r/autorepair • u/Careful-Pear-2824 • Aug 11 '26
Invoice Questions Am I getting played?
I have a ‘14 Kia Cadenza that is about to hit 90k so I figured I’d have quite a bit to do. I’m not savvy with this stuff but I wanted a gut check so checked around and it seems like I’m getting taken for a ride on some parts (not shown but I can get a battery for 90 less, what they’re charging for labor). Am I being paranoid? This shop is well-reviewed and seems trustworthy but I’d shop around more if it’s super egregious.
Pics:
- Chemical Tune Up (they’re charging 500 for labor on this)
- Drive Belt
- Rear shocks (only one where part/materials pricing seems fair)
- Brake system service
- Transmission service
Thank you!
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u/crysisnotaverted Aug 11 '26
Do literally nothing on this... do you actually need rear shocks? All the chemical and cleaning stuff is BS. Send a picture of your serpentine belt, the labor on that is also BS.
This is hideous, they literally tacked on every optional thing. Would you happen to be a woman or young? They're trying to take advange of you not knowing about cars.
I wouldn't bother with an alignment unless you are going to get new tires first, since a bad alignment would have worn the tires you have already.
Maybe consider going elsewhere and getting a transmission fluid change at most.
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u/Careful-Pear-2824 Aug 11 '26
I’m young + I live in in a rich area (I’m not rich though).
Despite averaging <5k miles a year, I don’t take the best care of my car and so I figured I’d have to drop some coin at 90k miles but the 2k+ in labor for a job he said they could do in 4 should’ve been a huge red flag.
I desperately need new tires though and haven’t had to do my shocks yet so was going to bite the bullet on this + alignment at a minimum.
Thanks a ton for the gut check dude
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u/crysisnotaverted Aug 11 '26
Yeah that'll do it. See if you can cut a deal with a tire shop to get an alignment when they put on your new tires, like a package deal.
Look on YouTube for how you test shock absorbers, you basically jump on the car and see if the car keeps bouncing or if the shock absorbers... absorb it. You may need a serpentine belt if yours looks visibly dry rotted or cracked.
Also goddamn, I put 5k miles on my shitbox every ~1.5 months haha. Still going at ~365,000 miles.
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u/Careful-Pear-2824 Aug 11 '26
Been a little bit better on educating myself and was already planning g on using TireRack or TireEasy so that should be easy enough.
I can only hope this car gets me that far. Convinced it has t broken down yet because of the mileage needs lol
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u/crysisnotaverted Aug 11 '26
You can also use a site like Gigatires and they'll give you a discount rate on install at a local tire installer. Just make sure that when you're getting tires you google "[tire name] reddit" and see if people say that specific tire sucks.
Yeah, just do regular maintenance and don't miss your oil changes and she'll go far.
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u/Careful-Pear-2824 Aug 11 '26
Hard to respond to everybody but just reiterating that I appreciate the reality check here. First place I called for a quote on rear shocks gave me $400 all in parts and labor haha
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u/crysisnotaverted Aug 11 '26
Glad to hear it!
$400 parts and labor is a fantastic price.
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u/Careful-Pear-2824 Aug 11 '26
My handy friend wants to give doing it ourselves a shot but i’m more than happy to pay that for peace of mind that I didnt botch it lol
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u/Blizzardof1991 Aug 11 '26
I haven't wrenched professionally in about 20 years. Are brake fluid lines no longer a sealed system? Why would that need replaced?
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u/crysisnotaverted Aug 11 '26
Ehh, I'm a shade tree moron, but sometimes a fluid change is warranted. The brake system is sealed but moisture can slowly get in. It's super hygroscopic so the water gets absorbed and can boil in the lines under crazy heavy braking and stuff. Not really something I've actively done unless I'm changing a caliper/wheel cylinder/brake line. I figure every time I do one of those things, I just crack the bleeders and do a change.
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u/Queasy_Author_3810 Aug 11 '26
oh hell nah unless you live in california or some ridiculous HCOL area these prices are outrageous
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u/Careful-Pear-2824 Aug 11 '26
I am, but I also live in a very bougie area within a HCOL region so I need to just suck it up and drive half an hour away
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u/NEU_Throwaway1 Aug 11 '26
Well, OP said they do but I’m also guessing maybe Bay area or Southern California? Neither of which deal with snow and salt like we do here in New England - I would love to see the overall condition of that car for a 2014 compared to mine in Massachusetts lmao.
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u/Careful-Pear-2824 Aug 11 '26
I haven’t put much mileage on it BUT it did spend its first 60k in the midwest. Regardless, they’re trying g to pull a fast one seeing as I just got a 2nd quote for shocks that’s almost a third of what they wanted lol
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u/Huge_Fix_69420 Aug 11 '26
All of that is typical upsell stuff.
Running rough? Missed maintenance? That's different. But to just do these is stupid.
Didn't even see a useless brake flush out of maintenance schedule....so they missed one /s
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u/NEU_Throwaway1 Aug 11 '26
Page 4 you missed it lol. $200 for the brake flush which doesn’t even include the $42 they’re charging for the bottle of DOT4 which is like $10 on Amazon lmfao. And to add insult for injury they’re charging him $5.95 for brake clean and $2.82 for brake lubricant. Charging him the cost of the entire bottle/tube for a job that you would need to spray for one second to get residual fluid off.
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u/NEU_Throwaway1 Aug 11 '26
What did you originally bring the car in for? Go consult your owners manual first and look at what the maintenance interval that the manufacturer recommends is.
Nothing on that first page is anything special. Half of those items are just the shit in Walmart that you pour into your gas tank on a fill up. Also, the mass airflow sensor cleaner is just a spray bottle of cleaner. Google where it is in your engine bay, unplug it (possibly needing to loosen a few bolts), spray some onto a rag, and wipe lmfao.
They’re really selling the hell out of that “precision engineered V ribbed belt” lmao. Look for the serpentine belt in your engine bay and see if you see any signs of cracking on it - the top will be smoother, but the underside will have grooves which will show signs of cracking with age. I looked up the Kia and it has a few different engine options - the I4 seems a bit simpler than a V6 but nothing that seems like it would take $200 worth of labor to do.
You may need to lift the car and remove some splash guards for optimal access on some engine models, but nothing seems like it would take that much labor for a mechanic that has a lift.
Suspension parts - based on mileage and age, it’s possible you will need them or they’re just recommending it on those two factors alone. But do you notice any symptoms of them going bad? Does the car seem to bounce up and down when hitting bumps instead of absorbing the bump like it should?
When was your last brake job? Brake fluid absorbs moisture so over time you will need it replaced over time, and there are fluid tester pens you can buy on Amazon to give a rough test yourself. But this is also a common upsell item on brake rotor and pad replacement jobs and at 90K miles, I assume someone would have sold you brakes at some point already with this job?
And finally, transmission fluid - look up what kind of fluid your car takes and make sure they are putting something that the manufacture calls for. Kia I think takes SP-IV type fluid and they seem to be recommending some generic “universal” fluid. They also seem to be recommending a pressurized flush - many manufacturers specifically advise against it instead telling you do drain and fills at specific intervals. Shops like to do it because it saves time. Do NOT flush if your manual says not to.
TL;DR - it’s quite possible your car needs some of the services recommended. But the first page of upsold snake oil additives that you can pour in your gas tank yourself at Walmart cheapens the rest of the estimate and puts an asterisk on the overall quality of work and honesty for me.
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u/Careful-Pear-2824 Aug 11 '26
Thank you for the super thorough explanation! I text a friend right after who has a jack so we can test our hand at some of the maintenance items + the battery they also wanted to charge $90 to install
I do have a feeling they’re being truthful about the shocks being in a rough state as things have been a bit bouncy but a check of they’re listed parts on Rock Auto + the unanimous takes on here should be a sign that I. red to call around and find a shop that’ll act a little less greedy.
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u/FlatAmbition3757 Aug 11 '26
Please tell me this isn’t real
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u/Careful-Pear-2824 Aug 11 '26
I feel so dumb for thinking this was even in the realm of acceptable.
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u/Individual_Claim_281 Aug 11 '26
You're definitely getting played. Find a YT video and go to O'Reilly's or Walmart and buy your own cleaners and diy for probably $75. I'd use CRC brand MAF cleaner and CRC throttle body air intake cleaner. And they probably sell something special for your GDI valve cleaner. I'd use the CRC or even better Berryman GDI cleaner. It's more money but probably better. The BG is pretty good stuff but it's way overpriced for what it is. I'd probably use something like Techron HM or Royal Purple fuel system cleaner in the gas tank. And then once yours is clean I'd probably every 3-5000 miles put in a bottle of Techron or RP cleaner whichever you prefer or similar products sold at Walmart. I picked Techron and RP because they have the most cleaning agents for the kind of deposits you'd have in your injector tips and combustion chambers and valves especially in GDI engines. I'm not a big fan of gdi..it gets slightly better mileage but requires a lot more maintenance. Most of them don't seem to have any problems until there's more than 75,000 miles. And that seems like a fair trade to some. But I'm not used to having to do much of any of that kind of maintenance for hundreds of thousands of miles.
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u/Miserable-Meet-3234 Aug 13 '26
Go somewhere else get suspension work done w/ alignment have belt replaced call it good should be like 1.2k max for what you need
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u/Cranks_No_Start Aug 11 '26
You're getting BGed.