Literally the worst customer experience I've ever encountered
The starter on our family owned boat went bad. Rather than wasting a vacation trying to do the repair ourselves we took it to Mertaugh for an estimate. They would not give us an estimate without first doing the diagnostics themselves, so we approved 1 hour labor for the estimate, they said would be credited if/when we approved the final work. It's an older boat that we will probably be selling soon, so if estimate was too much we would skip the repair.
Weeks go by with no contact, no quote, and no returned phone calls. My dad stopped in to get an update and they told him the work was already completed - not only the starter, but a replacement solenoid, and tune-up kit. All this was done with no quote (written or otherwise) and no approval (written or otherwise). He asked how much it was and they told him the invoice hadn't been finalized yet but probably around $700. He was surprised and someone behind the counter said they could make it more. The eventually sent the invoice for $777, which was probably not too unreasonable for the work, but is about 1/2 of what the boat is worth. Knowing how much it would have been, we would not have approved the work.
We tried to talk to someone numerous times about the invoice, and again no contact, and no returned phone calls. Finally a couple days before I was going to pick up the boat I finally got in touch with Brad. After I explained we wanted to discuss the invoice charges he told me now we would need to pay *more* money to pick up the boat and hung up on my. He actually tried to extort more money from us because we questioned the charges!
I called back and he went on a rant, asking me if I knew who I was talking to, and how important he is! That their invoices are always correct, and they never negotiate. I literally couldn't believe I was speaking to someone that childish! He was forcefully asking who I was, what I did for a living, etc.
After a while he finally acknowledged that they didn't have a signed work order, and the work was never authorized. So he said he was going to undo the work. I told him the boat needs to be returned with original parts, and he said they don't have them anymore.
I'm assuming I caught him on a really bad day, because I can't believe a place would stay in business if they frequently treated customers like this. Bottom line, I picked up the boat, paid way more than we approved, never got original parts back. The biggest concern though was his mysterious "additional charges" after we questioned the invoice!
The only positive is that the actual work seems to have been done ok.
2017/11/14 - update:
Since the original review, my dad has been in contact several times with Brad, who was very apologetic for the experience, and did offer to refund 1/2 of the invoice. He's happy with this resolution. read more
