Car workshop – this is how you recognize a good car workshop.

Every driver knows the feeling: Something squeaks and rattles “in front” or the warning lights start to shine. You drive into the workshop and the mechanic looks worried. You don’t understand anything yourself, only one thing is crystal clear: It’s going to be expensive now.

There it is again: the feeling of being at the mercy. A certain defenselessness because you don’t understand at all what the mechanics are doing.

If you don’t want to train yourself to become a specialist, you have no choice but to build a relationship of trust with the workshop. Only to which one?

Workshop advice from the specialist woman

Are independent workshops worse than the contract workshops with their showrooms and glass palaces? “There is no general answer to the question,” regrets Annette Bender-Napp, workshop expert at Germany’s most renowned car magazine, the “”.

“Everyone has different expectations of their workshop. Some people value being welcomed and courteously served in a large, bright building, while for others it is enough to know that the mechanic knows his trade.”

In fact, some customers feel at home in a large workshop with a waiting lounge and Italian coffee, while others think suspiciously – but not without good reason – that they can end up co-financing all this effort. Some are reassured by the quality assurance of the large corporations. But you can also be annoyed when quality assurance from Ingolstadt calls twice after a simple service and checks in detail whether the workshop has done everything right.

Glass palaces are no guarantee of quality

Annette Bender-Napp knows that large glass palaces are no guarantee of quality. “The appearance of a workshop rarely provides information about its competence. Even the designation” authorized workshop “(for a certain brand) is no guarantee of a good workshop, as we had to find out again and again in our tests.”

Of course, a workshop shouldn’t be really dirty. But in smaller independent workshops it is often not as tidy as in the large systems of a factory branch. But you also talk to a master who lends a hand himself, and not to a customer advisor with a white shirt and tie.

Study tips from friends and reviews

The tip from Bender-Napp: “If you are looking for a new workshop, it is best to ask your friends about experience. Basically, it is never wrong to just drop by the workshop and discuss questions personally.” Reviews on the Internet can also help, especially if there are a lot of listings. A few positive entries, on the other hand, can easily come from acquaintances of the owner. Conversely, even a few dissatisfied people can pull down an entire workshop.

Last but not least, gut instinct is important. If you feel uncomfortable, you should find another workshop. Car repair is a matter of trust and with a bad feeling it cannot be built up.

The standard rules apply: “If you hand in your vehicle for repair or inspection, a so-called direct acceptance should take place. In other words, you look at the car together with an employee of the workshop in order to be able to discuss the scope of the repair and open questions. “

No order without a quote

Be careful with blank orders, such as “TÜV ready” and verbal agreements. “Only a written cost estimate provides security. The workshop should then consult before additional work, which is best agreed when the car is handed over.”

When picking up, all work and the invoice must be able to be explained. After an inspection, the maintenance list should also be handed over, which shows which work has been carried out.

Cheating is particularly popular during inspections, as tests have shown. Workshops carry out the necessary service work, such as changing air filters and oils, but savings are made with the safety check of lamps and the like. That is not done, but the current values ​​can still be found on the invoice.

Good is not necessarily cheap

There is one more thing to keep in mind: a good workshop is not necessarily a cheap workshop. An authorized workshop and also many independent workshops carry out repairs and maintenance strictly according to the manufacturer’s specifications – this also means that expensive original parts are used. At the end of a car’s life cycle, however, it can be worthwhile to use far cheaper sources: Instead of the spare part in the original box, it can be an identical part directly from the supplier or even an alternative from a third-party manufacturer.

If this is important to you for reasons of cost, only independent workshops remain. However, you must expect to waive the guarantee if you want to use parts other than the original.

Also keep in mind that your workshop is not responsible for every car frustration. Nobody can give a one hundred percent answer to the question of whether an expensive repair is still worthwhile on an old car. Even if the vehicle still has substance, it can happen that you have the turbocharger repaired in one month and the alternator fails the next.