I've worked (and am currently working) in the automotive service industry, both for independents and a dealership. The unscrupulous dealers will have issues like this where they get techs that don't want to be bothered to diagnose properly and tricky service writers that will (up)sell the excessive or unnecessary repairs that result. What does surprise me a little is the rate the man paid for his pebble to be removed from the moonroof. A minimum of 2 hours charge is a bit steep with a shop rate that's around the $70 per hour seen here. I doubt it took 2 hours to fix, and in the name of honest service and good will a really great shop would charge 1 hour at most or even do it free.
The shop I work in now has done as much, because it's right. You'll be paid well for such negligible 'free' work, with repeat customers and an excellent reputation.
I was fortunate to work summer jobs/internships and managed to save a decent (for a high schooler) chunk of money, which I then proceeded to use to purchase some stocks. Too bad I forgot to proactively keep track of my investments. Nearly 10 yrs later and I'm sad to say I've lost money on some of those investments. If I'd paid more attention, then I could have sold stocks to avoid significant losses- or just put my money into a boring but safe CD or interest-bearing savings account.
I should add that while I don't agree with the atomic discussion (like begets like on an atomic level), I agree that people who are upbeat and confident will inspire that emotion in others, and Debbie Downers drag everyone else into the abyss. And I DO think that there is a physical explanation, but I think it's more high-level and chemical - probably the result of pheromones, or something similar that are used to communicate on a subconsious level.
A couple disclaimers:
I have not read "Excuse Me, Your Job is Waiting"
I have not read or seen "The Secret"
My girlfriend (an Oprah fan) was telling me about the Law of Attraction and a couple things bug me about it. First the most obvious one. In nature, like does not attract like. Like repels like and attracts things dislike itself (think magnets).
The other big problem I have with the LOA is that it almost seems to have a "Blame the Victim" bent to it. Good things happen because you expect them and "draw them towards you", but the flip side is true as well. The bad things that happen are because you "attracted" them, including disease and what not. Now are you really gonna tell me that my neighbors 4 month old baby got cancer because she was drawing it to herself? Or that the people in Sudan are suffering like they are because of the "bad vibes" they are putting out? It kind of make me angry to blame the innocent like the LOA implicitly does (or seems to from my understanding).
That being said, I do believe that posative thinking is a good think that can help you fell better and do better, but not because of some psuedo-scientic "particles"...
As someone whose job is helping the generally unemployable get jobs and assist them in keeping them, I am delighted to hear of this book. I would like to respond to Sarah's difficulty in grasping George's concept of the physical. Since I have not read the book, I can only respond in general terms. Long ago I realized that the phrase "say it and you create it," really means something. How that happens is the mystery. Then I was urged to see the film, "What the Bleep Do We Know." I highly recommend it; it helped give meaning to creating with "intention." I did not read "The Secret", but saw the film (over hyped, but again I understand the message). Through this process of living life and observing same as I go along and watching people succeed or fail, live life well or marginally, based not on their smarts, looks or character but by what they "attract," I am "getting it." If we expect something, that something will surely materialize. I think this may be the "physical" George is referring to--acting on the little "particles" (referring back to the physics of "What the Bleep do we Know") that can create reality. The sad part for all of us, is that we have far more power (I am not crazy about the term but cannot think of another that makes more sense to me) than we can begin to fathom. Because we have not learned to make use of that power, our lives are far less than what they could be. I have begun to live my life as if I already have what I need and what I want. It may not be in my life yet, but it is there and will be in or part of my life at some point. It is still an experiment, but I have lived life long enough to see in retrospect that all those things I did or might have worried about, meant nothing. All that we need is out there for us, all that we want (whether it is good for us or not) will come our way. That is why intention is so important. The old chestnut, "be careful what you ask for, you might get it," applies here. The remarkable thing I have found as a vocational counselor is that a person can come to me with certain beliefs about themselves (90% of the time negative to some degree) and through my positive belief about them, they begin to do things they did not think they could do, and in the process change their belief about themselves. It's not enough for me to believe they can be "successful." I believe they already are--they are just not living it yet. It is more than positive thinking; it is positive living.
My old fashion family taught me never to buy anything, except the house and other assets, unless I have the cash. So I don't have debt at all. I feel uneasy to have negative revenue. (How can my boss enjoy his vacation knowing the bill is all on the credit card?)
I don't have debt, but I do nagging mini-problems. My worst financial mistake is Procrastination! It doesn't sound like a big deal but it does add up. Video rental late fee, library fines, credit card bill late fee, penalty fee of all kinds. I didn't set up retirement until after 6 years of working. All the years of tax and company matching... Procrastination is very expensive!
I procrastinate fixing my car as long as it doesn't break down on the spot. Small problems turn into larger problems. I just spent $950 flushing the entire cooling system and replacing some parts because I waited 6 months to fix it. The gluey substance had spread throughout the entire cooling system. It would have been in just the coolant tank.
While I still procrastinate, I did learn to prevent problems from reoccurring. I made everything automatic if available. Auto-payment to avoid late fee, auto deposit for savings. Using no-late-fee-mail-rental services. Set up email reminder to nag myself to do stuff. I have just fixed up all the problems with the car and intend to act immediately in the future. Feeling hopeful!
I can only agree; went in to the dealership twice for two different cars. One was for a buick owned by my dad, it had transponder keys. At the dealership they wanted 90 dollars for the key blank and 40 dollars to 'program it'.
Solution: Went to a roaming locksmith who sort of screwed me on the wait so he went down to 35 per key I wanted versus charging me $50 dollars that he originally wanted. I got 2 keys made for $70 dollars. He didn't charge me for programming since all it was was putting the key in this machine that beeped after a second. He then tried the keys and since they worked; we each went our separate ways.
My brother had a pontiac grand am gt and the shifter cable had lost its nut and washer. The hardware was pretty hard to jury rig since any nut and washer he tried to get in there would fall out after a while; so he decided he might buy the nut and washer until he heard the price. It would have cost 400 dollars to order the parts; they wouldn't just order the nut and washer that were needed. We left and he sold the car; pretty much the mechanic who bought it went to a junkyard and bought the pieces for like less than 10 bucks; most of that is because junkyards here have to charge for an environmental fee or some such; this could of course be some scam but whatever. This is sort of a weak case but trying to force him to buy 400 dollars worth of parts in order to get a special nut and washer just seemed dumb.
I've been fascinated about wild weeds myself recently (as any reader of my blog can certify). I've made dandelion blossom 'honey', dandelion greens salad, wild garlic salad, ground elder cheesepie, and am about to make stinging nettle soup tonight. All have been tasty, and it's exciting to boot:)
My mother's worst financial mistake is sort of an ongoing larger mistake -- she never deals with problems until they're impossible. She neglects her house, so now it needs thousands of dollars of work instead of the minor costs of upkeep. She refused to fix her windshield wipers (which costs what, fifteen dollars?), and when an emergency trip came on a rainy day, we had to take a car with shoddy brakes that collapsed on themselves, with a total cost of four hundred dollars. I'm still repairing some of her easily prevented disasters. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, kids.
interesting... youd think that i would have learned something like that from one of the many communications classes i took in college... it makes alot of sense tho... great article
A true Wisebread reader would have took a flashlight to his moonroof and pulled the stone out with his own pair of tweezers. But let's be honest...if this guys is driving a shiny Merc, he probably isn't into all the DIY nonsense. I'd be surprised if he even owns a toolkit. But good on him for not just going blindly with the first quote...a lesson to us all.
I'd always taken it to the dealership before for service. This time, they charged me $1400 for a 90,000 mile treatment. I paid it but two days later I had a wheel well come loose and the car had trouble starting. Took it back to the dealership and they asked for another $1000 to fix these issues, including $100 for some part that they told me was the "at cost" price.
Took it to some small dealer and they charged me $200 to fix everything. They bought the part from the exact same dealership I went to. I even heard them order it on the phone and the price was $25.
Lesson learned, dealerships suck! Find a small shop you trust and you'll never go back to a dealership again. Don't assume you're getting good service just because you're at an "authorized dealer".
on one hand, this is an awesome story and awesome for the guy who could have spent $6500. On the other hand, in my wisebread mind I would still be irritated that I paid $143 to get a pebble tweezed.
I had a Chevrolet dealer (Bill Heard Chevrolet in Sugar Land, TX) try to screw me similarly.
I went in to have my air conditioner compressor replaced (it was under warranty, as they had put in a new one less than 9 months prior). Even though it was experiencing the exact same problems it did when they replaced it the first time, they claimed it was a completely different problem altogether.
THEN, my car was slow to start for them, which caused them to diagnose a failing fuel pump. Do you know what the real problem was? I WAS LOW ON GAS.
These fuckers tried to charge me $1,200 to fix two (nonexistent) problems, so I took it somewhere else for a second opinion, but not before they held my car hostage for a $70 diagnosis fee.
The mechanic I took it to said I had a minor leak in freon (from the compressor that the dealership, because of the warranty, should have serviced for FREE) and needed a new battery. I was fixed up for less than $100. LESS THAN $100! And the problems that the Chevrolet dealer dreamed up still wouldn't have done anything constructive, $1,200 later.
I chewed out the service manager and got my $70 diagnosis fee back, plus an apology. I'm currently in the process of shopping for a new car and I've avoided them like the plague.
it would be really cool if you guys would do brief recaps of the videos you post. im at work (hahah i know...so productive) and can't watch movies but i really wanna see what happened...
Good sites mentioned here, but I like having the community vote on online coupons to filter out the bad stuff... so I typically start my search at Savings.com.
The HELOC rate that I was using for the sake of illustration was 7%. There was a mention of zero in one of the posts but I think that was in reference to the loan balance. I do try to mention (in this and other posts) that the costs incurred (fees, balance calculations, etc.) may actually be higher than what I have illustrated.
1) Starting to smoke: I can't even bear to do the math on how much this addiction has cost me over the years, but I imagine it could have bought me a house instead.
2) Putting a boyfriend through school instead of paying off my own student loan. (We broke up shortly before he graduated.)
I've worked (and am currently working) in the automotive service industry, both for independents and a dealership. The unscrupulous dealers will have issues like this where they get techs that don't want to be bothered to diagnose properly and tricky service writers that will (up)sell the excessive or unnecessary repairs that result. What does surprise me a little is the rate the man paid for his pebble to be removed from the moonroof. A minimum of 2 hours charge is a bit steep with a shop rate that's around the $70 per hour seen here. I doubt it took 2 hours to fix, and in the name of honest service and good will a really great shop would charge 1 hour at most or even do it free.
The shop I work in now has done as much, because it's right. You'll be paid well for such negligible 'free' work, with repeat customers and an excellent reputation.
I was fortunate to work summer jobs/internships and managed to save a decent (for a high schooler) chunk of money, which I then proceeded to use to purchase some stocks. Too bad I forgot to proactively keep track of my investments. Nearly 10 yrs later and I'm sad to say I've lost money on some of those investments. If I'd paid more attention, then I could have sold stocks to avoid significant losses- or just put my money into a boring but safe CD or interest-bearing savings account.
...is there a difference between positive thinking/living and the Law of Attraction? I would say "Yes!"
Bump Proof Locks from Medeco, Mul T Locks and Schlage Primus
http://BumpProofLocks.org
I should add that while I don't agree with the atomic discussion (like begets like on an atomic level), I agree that people who are upbeat and confident will inspire that emotion in others, and Debbie Downers drag everyone else into the abyss. And I DO think that there is a physical explanation, but I think it's more high-level and chemical - probably the result of pheromones, or something similar that are used to communicate on a subconsious level.
I have to concur with Shawn. I've read some great dissections of The Secret, mostly from skeptics like me.
Anyway, I don't like the idea that you can just sit around thinking that you want something, and you'll get it.
Check out this if you get a chance. Killed myself laughing (some profanity).
A couple disclaimers:
I have not read "Excuse Me, Your Job is Waiting"
I have not read or seen "The Secret"
My girlfriend (an Oprah fan) was telling me about the Law of Attraction and a couple things bug me about it. First the most obvious one. In nature, like does not attract like. Like repels like and attracts things dislike itself (think magnets).
The other big problem I have with the LOA is that it almost seems to have a "Blame the Victim" bent to it. Good things happen because you expect them and "draw them towards you", but the flip side is true as well. The bad things that happen are because you "attracted" them, including disease and what not. Now are you really gonna tell me that my neighbors 4 month old baby got cancer because she was drawing it to herself? Or that the people in Sudan are suffering like they are because of the "bad vibes" they are putting out? It kind of make me angry to blame the innocent like the LOA implicitly does (or seems to from my understanding).
That being said, I do believe that posative thinking is a good think that can help you fell better and do better, but not because of some psuedo-scientic "particles"...
Sorry for the rant.
Sean
sounds like a very interesting book... funny also... i may have to check it out
As someone whose job is helping the generally unemployable get jobs and assist them in keeping them, I am delighted to hear of this book. I would like to respond to Sarah's difficulty in grasping George's concept of the physical. Since I have not read the book, I can only respond in general terms. Long ago I realized that the phrase "say it and you create it," really means something. How that happens is the mystery. Then I was urged to see the film, "What the Bleep Do We Know." I highly recommend it; it helped give meaning to creating with "intention." I did not read "The Secret", but saw the film (over hyped, but again I understand the message). Through this process of living life and observing same as I go along and watching people succeed or fail, live life well or marginally, based not on their smarts, looks or character but by what they "attract," I am "getting it." If we expect something, that something will surely materialize. I think this may be the "physical" George is referring to--acting on the little "particles" (referring back to the physics of "What the Bleep do we Know") that can create reality. The sad part for all of us, is that we have far more power (I am not crazy about the term but cannot think of another that makes more sense to me) than we can begin to fathom. Because we have not learned to make use of that power, our lives are far less than what they could be. I have begun to live my life as if I already have what I need and what I want. It may not be in my life yet, but it is there and will be in or part of my life at some point. It is still an experiment, but I have lived life long enough to see in retrospect that all those things I did or might have worried about, meant nothing. All that we need is out there for us, all that we want (whether it is good for us or not) will come our way. That is why intention is so important. The old chestnut, "be careful what you ask for, you might get it," applies here. The remarkable thing I have found as a vocational counselor is that a person can come to me with certain beliefs about themselves (90% of the time negative to some degree) and through my positive belief about them, they begin to do things they did not think they could do, and in the process change their belief about themselves. It's not enough for me to believe they can be "successful." I believe they already are--they are just not living it yet. It is more than positive thinking; it is positive living.
My old fashion family taught me never to buy anything, except the house and other assets, unless I have the cash. So I don't have debt at all. I feel uneasy to have negative revenue. (How can my boss enjoy his vacation knowing the bill is all on the credit card?)
I don't have debt, but I do nagging mini-problems. My worst financial mistake is Procrastination! It doesn't sound like a big deal but it does add up. Video rental late fee, library fines, credit card bill late fee, penalty fee of all kinds. I didn't set up retirement until after 6 years of working. All the years of tax and company matching... Procrastination is very expensive!
I procrastinate fixing my car as long as it doesn't break down on the spot. Small problems turn into larger problems. I just spent $950 flushing the entire cooling system and replacing some parts because I waited 6 months to fix it. The gluey substance had spread throughout the entire cooling system. It would have been in just the coolant tank.
While I still procrastinate, I did learn to prevent problems from reoccurring. I made everything automatic if available. Auto-payment to avoid late fee, auto deposit for savings. Using no-late-fee-mail-rental services. Set up email reminder to nag myself to do stuff. I have just fixed up all the problems with the car and intend to act immediately in the future. Feeling hopeful!
The same thing happened to my dad. He got furious though and traded his S600 for a Lexus.
I can only agree; went in to the dealership twice for two different cars. One was for a buick owned by my dad, it had transponder keys. At the dealership they wanted 90 dollars for the key blank and 40 dollars to 'program it'.
Solution: Went to a roaming locksmith who sort of screwed me on the wait so he went down to 35 per key I wanted versus charging me $50 dollars that he originally wanted. I got 2 keys made for $70 dollars. He didn't charge me for programming since all it was was putting the key in this machine that beeped after a second. He then tried the keys and since they worked; we each went our separate ways.
My brother had a pontiac grand am gt and the shifter cable had lost its nut and washer. The hardware was pretty hard to jury rig since any nut and washer he tried to get in there would fall out after a while; so he decided he might buy the nut and washer until he heard the price. It would have cost 400 dollars to order the parts; they wouldn't just order the nut and washer that were needed. We left and he sold the car; pretty much the mechanic who bought it went to a junkyard and bought the pieces for like less than 10 bucks; most of that is because junkyards here have to charge for an environmental fee or some such; this could of course be some scam but whatever. This is sort of a weak case but trying to force him to buy 400 dollars worth of parts in order to get a special nut and washer just seemed dumb.
I've been fascinated about wild weeds myself recently (as any reader of my blog can certify). I've made dandelion blossom 'honey', dandelion greens salad, wild garlic salad, ground elder cheesepie, and am about to make stinging nettle soup tonight. All have been tasty, and it's exciting to boot:)
My mother's worst financial mistake is sort of an ongoing larger mistake -- she never deals with problems until they're impossible. She neglects her house, so now it needs thousands of dollars of work instead of the minor costs of upkeep. She refused to fix her windshield wipers (which costs what, fifteen dollars?), and when an emergency trip came on a rainy day, we had to take a car with shoddy brakes that collapsed on themselves, with a total cost of four hundred dollars. I'm still repairing some of her easily prevented disasters. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, kids.
It's a little awkward at first, I must admit. But it helps people to remember your name and sort of "cements" your presence in their consciousness.
I actually go by "Andi" at work, and saying "Andi Dickson" sounds really close to "Andy Dick", which makes me feel like a bad, bad person.
interesting... youd think that i would have learned something like that from one of the many communications classes i took in college... it makes alot of sense tho... great article
A true Wisebread reader would have took a flashlight to his moonroof and pulled the stone out with his own pair of tweezers. But let's be honest...if this guys is driving a shiny Merc, he probably isn't into all the DIY nonsense. I'd be surprised if he even owns a toolkit. But good on him for not just going blindly with the first quote...a lesson to us all.
I had an issue with my car recently.
I'd always taken it to the dealership before for service. This time, they charged me $1400 for a 90,000 mile treatment. I paid it but two days later I had a wheel well come loose and the car had trouble starting. Took it back to the dealership and they asked for another $1000 to fix these issues, including $100 for some part that they told me was the "at cost" price.
Took it to some small dealer and they charged me $200 to fix everything. They bought the part from the exact same dealership I went to. I even heard them order it on the phone and the price was $25.
Lesson learned, dealerships suck! Find a small shop you trust and you'll never go back to a dealership again. Don't assume you're getting good service just because you're at an "authorized dealer".
Gal
on one hand, this is an awesome story and awesome for the guy who could have spent $6500. On the other hand, in my wisebread mind I would still be irritated that I paid $143 to get a pebble tweezed.
I had a Chevrolet dealer (Bill Heard Chevrolet in Sugar Land, TX) try to screw me similarly.
I went in to have my air conditioner compressor replaced (it was under warranty, as they had put in a new one less than 9 months prior). Even though it was experiencing the exact same problems it did when they replaced it the first time, they claimed it was a completely different problem altogether.
THEN, my car was slow to start for them, which caused them to diagnose a failing fuel pump. Do you know what the real problem was? I WAS LOW ON GAS.
These fuckers tried to charge me $1,200 to fix two (nonexistent) problems, so I took it somewhere else for a second opinion, but not before they held my car hostage for a $70 diagnosis fee.
The mechanic I took it to said I had a minor leak in freon (from the compressor that the dealership, because of the warranty, should have serviced for FREE) and needed a new battery. I was fixed up for less than $100. LESS THAN $100! And the problems that the Chevrolet dealer dreamed up still wouldn't have done anything constructive, $1,200 later.
I chewed out the service manager and got my $70 diagnosis fee back, plus an apology. I'm currently in the process of shopping for a new car and I've avoided them like the plague.
Maybe we can do a round up of the video stories we have featured every month?
it would be really cool if you guys would do brief recaps of the videos you post. im at work (hahah i know...so productive) and can't watch movies but i really wanna see what happened...
Good sites mentioned here, but I like having the community vote on online coupons to filter out the bad stuff... so I typically start my search at Savings.com.
The HELOC rate that I was using for the sake of illustration was 7%. There was a mention of zero in one of the posts but I think that was in reference to the loan balance. I do try to mention (in this and other posts) that the costs incurred (fees, balance calculations, etc.) may actually be higher than what I have illustrated.
It's a toss-up.
1) Starting to smoke: I can't even bear to do the math on how much this addiction has cost me over the years, but I imagine it could have bought me a house instead.
2) Putting a boyfriend through school instead of paying off my own student loan. (We broke up shortly before he graduated.)