Shafted on repair charge??

My neighbor to his car (not a Chrysler product) to a shop for a coolant
leak. It was diagnosed as a bad water pump. He had it consented to the
repair and also agreed to their suggestion of also replacing the belt
while they were at it.
His bill indicated labor charges for:
2 hours to replace the pump.
1 hour to replace the belt.
Why would there be an additional charge to put a new belt on? If he had
told them to put the old belt back on, there would have been no charge
to do it, it would have been part of the waterpump replacement charge.

 

Since we have no idea what kind of vehicle it is how can we answer that
question???
There are some vehicles out there that the timing belt drives the water
pump and the pump is easily removed, But the belt may require that you have
to pull the harmonic balancer/pulley.
If that is the case the radiator may have to be removed to access it ,
possibly the condenser and so on!!!

Glenn Beasley
Chrysler Tech

 

But if they are going off book, then the hours for the water pump should
include the time it takes to pull and replace the belt. Also note they
said to "replace the belt WHILE they were at it"

I would tell your neighbor to start by assuming it is a simple mistake in
the bill, and take the bill back to the garage and explain this and see
what they do. If they tell him that they just broke out the time for the
belt replacement, and show him a book time of 3 hours for a water
pump replacement, then so be it. But it's quite possible that some
front office girl who doesen't know a water pump from a washing
machine setup the bill, and assumed that they were two separate
jobs.

Ted

 

I replaced a water pump on a 3.5 intrepid this week, the owner had the belt
replaced last year, the pump was just seeping (after market) I charged the
guy 2 hrs to remove and install the pump, the dealer gets 4hrs to do the
pump and belt. I guess I was just thinking that I could have confused the
guy the same way this OP was

But your right about the part where he agreed to do the belt, and yes, they
should have just told the guy 3 hrs to do the job make it easier to
understand