THE OIL CHANGE

​I have always felt that I have a pretty good sense of people. In other words... I can usually tell

if someone is honest or not. There is just a gut feeling I get when I first meet people. However,

I'm not always correct or if I am suspicious I don't always know what action to take. For the most

part I will leave if I'm uncomfortable but there are times that I feel like I want to give someone a

chance and so I'll stay...against my better judgment.

So, to get to my point, I went to have my oil changed the other day in Gilbert AZ at a well

known national company that rhymes with pithy tube. The moment I drove in I felt like things

weren't going to go good but instead of listening to my gut I continued on. The first problem was

that the young man gave me a quote for the highest priced service and for an oil that I don't use in

my car. To his credit when I mentioned that my car doesn't use full synthetic oil he went and

checked and came back with the correct type of oil and a different price. But still it was a lot

higher than oil change prices typically are but he told me the reason for that is because they can get

me in and out in a real quick hurry. So, since I'm like a lot of people are now a days, and don't

want to wait long, I decided to proceed with the oil change. The price included vacuuming and

washing the windows so that seemed to take a little of the punch out of the price. So, thinking that

$69.00 was the highest I've ever paid for an oil change I set in the waiting room biting my nails

and wondering what possessed me. Well, I'm sure you know there is more to this story. So, I

waited a little while and soon I was called up to the counter. The technician had a filthy air filter

in his hand with a tear in it. His story was that I needed to buy a new filter because when they

went to check mine it was soooo dirty that when he went to pull it out it got stuck and ripped. Of

course that will be another $39.99. I was stunned but thought that if it's been torn of course it

needs to be replaced now, and yes it does look filthy. As I set back down in my chair waiting for

them to finish up I began to feel like they had just tricked me but I had no way of proving it. So

the only thing I could think of was to ask for the old filter so I could take it home and have my

husband have a look at it. The final bill was over $120 because of the taxes and my ignorance at

not listening to my gut in the first place. I left that place in Gilbert Arizona more than a little

upset. Ready to tell anyone who would listen what had just happened to me. And oh...the icing on

the cake was that I know they did not vacuum my car or wash the windows. My car wasn't all that

dirty but I certainly would have been able to tell if they had vacuumed. So the moral of this story

is listen to your gut. Lesson learned....again.