Thread: $600 for an oil change?

Originally Posted by No.3

All maintenance done offsite would have really helped when the dealer's man forgot to put the oil back into the 2-wheeler... That to me is total and utter BS from Worksafe - it shows that their people are not qualified to do the investigation and understand the root causes of the problem. It's not 'all servicing done offsite' that will fix the issue when if that is correct and there was no servicing done at all.

It's similar to what happened in Commercial Marine, anything below a MEC2 got a frowning for touching marine engines for routine servicing purposes when in reality if you are at sea and and an engine comes up at service interval what are you going to do? Steam home for a further 24 hours or so and get the man to do it or pull up and park beside the floating log and wait for the friendly local dolphin to organise the cleaner shrimps to swim up the raw water intake and have a look at it for you? Bah...

I know of a case a couple years back now where a farm ended up with two different guys both breaking their legs because they were doing jumps on the farm bikes off small piles of gravel that had been dumped by each water trough to spread around. One of the suggestions from worksafe was that they put permanent fences around all their water troughs...

Originally Posted by Ryan_Songhurst

Our local mechanic is really good i just had cambelt and waterpump done on my ute and 150km major service so oil and filters, radiator flushed and antifreeze replaced, gearbox flushed and oil replaced, all cabin filters, diesel filters replaced and DPF cleaned etc. And they did a wof at the same time (just needed one reverse bulb)
Thought it was going to really hurt but was $1750 was quite chuffed with that

Interesting that it failed on a reverse bulb, as reverse lights aren't mandatory

Originally Posted by Ryan_Songhurst

I know of a case a couple years back now where a farm ended up with two different guys both breaking their legs because they were doing jumps on the farm bikes off small piles of gravel that had been dumped by each water trough to spread around. One of the suggestions from worksafe was that they put permanent fences around all their water troughs...

...So the inspectors come from a rural background.....Not!

A bit like the Coroner back in the 1990's looking at the fatality rate of quads on farms then recommending seatbelts be installed on all quads...

Originally Posted by Tommy

Interesting that it failed on a reverse bulb, as reverse lights aren't mandatory

Yeap but if it has them they both have to work

Originally Posted by cambo

As someone thats been a lowly mechanic for over 30yrs, I can say we just love it when people do ( or attempt to do) their own servicing and repairs. We are certainly kept busy fixing their "work".

People may bitch and moan about what it costs these days but our expenses to operate are also astronomical. Oil isn't cheap. And the correct oil for certain vehicles can be crazy expensive. And if you don't use that right stuff you could just end up with a very expensive mistake.
Know of a place that used the wrong oil in a Maserati and it cost them a new motor from Ferrari...plus lawyer's fees after a court case.

Mechanics also have to purchase their own tools some of which are so specialized it makes surgeons weep when they see the prices.

I think I remember that one. They'd looked up the specified oil, used it, but the spec had been updated. Hahaha poor cunts

I do my own oil changes, on a Corolla and Hilux. But I know and accept the possibilities that I open the door to. I wouldn’t want to try and undercut some of the prices tabled here though. If I stuff up my own vehicle I live with it. If I stuff up someone else’s vehicle….is why I don’t do services for friends. It would get awkward.

Oil and filter and tools to service a Corolla = less than the cost of a professional service.

No arguments or lost friendships in the event that I forgets to put oil back in = priceless.

For everything else…. There’s meat in the freezer or a handshake.

Originally Posted by Tommy

Interesting that it failed on a reverse bulb, as reverse lights aren't mandatory

I had one clown tell me that vehicles needed two reverse lights or no reverse lights. The vehicle in question only has one reverse light in the bumper on the right hand side as it rolled out of the factory... Bit hard to fit a matching one on the other side when there ain't a hole for it hey? Very reluctantly passed and a WOF issued, but the three guys crawled all over the bloody thing for close to an hour looking for something to fail it on.

Originally Posted by Ryan_Songhurst

Yeap but if it has them they both have to work

Nope

There is zero consistency in our cof/ wof testing....truck passed wof with no operational passenger outside door handle. I broke same on Terrano and it failed wof...two weeks later. Lights...yeah right.these retina searing jobbies on line haul trucks plus headlights pluss enough wank wank marker lights makes a mockery of the four only laws.

Originally Posted by Ryan_Songhurst

Yeap but if it has them they both have to work

i think thats for a cof

Dont forget also some of that 600$ oil change probably had gst on it as well. That can whack a bit extra on the bill

$600 for regular basic service is abit too much in my book maybe there was more to it.

Toyota used to cap service charge at $370 / service for 5 years,
now capped at $410 and maybe more next year for new car.

Originally Posted by blip

i think thats for a cof

Still a nope

Full service on my 2005 Mitsubishi Airtrek. $350. My wife's 2005 Mazda Axela same.

Originally Posted by Tommy

Nope

It has a section for reversing lights under the "reasons for rejection" section on the waka kotahi website. Basically says they need to work properly, or be disabled. In any case he didn't really "fail" my vehicle on them just had a note on the wof sheet and a charge for putting a new bulb in one side.