My experience with Colemans Suzuki K Road

[tippersv]

They say the big boss (alistair or something) makes the price, fair enough, that's why he wasn't there but on his boat eating oysters.

whine.....chip on my shoulder............whine

keep digging buddy, you're almost at China

[tippersv]

Surely if you are old enough to own a bike you can be expected for taking a bit of responsibility for finding out what you are getting into?

Ulsterkiwi, there is sometimes a difference between the age of one's teeth and one's reading age; the problem with the OP, is we have quite a discrepancy between the two

[jonbuoy]

Gianz

"Consumer Guarantees Act" I'm not a legal eagle but...
Your point on the over priced oil (same product) is valid, I would say the consumer has some sort of protection / cover in this instance.
It might pay to investigate this further, the process does not involve to many hoops to jump through but may we worth it in this instance.

Have they given you a valid reason why it is over priced in the service dept v's the parts?
Their response will be interesting if not entertaining for us all, give them the opportunity to put it right firstly.

Going by the price of 5100 elsewhere its more likely the stuff in the shop is underpriced. But yeah take it international over $20 of oil.

[nodrog:Me]

Funny, I read the OP as a general whinge about the overall bill.


The discrepancy in the two oil prices could well be an oversight, sure the OP mentions that he raised it with the service dept. but by that stage I'd say they had already written him off as a whining frog & thought "fuck him".

don't get me wrong I still think the OP is a tool, I'm just pointing out the storyline.

[MarkH]

The price on the invoice doesn't really look out of line to me, but I choose to do my own oil changes and not pay for such a simple job.
Sure the oil price is a little funky, but it only works out a few dollars on the stupid side - nothing to get overly excited about.

There are plenty of cuntier (I may have just made up that word, you got a problem with that?) jobs that I'll give a workshop money for, I'm not even willing to fuck around changing a tyre on a motorcycle.

There are plenty of rip-offs to bitch about, but I usually just do what I can to avoid them.
I won't be buying another OEM oil filter, why pay $25 for OEM when I can get a better filter going after-market and pay US$6.09 for it?
But rather than bitch about what the local Honda dealer charges for an oil filter I'll just purchase some overseas and let those that want to pay more for a worse product do so.
Paying a lot of money for a simple job you could do yourself? Just do it yourself then!

[Crasherfromwayback]

Gianz

"Consumer Guarantees Act" I'm not a legal eagle but...
Your point on the over priced oil (same product) is valid, I would say the consumer has some sort of protection / cover in this instance.
It might pay to investigate this further, the process does not involve to many hoops to jump through but may we worth it in this instance.

.

Think you'll find they can charge whatever they like for the oil out the back. Not saying it's right or good practice but...

[nzspokes]

all the bikes we work on here get to wear a tank bra so this doesn't happen.

Can you get a universal one? I help the odd mate out working on there bikes and I use old towels but something made for it would be cool.

[Robert Taylor]

Actually the best have a looks I have been the recipient of:
Geoff at Red Baron (or he was, not sure where he has moved on to) spent about 8 hours disassembling my DR and tracing electrical faults. Did not charge me for the inspection / diagnosis only the repair when the parts arrived.
Geoff at Red Baron told me I would have to leave it with him because he could not immediately see what was wrong with the GSX1100F... 2 or 3 days later tells me its all fixed and the labour is about an hour. Hairline tear in the carb diaphragm. Workshop manager was not happy...
Neil at K-Force Kawasaki (New Plymouth Circa 1995) spent hours if not days tracking down second hand parts and one off constructions to save my Ninja before telling me his team could rebuild it for about what the insurance payout was if I wanted to buy the wreck off the insurer. He would only charge for about 75% of the labour because he knew I could not afford more.
Mike at Red Baron. Pulled a couple of tyres off the rims and put them back on looking for a clicking noise that turned out to be a stone inside the read rim. No charge.


It is easy to remember the times a shop pisses us off, and sometimes given time to think about it, we were wrong. Other times we were right.
Either way it is important to remember the mechanics that were good to us rather than only reporting the ones who piss us off.

K-Force went out of business and undercharging would have been a major contributory factor.

[Brett]

I think that it is a bit on the nose to charge more for oil purchased in bulk and supplied as part of a service than what the consumer can buy in smaller "consumer" packaged quantities. That is just really dumb business IMO. Great way to piss off your customers and not add value...but then that is just me. In general, a bike shop can charge what they like and make up their tariffs how they see fit...but they mustn't be surprised when consumers take their business elsewhere if they are perceived to be not providing value. Charging more for oil provided as part of a service than what retail price is doesn't sound like value to me at all. As a consumer you are free to take your business anywhere you like. If I owned Coleman's or any other bike shop or service shop for that matter, I would be taking issues like this pretty seriously.


But then yeah, I do my own servicing anyway. The times that I have used Colemans in the past, their service has been pretty decent.

[Big Dog]

K-Force went out of business and undercharging would have been a major contributory factor.

Yes, sadly Neil cared more for his customers than his business.

Then for reasons I can only put down to people are bastards, quite a few long term customers jumped ship when Callendars expanded. Possibly for the beer.
Many leaving large workshop accounts behind.
Loyalty is over rated these days?

I used to pay my account every week at our agreed rate ahead of everything else. Even food or petrol. A guy I went to polytechnic with just started going to NP motorcycles. Laughed that as a student he couldn't afford the nearly 4k he owed and keep his bike on the road. That really pissed me off. He had the money next student loan to buy an Italian one piece, new boots etc but still did not pay Neil. He eventually did the same thing to them and just left town with a smaller but still hefty unpaid bill. Prize wanker.


Stupid phone / Tapatalk, apologies in advance.

[Gianz]

Gianz

"Consumer Guarantees Act" I'm not a legal eagle but...
Your point on the over priced oil (same product) is valid, I would say the consumer has some sort of protection / cover in this instance.
It might pay to investigate this further, the process does not involve to many hoops to jump through but may we worth it in this instance.

Have they given you a valid reason why it is over priced in the service dept v's the parts?
Their response will be interesting if not entertaining for us all, give them the opportunity to put it right firstly.

As I said before, they said they had no idea. Of course they never even found out because all the kiwi customers they have they just pay without checking, then they complain that nowadays everything is so expensive. In France you go on a motorbikes forum to give other fellow riders the heads up on dubious business practices and you get thanked. Here they take the side of the business. No wonder National are gonna win again.

[oldrider]

As I said before, they said they had no idea. Of course they never even found out because all the kiwi customers they have they just pay without checking, then they complain that nowadays everything is so expensive. In France you go on a motorbikes forum to give other fellow riders the heads up on dubious business practices and you get thanked. Here they take the side of the business. No wonder National are gonna win again.

You were doing OK untill that last irrelevant unrelated comment!

Has the OP had a discussion with Colemans on this thread subject matter? Or is that in their too hard basket!

[Crasherfromwayback]

As I said before, they said they had no idea. Of course they never even found out because all the kiwi customers they have they just pay without checking, then they complain that nowadays everything is so expensive. In France you go on a motorbikes forum to give other fellow riders the heads up on dubious business practices and you get thanked. Here they take the side of the business. No wonder National are gonna win again.

Some of us take the side of the business because we too are in the industry and have heard it all before. And hey...if National getting back in worries you...you could always fly home!

[jellywrestler]

I won't be buying another OEM oil filter, why pay $25 for OEM when I can get a better filter going after-market and pay US$6.09 for it?

does that include postage and credit card/paypal fees, what's it really cost in your hand?

[bogan]

It's not the same oil. The stuff in the workshop comes in a huge drum and they have to get a forklift to take it to the workshop. This is more expensive that some dolly carrying a four litre pack to a shelf.

Could well be it, maybe they bought half a dozen drums a while back at a more expensive price than the bottles they got a sweet deal on in the meantime and moved more of. Might explain why the charge rates are different. Same liquid but through a different supply/price chain.