Don't get your car worked on at Sears!

[BADCO45@aol.com]

Freinds and list members,
Please forgive this if you know a good mechanic at Sears. I know there are a
few. This is mostly about the lack of competent managment there. But all off
it is true. But I feel it's my duty to inform those that don't know, just how
bad the shop I worked at was. 

I worked at what was called the "flag ship" of the western division of Sears
auto centers. The one that lets some of their employee's(so-called team
players) forgo the normal safety standards. Like NOT hand-torqueing wheel
lugs. Letting sales personel do work in the shop. Some of the work that was
done is quite questionable. I personally had had front struts installed and an
alignment done, on my '77 Rabbit. With-in 10 miles of driving afterwards, the
right front wheel feel off! The gentlemen who did the alignment, did not check
if the wheels were tight. They repaired the damage, stripped out hub replaced
with a new wheel bearing. When the wheel came off, it stripped out all the
threads in the hub. After the guy who didn't torque the wheels admitted doing
this, it was passed off as no big deal by the shop manager! I mounted tires
there, and I know every time I made a mistake(they do happen) I got reamed
deep! But for the brake techs and most of the alignment techs, it was oviously
ok for them not to follow maditory safety standards. So if the management
doen't care if a job gets done safely, just if the money comes in, why should
the techs. Please don't get me wrong, there are good people that work there.
It's just that 85% of the techs I worked with didn't seem to care. Ironic that
after work they hung out with the same shop manager. HHMMMM... connection? I
think so. This was the Chapel Hills Mall store in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
If this store is supposedly the flagship/leader for the rest of the western
stores in the chain. I can't imagine what the others may be like. So beware,
check out the shops that do the work on your vehicle. There are great shops
and great mechanics out there. The way Sears likes the amount of money coming
in over doing it right, I just can't believe they run the shops the way they
do. They would rather rush cars out, and have them come back to get fixed
again then do it right the first time. Question everything, a good mechanic
will answer all your questions without a problum.

Thanks for listening,
Wolf
BADCO45@aol.com
'64 Jeep Gladiator
'71 Baja bug
'77 Rabbit
'81 Scirocco-(soon)
'66 El Camino
'77 Celica
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