Bodyshop horror story

[73Chally]

Cudagirl nailed it with shows like Overhaulin and CCR, etc.  The average Joe who has a car to get restored ses these shows and thinks his can be done in the same time, and flips out when he hears it will be a year plus.  My restoration was done perfectly, in my opinion.  I'm tight on time so I would never be able to disassemble/reassemble on my own, so I just pulled out the interior and delivered the car to the shop bare inside, and they handled the blasting, etc.  No money up front, and I just paid as work progressed.  Craig only billed me for work he had already performed, and never for future work.  When the paint and body work was done, he let me bring the interior back to his shop, and basically let me put it all back together under his instruction.  I could not have been happier with how the whole thing went.  For anyone in the Dallas/Fort Worth area, you can check him out at www.hulsautoworks.com.

[hotrod98]

Well here is how my husband does it.He charges $40 a hour and after every 50 hours of work he sends a bill to the owner and no money up front.Also he sends a list of supplies to the owner and has  them by the supplies themselves and has them done thru mail order unless he needs something right away then he buys and charges in next bill.At anytime the person isnt happy they can take their car and only owe for hours worked not like losing a depoist and such.Take alot of hours to do a full restore on a car.People dont understand how long it takes when they watch tv shows and think it is all easy like on the tv.Not so alot of time and hours to make it right.My husband tells people that look to 30-35k with parts to do a full resto when your replaceing 1/4's and floors and trunks and such.Not always that much but always expect the worst.Especially when supplies are getting insane.People say to my husband how about a estimate and he tells them you can not be sure of what the car needs until it is stripped to bare metal to get a idea of what it needs.

michele

I bill a little differently. I ask for $1000 up front for materials, etc. Then bill for the hours accumulated just as your husband does. The reason I ask for the deposit is because I've been in a couple of situations where the owner didn't have the money when it came time to pay the first bill. At least with the deposit, I'm not out a lot of money on someone else's car. In most states the owner can come and pick his car up at any tiime without making payment if he chooses and the shop has to sue since it's considered a civil matter. Even if the shop wins, all he will get is a judgement which is practically worthless.
I find that some people just feel like they can scrape up the money somewhere when the time comes to pay each of the bills. Many people don't have all of the money needed for the resto sitting in an account somewhere.  Then, if they don't pay their bill, I'm stuck with a car taking up space in my shop which is costing me money. If the car has been stripped, which is almost always, the car can't be pushed outside.
I try to pre-qualify my customers before taking on restos. Most of my customers are professionals. I have two repeat customers that own large construction companies. They can just write a check at any time. This makes my business more profitable just because I'm not dealing with someone that doesn't have the money and really shouldn't be restoring a car.
This restoration business has negatives for both sides.

[HemiOrange70]

Thanks for the replies guys. I think I have to be clearer on a few things
-I paid 10K up front with the understanding that when ni inuracne claims are being done, my car fills up their time.
           -this being siad, they have added four other projects which take time away from me as I have already prepaid
-I had three other estimates of 10K and they noted what had to be done
           -the shop that is doing my car had done exactly what the other three said needed so what is the big suprise here?
-my original quote was 9-12k, I have paid that and now he wants 9k more to paint the car....
                   -that was his original quote to do everything and now with all the work done he still wants 9k to paint it
-he said no work once the money runs out...so why did he state I owe him 4k more for work done?
What really gets me is once he had my $$ my car was not a priority and other projects took his time, I picked up my fenders which were supposed to be done and they are brutal. I hate it when someone misplaces my trust 

[ChallengerHK]

I'm certain there are lots of folks out there, including lots of folks on this board, who are honest and interested in putting out quality work. I'm just as certain that there are lots of folks running body/resto shops whose method of pricing out a car runs something like this: "My kid's tuition is due next month, and that's $10,000, so this fender replacement is now a $10,000 job."

[cudagirl4406pk]

Alot of shops lik the insurance work and hate doing restorations becuase they say there is no money in it due to the time and space it takes up.Also giving estimates is exactly that and people think oh ok that is the price no matter what and they dont realize that once you strip down the paint and all you get a clearer picture of what is going on.Anyone who says ok i will do your car for 10k or 20k i would stay away from because they are guessing and you will end up paying more i am sure.Kenny likes doing it by the hour so if you get into a financial problem you can stop and get your car and not owe anything else and then when you get more money then proceed. People who get a car to restore and have never done one before are the worst because they really dont understand how much time it take to do it right and get upset when it takes longer and costs more.People who want a car that is getting into the sport needs to get a done car and get a loan then buy a project and restore it while they drive the other car then when resto done the  sell the first done car and they then have there dream car the way they want it and did not get impatient by having the other car to drive.Just my thought.

michele

[troutstreamnm]

Any good bodyshop will keep you informed and invoice you for work on a periodic basis.  The shop that did my car encouraged me to come down and check out the progress, talk with all the guys working on my car and make sure things were moving along to my satisfaction.  The owner was alway accomodating when I showed up.  If there were delays due to a rush of insurance priorities the owner usually let me know, but you need to realize that is their bread-and-butter so you have to give them some slack.  They had my car for seven months and I bet half that time it was set aside for insurance work.  They ended up doing a nice job for me because I worked with them.  As far as $$$, they invoiced me about every two weeks when they were working on it so my wallet was well aware when progress was being made  The final cost was about 25% over his estimate, but I had them do several things that I had not originally planned for them and then the few surprises had to be dealt with too.  Honestly, these jobs are very difficult to estimate accurately and they take a long time to get completed.  And today, I'm not sure you can get away with a quality paint and body job for under $10K if your car is in decent shape, and a hell of alot more $$$ if it's a rust bucket.  Costs rack up quickly if you're paying $60-$70/hr shop rates