Loading…
32
I finally snapped a customer's door mirror bracket last month and had to own it
So last month I had a 2019 Civic in bay 3 for a driver side door respray. Pulling it out of the booth, I caught the mirror on the edge of the masking rail. Snapped the bracket clean off and cracked the housing. My stomach just sank, because I knew that mirror had a camera in it. I walked straight to the office and told the service writer before the customer picked up. No hiding it. The part was $312 from the dealer plus two hours to program the camera. I told the owner straight up on the phone, offered to eat the labor and just charge him part cost. He was quiet for a bit. Then he goes, I appreciate you calling me before I saw it myself. That line stuck with me more than the money part. Do you guys fess up right away or try to blend it and hope nobody notices?
1 comments
Log in to join the discussion
Log In1 Comment
davidh901mo ago
How many shops out there are actually thinking about what those cameras cost to calibrate after the fact, not just the part itself? Everybody focuses on the mirror price and the labor to swap it, but nobody talks about the programming side until it bites them. On newer cars that camera has to be aimed with targets and a scan tool, and if you skip it the lane keep and auto braking can be off just enough to matter. That is the part that should scare people more than the $312, because it turns a two hour job into a headache and a comeback. If you are blending damage and hoping nobody checks the mirror, you are also betting nobody ever notices their safety system acting weird. That bet gets a lot worse when the car is newer. Was the camera calibration something your shop already had the tooling for, or did you have to send it out?
3