coast for $300 (I was going to do it myself). When I decided I didn't want to do it (haha) took them to my dealer and they installed them for me. The only "catch" was the part warranty was thru the other dealer.

 

Just curious, which indie do you use in Austin, TX?

 

200 is like honda dealer in bfe nebraska labor rates these days.

if you’re working at a jag wallet rover dealer you will have no shortage of hours to book.