A Tec Auto Sales and Service ME 04294

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Jenn Steingass

I went to this shop because I got a new to me car that my regular mechanic in this area doesn’t work on. I supplied my own parts because my car probably has only 1 year of life left due to rust. I was charged $300 for 3 hrs labor for a single wheel bearing/hub assembly replacement in the rear. Bearing didn’t even need to be pressed in since it was a bearing hub assembly. Charged $50 to replace an air filter - they do this for free at the place I get my oil changed. I know this is a job that takes a couple minutes. I should have just done it. They aligned my wheels for $80 but then they told me I needed another bearing plus new wheels and tires because they aren’t correct size for car and causing damage, so why not align after correct wheels and additional are on car and just tell me it doesn’t make sense to get alignment yet? I probably overspent by $400-$500 on labor. I made the mistake of not getting an estimate first and also wondering if I was overcharged this much because I’m a woman? Wish I had my boyfriend call. I don’t suggest supplying your parts here, they might make up for it with excessive labor hours cost. I feel I was grossly overcharged here and won’t be going back. Work I had done @ $100 an hour Front strut assemblies, 3 hours Brake pads all around, 2 hours Rear driver bearing hub assembly, 3 hours Cabin air filter, half hour Air filter, half hour Alignment $79.99 Total cost: $1082.87 - I supplied all the parts except for cabin filter. They didn’t call me when the front pads I supplied didn’t fit and charged me $78 for brake pads. They didn’t call to tell me that they were altering one of the struts because they said there was a manufacturer defect. They didn’t supply me with an estimate when calling about the work but I should have asked and will be asking more specifics when dealing with a new shop in the future. It was very obvious I was trying to do this repair for less with supplying my own parts and not even getting rotors when having the brake pads replaced. I spoke to Boyd, the owner, regarding my unhappiness with how much my bill was. The most outrageous stuff he said was that 3% of my $1082 bill was $100 (haha) and that fluid film would be fine to fix up the 6” diameter hole in the floor of the unibody and rotted out rocker panels. They let me know the hub bearing assembly I supplied didn’t have speed sensor and that I’d need to come back. - I’ve already set up with new mechanic to have this put in and he asked why my existing speed sensor wasn’t just used when they did this work. It was working fine before I went to this shop with no ABS lights on. Observations: I called at the end of a work day on a Thursday, they’re closed Fridays and they had availability first thing the following Monday. Red flag that there was no wait time. Well loved mechanic shops with happy customers tend to have a week or longer wait. Any mechanic I’ve regularly gone to that I was happy with had a decent wait time until they could get me in. They have a sign up that says customers can’t swear or use the lord’s name in vain. This is very likely because customers are frequently getting upset here. They have a thick glass barrier at the desk where you pay with a little slot to pass your payment through. We’re talking about Wilton Maine, this is not NYC. Also there’s a clause on their receipt that they will charge you by the day if car not picked up and paid for within 48 hours of work completed. I wonder how many customers here have had a mechanics lien put on their car and then had their car sold or retained by A Tec? I paid the exorbitant overcharged amount to get my car but I’m guessing there are a good many that unfortunately had surrender their car to this person. There are many older cars sitting in the lot. I have probably been to 20-30 auto shops over the years and have never been so disappointed. This guy doesn’t seem to understand that people will keep coming back to fair, honest mechanics. This guy is shooting he himself in the foot with the tactics he’s using.

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Teighlor Ellis

We have been going here for years and always had great experience up until about a year ago. It seems Boyd himself is stepping back a bit and that's when the issues started. We could tell one of our wheel bearings was going bad so we brought it in. Hunter claimed he couldn't hear anything so we picked it up. We still heard the sound so brought it back in a few months later, because surely he could hear it now. Nope, still couldn't hear it. We waited again and the thing was super bad so we brought it in. This time we knew exactly which one, yet he claimed he couldn't hear it. We just requested it be replaced regardless. We also could not get ahold of them for 2 days even though Hunter claimed he would call back in 30 minutes. We were preparing to drive over when we finally go through and we told it was ready to pick up. It fixed the noise, but the tires were not torqued properly and they failed to mention they had broken one of the lug nuts. The whole car vibrated going down the road. We refused to take it back there for subpar service, so stopped at VIP to figure out what the issue was and they put a new lug nut on. The broken one was on about on turn just so it will sit on there. They know we have children and said nothing! We will never bring our vehicles there again after this whole experience. It's so hard to find a good mechanic, and we loved the service we received from Boyd in the past, but the service now is shady at best.

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Timothy Freme

Quality, comprehensive, and fast! They did a big/risky job on my vehicle (engine swap) and my car is running beautifully. Amazing service and kept me in the loop the whole time, will definitely be using them again in the future