Nerve Endings Firing Away

Recently, I had the opportunity to compare estimates for some vehicle body work. I located around three body shops within a reasonable distance from my home. I drove to the first one and got an astronomical quote. Of course, this shop was at least a second-generation business and had a decent setup that would assure me quality service. But I am a poor graduate student with a beat up car so spending the worth of the car on fixing a minor dent is not worth it.

So I drove up to the next body shop on my list. This was a smaller setup and a Hispanic-owned business. The proprietor was a little hard of hearing and I had some difficult communicating because of an added disadvantage of an accent difference. But finally, I got an estimate that was approximately half of that of the first place I had been to. He also promised to deliver quickly. So where does the cost difference lie; Mostly in the labor charges. But effectively both shops favored replacing the damaged part although 90% of the part was not even scratched. If I recall correctly, such a problem would be handled differently in India and the mechanic would cobble together some remedy and a little banging later would ultimately use the existing part. Looking at the damage, I could see that you could easily fix it using a blowtorch and a drill. I could have easily done with little rough edges as honestly the car is no chick magnet and could not be used for that purpose even if it was. So why replace the part incurring a huge cost of doing so not to mentioning the recycling or debris cost for the disposal of the old part as well? For one, it is easy. It takes much less effort to charge the customer for a brand new part rather than try and attempt to fix the existing one. Second, it might absolve the mechanic of any future liability if the quick-fix happens to fail in the near future. Finally, almost everyone in the business seems to be advocating replacing the part instead of even trying to fix it.

Now, if you drive around town a little more, eventually some enterprising chap (more likely to be an illegal immigrant) might offer to fix it for you at a fraction of the cost and he’ll do it the ‘India-style’. But then, would you really want to do it in a way that my dad best describes, thook laga ke diya?