Had my front pads changed yesterday by the garage apprentice, He did the job fine as it was passed off by the head mechanic. The wheels went back on and I went to pay whilst the car was being lowered off the ramp.
When I went to leave the garage, I had to give it a little boot to get over the central beam of the two poster ramp which was fine until I went to stop at the edge of the road I was backing onto accross the pavement. Now .......maybe it's just me but I didn't think it was down to the paying customer to have to pump the brake pedal after the pads had been done!!! It's a horrible feeling when you have zero brake response whilst travelling backwards onto a potentially busy road, or ANY road for that matter don't you think?

Now if I hadn't of managed to stop and pranged my beloved Cinq , would it have been MY fault? Also if I'd pooed my pants in process , could I claim back the cleaning bill??!!

Joking aside- it 'could' have been a dodgy situation but luckily it ended up with no one hurt:worship:

atvb

sg1

Common thing for people to forget as well as putting the brake reservoir cap back on. Best check that too. Yes it would have been your fault I'm afraid! Your the driver and responsible for your vehicle defect check. How many drivers check all the lights are working after washing their car?

Not your place to be getting the car off the ramp. The car should have been driven out, parked up & the keys brought to reception and handed to you.

that ""no brakes"" is yes because they didnt pump the brakes to make them mate and set the correct gap

Im with sludge guts - they should have got it off the ramp

As a customer you shouldnt be in the workshop - only the reception/carpark

Ziggy

head mechanic Should have reminded him to press brake to reseat pads, i see this once before at independant volvo garage, guy who ran it only told the boy that he should have done it after a woman came in and moaned she had just nearly crashed

Can you imagine the fun & games?
Insurance would have a field day. The garage's insurance would be wanting to know why you went in & helped yourself - by the time it gets anywhere, the company will have installed plenty of signs telling punters to keep out - and no amount of you saying they told you to get it, will wash. By now, they will all have their story straight that not one of them heard anyone tell you.
And why would they tell you to get the car as they hadn't finished the job? The fact that the ramp was down & the mech was nowhere to be seen is irrelevant.
Basic customer service - take the car off the ramp and perform a small brake test on the way out to parking the car. Keys on desk - "there you go sir, everything's in order, we've replaced, checked etc & your car is outside. I'll just write your bill"

I remember my old teacher telling me a story from when he was a apprenticeship something similar

let a car roll out of the garage to a customer his "trainer" / head mechanic had told him its ok. customer rings back half hour later as he went to stop at a set of lights and somehow went straight through them without being hit! my teacher had left the servo lid off

they offered him a free full service as a good gesutre