We lock up at 5:30pm, at 5pm we get a call, nick answers:
custy - If i bought some speakers from you yesterday can I bring em back? Nick - Is anything wrong? custy - I just wanna bring em back and get my $ Nick - Hold please.
Nick tells me what going on, I'm thinking they just just didn't want the speakers or they are the wrong size. I'm in a good mood, so I say sure, if they have not been removed from the box and mounted or harmed.
Nick (picks of the phone)... no one there, they hung up.
5mins later a ~18yr old girl walks in, phone to here ear, talking to he dad and tries to hand me the phone. OHHHHH NO...no cell for me. I ask here the problem, she says they don't sound right. Its the girl from yesterday that I quoted $250 to remove and fix everything her friend did, sub/amp install in her charger w/ new amp kit and subs.
She is in a Charger, no fuse holder, fake 4ga power wire ran to the FRONT of the the vehicle under the hood, and every connection is bare, sony 500w 2ohm mono amp.
She goes out to the car and gets the subs. '07-'08 model Autotek SS12d2, sold them to her yesterday off the close-out rack. $50 each. I can smell VC thru the cardboard box.
Me - so what is wrong again? Girl - they don't sound right. Me - did you get the install fixed like i told you it needed to be? Her - my friend fixed it and they wuz smokin. Me - so you did take the subs out of the box and mount them? Her - Yea, they wuz smokin. Me (push in on cone, locked up) - yea, your friend has no idea what they are doing, they fried the subs, can't warranty that, especially since the install was so horrible. Her - but... Me - If you run your car off in the river, will the dealer warranty that? Her - but...ah...
RING, shop phone, its her dad.
Me - The subs where installed wrong and abused, can't warranty that. Dad - We didn't even put em in, just want to get our money back. Me - So you didn't play them? Dad - No.
Girl (over hearing me talking to dad on phone) - they played for a little bit, but they started smokin Me - so you did install them, she said they smoked Dad - no, i just want $ back, she didn't play them Girl - OH, I didn't mean the speaker smoked, it was something inside the box!
PHONE STILL TO MY EAR Me - were the speakers put into the speaker box ? Girl - yes Dad - no Girl - he didn't even get em up loud Me - well its obvious they where abused, no warranty on that. Girl - they only played for a little bit though. Dad - We didn't play them. They were dead. Girl - my friend hooked his up. Dad - Can't you just send them back to the company and get your $ back? Me - No, we are not walmart.
That's the reason why there are no reputable shops in my area, they get screwed by customers.
The only guys left are such pieces of human waste I've really been discussing opening an audio/tint/custom shop with my brother. I just drove an hour and a half today to pick up 1/0 ring terminals at the closest shop, and they tried charging me 20% more than quoted.
I took a quick look around, they had 1 amp kit, 3 amps, and a half dozen subs in stock. I couldn't even pick up an ANL fuse if I wanted to.
Then when you get a good shop and the idiots pour in, ghetto rigging things then wondering why you don't want to work after they screw things up royally. Or they buy an amp and ground it to a bolt on the trunk lid and wonder why things aren't working right. You either get them trying to return the product because it doesn't do what they want, or waste your time explaining how to wire things properly instead of making money off the install or doing worth while work.
Haha, we get the people that want to pay for $50 installs, then when the wire catches fire or the subs fry, they go back to the same shop and get charged for new product which fails again. Then they come to us wondering what is wrong after paying more than we quoted them for a shiesty install.
We lose customers because we are "too expensive," yet they usually end up at our door asking us to fix the install done by the shop down the road....
hell i am a noob and i can still wire up every the right way. only power problem i ever had was my alt in my old car died (was from 96). and only killed 2 subs cuz frys decided they wanted to tune my head unit after they swapped it out for the old one that died. (warranty bull sh1t). i have wired up 3 other cars than mine and there all still bumping 2 this day. even the one with the sh1t fusion subs i got for 20$. it makes me wonder just how stupid some people are.
We lose customers because we are "too expensive," yet they usually end up at our door asking us to fix the install done by the shop down the road....
I get alot of that too, but mainly from the guys that say "my friend will hook it up". I usually repair more installs than anything.
I had a good one today though. Totally untouched 2002 Suburan (i love an untouched vehicle). Pioneer AVHP4100, backup cam, 2 pr Arc KS 6026 6.5's, 2 CVR 12, RF 800a2. Had to cut, mold, sand, and paint the dash for the DDin...also butcher up a metra 99-3002 it for mounts and hollow out the subdash. The DDin turned out nice and clean. The whole install took me awhile because I kept having to walk back up front and deal w/ the occasional customer.
I caught a snag at ~3pm...bypass on the DDin. Wired up the relay and the amp quite turning on. Checked the REM wire, only getting 1v. Fought of for like 45mins, took the relay out of the loop and all was good. Tried other relays, same thing. Ended up using an Xscorpion brand relay and it worked. I just couldn't figure WTF was going on w/ the Omega brand ones I was using. NickV got out there and mounted up a pair of the Arc 6.5s to help me finish and we got it running.
Come to find out, they are diod isolated across 85 and 86, built for starter interrupt i guess.. Found that out at about 6:15 when I tested one on the bench up front....the 1amp diod exploded...thats how i found it...lol
yeah we consistently fix "friend's" installs. it's either the "well my subs will play and then all of a sudden they cut off and then a lil later they start playing again. I can't find out what's wrong." or "I keep blowing fuses, so I put a bigger one in there, why did my fuse holder melt?"
The best one we had was the guy that had to turn his lights on and off to get his amp to turn on and start playing the subs. Then for some reason the amp would cut off again. He was also the guy that didn't wanna pay for the $100 GMOS. Come to find out he snipped the wires down to the nub at the factory harness, then asks us if we can fix it.
.. unfortunately