tipthebalance's Qype profile

Work near this garage and have always thought they were okay.

However they changed an exhaust for me a month ago and the new exhaust makes my car sound like a tractor.  So loud that people stare at me at traffic lights.  No new exhaust should be noisy!

The owner refused to change it and said it 'blows fumes out' so it does what it should.  He acknowledged that he had put a cheap exhaust on, and had also made a comment about my car needing to be scrapped (it's a tidy R reg.. no rust, silent engine, perfect drive), and clearly decided to treat my car as such.
He told me the noise was because my car's emissions were out.  I may be female, but I know when someone's talking a load of rubbish.

Having had other garages look at it, they have said that the new tailpipe is shorter than the one he removed and should be either longer, or angled downwards.  Again, the owner of City Tyres keeps saying that 'it blows air out' and that he will not replace it as it isn't faulty.  When I pointed out that the exhaust should be longer, he told me that I 'should have gone to Toyota'.

I'm currently going down the Trading Standards route with this guy.  He is patronising, sexist and obnoxious.  Don't go there.

I will update as things unfold.

**  Have increased the ratings slightly.  Hmmm.
I went back armed with DOT guidelines and a load of legislation provided for me by Trading Standards regarding the sale of goods or services.
All of a sudden the owner stopped being quite so condescending and argumentative, and started staring intently at the order catalogue and then said that the supplier had given them the exhaust for a hatchback instead of a saloon.  So, too short, then.  As I had been saying all along.
They added an extention to the tailpipe.. and at this point the owner disappeared and I was left dealing with one of the mechanics, who was a whole lot more pleasant.

It cost me a whole load of stress, several phonecalls to Trading Standards, a visit to another garage, and a very unpleasant shouting match over the phone with the owner, who insisted he was refusing to change anything.
Note of warning - he seems to think that shouting loudly and repeating the same phrase over and over, makes him right.  Going back there was pretty hard, given I will usually do anything to avoid confrontation.

If he had listened to me at the start, admitted he'd fitted the wrong exhaust and treated me with a little common courtesy, I would be giving them 5 stars.
I work approximately 30 feet from this garage and it's very convenient... but I will never, ever go there again.  A shame, cos the rest of the lads are pretty nice guys.

Beer excellent, nice friendly barman; not obviously hostile to gay couples. £1.95 for a pint of Tribute (wuuuuw!), 3 real ales to choose from. The lighting could be dimmed a little, but the music was unobtrusive. Nice buzz and a good atmosphere. Comfy seating and fairly quiet. Can't understand why more people aren't in here.....but we're glad they're not!

Expensive and pretentious, city prices for a pint. We paid £3.05 for a pint of Black Sheep. Good selection of ales. The kind of place everyone dresses up to come to. Felt a bit out of place in jeans and a t-shirt.

I went yesterday - and was totally disappointed.

The truth of the matter is, if you go to a chocolate factory, what you want is to see chocolate on conveyor belts, vats of choc being mixed.. and loads of freebies. Right??!
The reality is that you are forced to watch endless, very boring films about the history of Bournville, Cadbury, chocolate, cocoa beans, the making of chocolate, blah-blah…and you only get FOUR bars of chocolate. For £13:45. I don’t class those as freebies.
Cheaper to watch a load of films on YouTube and hang around the chocolate aisle of Asda.

The shops are extortionate (£3:95 for a PEN) and you only see a glimpse of boxes on conveyor belts and a few wrapped bars being packed into yet more boxes.

The reviews telling you about being able to eat samples on the way round are WAY out of date. Ignore them… and don’t go. Way too boring for kids (we had a 2-yr old with us, who wouldn’t sit still for those b&w films) and way too shallow for adults.