I am doing what you all would call a frame on restoration on my 71 442 "tribute car" convertible. I live in north louisiana, I took the car to a paint in my area to get a quote on the job. First of all as best of description as I can give on the car. No metal work all the metal work was done prior to him starting on the job. No metal replacement, no removal of any glass was done or needed. The car was a supreme and I want to remove the little studs along the bottom of the car where the stainless steel panal where so he had to weld those tiny holes up all around the car. The truck lid needed some metal work where water ran into the holes where the oldsmobile letters went. Swapping the factory hood for a all fiberblass w-25 hood with the lock louvers. For the most part that was all the extra repair he has done to the car in addition to the normal straighting of the body so it will not have waves. After he looked the car over and I gave him a idea of the quality of the body work and fininsh I expected, by the way the body work and finish grade I expected would be about a 9 out 10, he gave me a price of $4500 that was on 2-6-2012 it is now late August, I gave a $2000 deposit and left with a receipt with a clear description of the job and agreement and now he want an additional $1000 HEEEEEEELLLLLPPPPPPPP Sorry about if I am confussing you all I am extremely pissed

 

I understand you are upset, but please do not use that language, especially in your subject line.

 

Back again ehhh? $4500 of body work aint squat and 6 months in body shop prison is only soft time #9 quality will cost a heap more than 45 hundo. Get what you pay for. Niiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiice choice of words on the subject subject line, by the way.

 

Sorry your in the situation your in. If you have a copy of the agreement then you should have legal authority to not pay the additional costs. You might have to go to small claims court though, and you'll have to decide if the time, trouble and stress are worth the $1,000 that he's trying to gouge you for. You might also try to compromise with him and reduce the amount of extra dollars he wants. There's no easy way to get through this, you'll just have to decide what's best for you. Sadly, this isn't the first time I've heard of this happening. There's at least a couple other members here who've had a restoration shop take them to the cleaners. Life's not fair, we just have to decide how to respond when things go bad.


John

 

How much of the work has he done to date?? Is he looking for an additional $1k, or $1k towards the remaining bill?

 

My brother got his truck painted by someone other than me a few years ago because I was busy at the time. The guy got his truck in July and it wasn't finished until November. The truck was in great shape. The only thing he replaced was the back body......so really, the guy only had to paint the back box. But sometimes the colors don't match due to fading over time, but still, 4 1/2 months is a long time to change a box and scuff and paint.

What's worse is, the guy asked for an additional $1000 (he wanted $2000 to begin with) and when he got there, he set the money down in the office and went to the shop to see the truck. When he came back to the office, the guy said "you're $100 short of the full price". Now.......you'd have to know my brother. He's one of those guys who is meticulous in everything. He told me he counted the money 3 times to make sure it was all there. All the money was in 20 dollar bills, so he knew it is possible to lose a bill, but 5 of them? He figures the guy, or one of his buddies slipped $100 out of the envelope while he was looking at the truck. That was his second mistake. The first was taking it to that crook in the first place.

 

To answer some of you guys questions, he has most of the 90% of the body work done the car is ready for a final coat of primer and then paint and clear. But he asking for an additional $1000 for a grand total of $5500 for the entire job. He gave me a receipt that clearly states TOTAL BODY REPAIR AND PAINT". TOTAL $4500 i GAVE HIM $2000 DEPOIST ON 2/6/2012

 

sounds fair to me . I just helped my buddy do a race car for another olds racer and it cost 6k. but it was damn near show car quality.

 

The $1,000 may be difficult for you to come by right now which would make this especially hard. But I've known people to loose from several thousand to ten's of thousands of dollars at dishonest shops. It's like being in a car accident that's not your fault. There's no painless answer, you have to decide if you want to fight it or cut your losses and get on with life. Or something in between.

The worst situation I know of was a guy with a 1969 442 convertible that needed restored. He found a guy who said he could make it a really nice car for about $35,000. Well... they kept coming up with cool ideas on how to customize the car, do this or add that. Each time added more costs. There were times the owner was mad enough to spit nails, but he decided to give a little more money and a little more time. He was into it so deep he didn't want to pull out. It took 5 or 6 years and even now there's little things that I don't think were done right. But as of last month I can now say that I've ridden in a $125,000 442 convertible!

Take some time to cool off and think through your options. Then decide what would be the best thing in your situation and go with it. Just don't go postal and shoot the guy, even if that's what you feel like doing!!!



John

 

what is the extra 1k for ?

did he need to do additional work ?

was his intial estimate off

did he spend it on materials ?

if for instance he replaced the trunklid instead of working it that may add some expense

I would try to find out where the extra 1 k bill came from. of course your in a tough posiiton now, car is not done he wants more money you say no car never gets done or gets done real quick. you say yes to extra cash car takes longer and suddenly more money is required

Some may suggest 4500 isnt enough money I dont agree.. you and the body man both agreed 4500 was enough money, there may be reasons why he needs 1k more if there is legitimate reasoning Im Ok w that if its simply its taking me more time than i thought .....I may be open to some negeotiation...after the car is complete

 

Caps on for a reason: CONTRACT, CONTRACT, CONTRACT.....

If you do any capital project at your home or on your car, draw up a contract.

 

I never do any bussiness with any shop unless it's a non estimate agreement thats written out this way of work performed and I always pay in full at the beginning. If they don't want to do this type of agreement I just go elsewhere. No fuss or hate, it's just how I do bussiness. If the shop wants my business they can get a qualified estimator to make sure he estimates the job accuratly and fair and not gouge and to account for material cost to rise if the job will take a considerable amount of time.

See, my logic is most repair shops don't give money back if they charge you 4k on an estimate and it only ran them 2k. So why should a customer pay more when the shop underbids the job. I could see a couple hundred difference due to rising costs over a 6 month period but 1k shortage? Thats some serious estimation short commings. So this is why I ask for this from a shop and if they refuse to write out an agreement as such I go else where. It's just the way I personally like to conduct business. It's not everyones cup of tee to do it this way but I don't like estimates because there too vague and they leave to much room to error in the shops favor.

Hopefully this all works out for you. I don't know the condition of your car before and I don't know the shops work or costs. All I know is most shops have policys in place to call and get the ok on any additional work over a certain amount. 1k is quite a bit over and I would be curious why an estimator was so short or wrong in his estimation originally. Good estimator should be in the business for a while and know problem spots on cars or typical underlying issues and should account for this. If the additional cost is labor because it took there workers longer to do something then that is their fault for having workers not capable of performing the job in the time the estimator thinks it should take. From my understanding most body shops add on 10 to 15% right off the bat to account for short commings like this.

In the end like stated above, unless your agreement said no additional work, or no additional work authorized or "Not an Estimate" then I would just pay the 1k and if you feel you were taken advantage of the courts are always at your disposal. If you have a good case you might win, but somethings are hard to prove. Good luck in getting this settled.

 

I have heard dozens of stories like yours! After 28 years in the business if I have learned anything it's REPUTATION that matters, 2000 down should've covered the materials with a smidge left over! I'd say he under quoted the labor hours, 100 hours If the car was straight before hand incuding a few dents here and there, even at 30 bucks an hour he was WAY short on his estimate! Dry time or cure time is necessary for a great long lasting finish. Unfortunately, you're in the rock and a hard place,sounds like if you don't fork the 1000 (without a ceiling) this will go on forever!

 

Sorry to hear about the situation you're in but you have to realize that these cars weren't straight (waveless) from the factory. So it takes a lot of work to get a 9 or 10. Hours of sanding an easy 80 hours at $44 the going labor rate in Indy. Nor did they have the quality of paint that will be applied so it will show any imperfection. Your talking a 42 year old car. Besides all of that insurance work pays so much more for a lot less work that is whats taking him so long. Here in Indy paint jobs of that quality start at $3500 that's prep and paint. If the quality is up to par it's well worth it. Even though an extra $1000 is a lot of money.