Jiffy Lube's new advertising campaign "We don't find stuff to fix"

[Jordan 191]

I have found dealership service departments to be just as bad or worse than quick change joints when it comes to overfilled and underfilled oil, lost bolts, etc.

[MightyDSM]

Cars that have routine scheduled maintnance performed on them generally don't need thousands of dollars in repairs at once. Only neglected ones do.....

The thing is, I don't neglect my cars.

Somone is missing the point here......

The idea is that most cars do NOT need these services...that's how the quick lubes make their money.

And this

[seadoo2006]

Why didn't you change the oil when you did the t'belt

I drive roughly 800miles/week ... would've been a waste of money to do it then.

[mike02467]

a Jiffy lube tried to rip off my sister. She called me one day and was like the guy said I need new transmission fluid, a coolant flush blah blah blah, and I was just like, your car has what, 30k miles on it? It doesn't need new fluids. Tell them to change your engine oil and let you leave. So stupid...

[rains]

lol, haven't seen those videos for Jiffy Lube in quite a while!

[Horror Business]

You guys don't think it's the ASE Certified Master Tech's doing oil changes at the Dealership, do you?

Yea, ASE Master Techs just sit back all day like kings twiddling their thumbs and waiting for an engine rebuild to come in.

And you don't have to be a master tech to know a specific make of car inside and out. There is such a thing as factory training. This is what you benefit from at a dealership.

[Denniswhat]

Food for thought..

All of you are on this site therefor have a pretty good understanding of a car. Car people make up only a small percentage of drivers on the road. Most people don't know anything about a car except where to put gas in it.

A car comes into a general service shop for an oil change. The certified tech only changes the oil but notices some potentially dangerous things wrong with a car (brakes low, swaybar link broken, ect) and doesn't inform the customer. The car leaves the shop and gets into an accident because of those broken parts. The customer would go right back to that certified mechanic and shop and want to know why they didn't let them know their car was a hazard.

I'm not saying there arn't some shady jiffy lubes or quick lubes, I am just saying there is a lot you guys are generalizing and a lot you don't know about the business. Most people would be thankful you let them know they had a broken spring digging into their tire that was going to blow out at any minute.

[Inspector Detector]

Kinda like taking your car to Firestone..

"Hi, I would like get my tires rotated"

2 hours later: "Your car is ready. We found blah blah and blah wrong. It will cost $2000 to get it all fixed"

It seems like it's always more broken after you get your car back than before you took it in

Yeah that's how Car X operates. Just take it in for a simple oil change and they'll find plenty of other things that supposedly need routine maintenance too.

[Mr Miyagi]

Oil changes usually cost around $500 at Jiffy Lube. It's horrible.

[Iroczgirl]

There's only one thing you can do with a Jiffy Lube and all the other fast oil change places out there.

Burn them down.

[Ghost85]

Jiffy Lube always makes me cringe. I even knew before I could drive that I would never got to a Jiffy Lube.


On a side note, I've been going to a tech school for the last year to become an "Automotive Technician" (Friday is my last day) and there has been times when my fellow students have made a blunder that made me cringe. The only oil change blunder I have done is when I forgot to check the drain bucket to see if it was full. Exxon Valdeez on the shop floor!!

[Der Roboter]

The average(system wide) service ticket for Jiffy lube was closer to $55.00 last year.

[driveareliablecar]

Going in for an oil change opens up a world of fraud for other recommended repairs that are not needed.

Go in for an oil change and oil change only. Keep it at that.

[kamzcab86]

I think "We'll strip your oil pan threads and then deny it" is more accurate.

So very true. The place is like U-Haul; how the two companies are still in business is beyond me.

So, does that mean they won't replace your oil pan drain plug after they strip it?

Previous owners of my Vanagon took it to Jiffy Lube the morning of the day I was to pick it up without my knowledge; they wanted to do something nice, just like the previous owners had done for them, but it backfired. Before driving off, I found oil on the street which hadn't been there the day before; looked for the leak source and found it to be at the drain plug. Drove over to Jiffy Lube with the PO and raised hell. They were forced to back a car out of the work station to put the van back in and then denied causing the issue and that it was leaking when it was brought in. Later they claimed that it was brought in with a Honda plug in it. They had five angry people telling them that it was, in fact, not leaking, nor did it have a Honda plug in it because it was last serviced at a VW shop. They ended up finding a plug that worked, but the threads in the hole were stripped down to a single thread. At the next oil change, we ended up having to do a time-sert thanks to their total incompetence. POs of the van learned a valuable lesson that day.

[jettagli1991]

I went to one of those places once. I didn't feel like changing my oil in the snow and the car was a beater Honda. I made sure to tell them not to waste a good seat cover on my dirty work car, and casually mentioned that I was just there for my yearly oil change. I watched them up-sell a lady to death, and then when it was my turn....nothing, they didn't even bother. I take my winter car to my mechanic, usually timing it so I can get it done with my inspection. The rest of them I do myself.

[NewsJunkie]

When I get my car serviced, I appreciate when the service tech tells me if something needs to be fixed. Nobody puts a gun to your head and makes you pay their potentially inflated prices, but at the very least you now know there might be a problem and can shop around.

to the Jiffy Lube ads.

[unimogken]

This is one of the many reasons that people don't trust mechanics. . . . .even the legit ones!

[emkaytree]

A tire shop down the street from me tried to sell someone I knew parts that were replaced recently and worked fine. They've also done me wrong. Stuff like this is everywhere these days. More excuse to do it yourself.

[volkstyle]

You want things done right you got to do it yourself. Its really not very shoking that a small lube place does it even deakerships di it also. VW told me my timing belt and water pump needed to be done very soon and wanted to charge me around $600.00. I paid a mechanic I knew to do it for $300.00, as he pulls out the belt he starts laughing. I ask "whats so funny?" he replies "its brand****ing new".

[turbo_nine]

Cars that have routine scheduled maintnance performed on them generally don't need thousands of dollars in repairs at once. Only neglected ones do.....

only cars taken to firestone get you a quote for $2000 even.

CSB: it happened to me too.

[miatafreak]

My girlfriends GTI is still under warranty so she takes it to the dealer for oil changes and such. Last time she took it in they didn't tighten the drain plug all the way so the car was slowly pissing oil all over her driveway. *facepalm* I thought it was the PCV valve causing the leak as that's a super common problem in 2.0ts. So I took it all apart and tested it, and it was fine. Never would've guessed it was the drain plug. That's something I, a shade tree mechanic, would do. Never a certified Tech.

[pezzy84]

I am a dealer service only type person. (Flame and joke all you want.)

I have a tendency to show dealer service departments quickly that I follow the owners manual to the T and they learn pretty quickly that I do not screw around. Once they learn that they really do not try to push unnecessary services on me and just suggest them.

I learned to avoid these quick lube places like the plague. While I know dealer service is not too much better at least I know I have a bit of support from the brand should I have an issue.

Find a GOOD dealership and build a relationship with them is my motto.

[cityjohn]

I avoid quick lubes but it bugs me when looking at a used car and seeing their work orders in the records. You never know if the oil/filter were really changed.

[drecian]

There's a similar chain of quick lube places down here, one of which I took my beater (2cyl Daihatsu) to get a wheel bearing changed as it would cost about the same as buying the tools required to press the old one out. Prior to this, since the wheel bearing was howling/whirring, I repacked them with grease and torqued the driveshafts to spec, taking care to install the split pin in the castle nut.

So I get my car back and they say the OTHER wheel bearing was gone and promptly showed me how the wheel rocked back and forth loosely on the hub with the car on the hoist. Knowing that there was no way it would be THAT loose since I torqued them to spec, I just took the car. After poking around back at home, I found that they had cut off MY split pin, loosened the driveshaft castle nut and put their own pin on.

I knew this because I spilled a tin of touch up paint into my jar of split pins and they all had paint on them whereas theirs was shiney and new...

They also told me that ALL the suspension bushings were MISSING (rear leaves, lower control arms, all of them). Just to humor them, I got them to price it all up with all new bushes from their books to come up with some rediculous sum for a $100 car, then just just walked out.

[P-Body]

The flip side is that a LOT of people use places like this and never have problems. As in, millions. That doesn't mean they're not getting cheated necessarily, but just for perspective.

I've used them before, and it's not bad if you're upfront with them- tell them you just want the oil changed. No air filter check, no lubing the door hinges, no up sells. They leave you alone. And i always ask to see the used filter after the car is running.

[ATLGLI83]

Dealerships are just as bad. Took my Jetta in to the dealer for an oil change because I had coupons for free changes. A few days after the visit I noticed some oil spots on the front of my car. Figured the tech dripped a bit when filling up. I wiped it off and carried on. A few more days and there a more oil spots. Opened the hood to find the fill cap sitting over in the battery tray where the tech had left it. Oil slung all over the engine compartment. Called the dealer and raised hell. The service manager tells me "everyone makes mistakes." Yeah. I get that. But this isn't forgetting to top off the washer fluid. You left THE CAP OFF THE DAMN ENGINE. Threw my remaining coupons away...

[seadoo2006]

I am a dealer service only type person. (Flame and joke all you want.)

I have a tendency to show dealer service departments quickly that I follow the owners manual to the T and they learn pretty quickly that I do not screw around. Once they learn that they really do not try to push unnecessary services on me and just suggest them.

I learned to avoid these quick lube places like the plague. While I know dealer service is not too much better at least I know I have a bit of support from the brand should I have an issue.

Find a GOOD dealership and build a relationship with them is my motto.

Problem is, no tech is worth the $100+/hour dealers charge.

[Chmeeee]

The flip side is that a LOT of people use places like this and never have problems. As in, millions. That doesn't mean they're not getting cheated necessarily, but just for perspective.

I've used them before, and it's not bad if you're upfront with them- tell them you just want the oil changed. No air filter check, no lubing the door hinges, no up sells. They leave you alone. And i always ask to see the used filter after the car is running.

A lot of them do have a problem and just never know it. I saw a receipt from a quick change place that my roommate left lying around and it had almost $200 worth of completely unnecessary maintenance. He had no idea until I told him.

[mike02467]

Problem is, no tech is worth the $100+/hour dealers charge.

clearly you have no idea where that money goes as those mechanics aren't rollin' around in lambos...

[NoLongerLow]

I went to Jiffy Lube one time in my life, when I was daily driving a '94 Isuzu Amgio (beater status) and I had a coupon for like $15 off. They told me I needed my coolant flushed. Funny thing was I had just replaced all of the coolant b/c I had just put a new radiator in the car. The look on the tech's face when I informed of this was priceless.

[seadoo2006]

clearly you have no idea where that money goes as those mechanics aren't rollin' around in lambos...

Precisely my point ... A good independent shop in the $50-60 range has served me well.

[Chris_V]

I've gone to Jiffy lube a block from work a few times in the last decade, when I simply didn't have time to do it myself. Never had a problem and was never upsold on anything, just had oil changes. No stripped bolts, no leaks, nothing.

[.LSinLV.]

what's the proper way to do an automatic transmission flush anyway?

pull the pan, and remove the torque converter drain plug and drain it as well, as the majority of trans fluid resides in the torque converter, NOT the pan.

[gonzo08452]

back in college, I went to the dealer whenever I could. $19.95 for oil changes w/ oem filter. Jiffy Lube charged me $29.99 and some crap filter that leaked.

[turbo_nine]

back in college, I went to the dealer whenever I could. $19.95 for oil changes w/ oem filter. Jiffy Lube charged me $29.99 and some crap filter that leaked.

Loss-leader deals at the dealer have generally worked well for me too.

I have a lot of free time lately, so I have been doing changes myself and it often works out to a greater expense just because I tend to buy nicer oil and filters.