Accident At A Car Wash

[Az]

Today being Sunday, I took my car for a car wash to my regular cash wash place adjacent to the Dehiwela Odion cinema on Galle road. As I was exiting the place, an inexperienced employee directly reversed another car into my car. The owner of the other car had left the car there. When I asked the person in charge/manager for the phone number of the owner of the place, he got really rude, and almost came for a fist fight with me. As can be expected, I was pretty pissed off since I look after my car like a baby. I've been a regular customer with them for more than 3 years. Unfortunately, this is the situation in most places in Sri Lanka. However, I managed to find the phone number of the owner and he spoke very nicely, and apologized. But basically that was it. Perhaps, the manager and owner were playing good cop bad cop on me, and they got away with it. Anyway, they just lost a loyal customer.

I think we should never leave our vehicles unattended at these car washes, and should never trust these employees with our precious vehicles.

Has anybody else on this forum gone through similar experiences? This was a first time experience for me.

Edited March 13, 2011 by Az

[Ripper]

Today being Sunday, I took my car for a car wash to my regular cash wash place adjacent to the Dehiwela Odion cinema on Galle road. As I was exiting the place, an inexperienced employee directly reversed another car into my car. The owner of the other car had left the car there. When I asked the person in charge/manager for the phone number of the owner of the place, he got really rude, and almost came for a fist fight with me. As can be expected, I was pretty pissed off since I look after my car like a baby. I've been a regular customer with them for more than 3 years. Unfortunately, this is the situation in most places in Sri Lanka. However, I managed to find the phone number of the owner and he spoke very nicely, and apologized. But basically that was it. They just lost a loyal customer.

I think we should never leave our vehicles unattended at these car washes, and should never trust these employees with our precious vehicles.

Has anybody else on this forum gone through similar experiences? This was a first time experience for me.

the only place i've left the vehicle and gone is pitstop...not had an issue so far...

when i take it to a small timer joint i always wait there untill it's done...

waiting all those hours is the only bitch but you get a better job done imho...

[charitha19]

dont think u should leave ur car and go at any car wash place in sri lanka.. u dont know where they point that pressure hose at..or what they will do to ur interior.. if u cant wait dont go.. do it at home. thats should be the policy in SL...

[Pericles]

If this is the place I think it is, my dad is a regular customer too. Even I've been there once. I stayed while they washed.

[Ek3 Ferio]

You must never leave your car at any service joint, as this is Sri Lanka. No one cares about your car unless you do. I went to a service joint near Pelawatta, to get under carriage wash and body wash, a man came and ask what I needed to get done, So I explained what I need and especially mentioned that I dont need the engine bay wash and interior vacuum and carpet clean. Then they took the car to body wash. And another guy came and open the engine and trying to spray the high pressure water into the engine, then I instantly shouted and explained again as I don't need the engine wash. I saw that they open the doors and apply high pressure water into door's edges, I don't understand why they do it as it is completely useless and it may get wet the interior too. So before doing it to my car I said no need to wash the door edges.

After the body wash they I took the car from the washing bay and parked in another place to wipe out the water. While one person doing it, another man cam with a vacuum cleaner to vacuum the interior. Then again I had to stop him saying that I don't need it. Then he went back while another man came and tried to get the carpets out to wash them, I had to stop him too. I mentioned previously at the time of arriving the place that all of them are DON'Ts. But they don't keep records.

Then after wiping out the water they took it for the under carriage wash. They tried to remove tires, I stopped them as I don't need. Then after the under carriage wash, they again spray water to whole body and get the vehicle to the wiping out area.

Then same thing happened again as I mentioned earlier. One man came to vacuum interior. Another man instructed to remove carpets to the same man earlier I explained that I don't need it. But funny thing is that idiot again tried to remove them. May be that idiot has short term memory lost

So guess what will happen to my car if I don't stay until them finish washing it. Funny ah

The only place I kept the car and left was the Kandy CRC. They did a remarkable job. I get done a complete interior clean. they asked me to keep the car for 1 night as it will take time to dry the interior. But the whether was not good at the time so they asked me another night. once I received the car they have done a remarkable job there. I'm really satisfied with them and they are really care of the customer. I contacted a guy called Mr. Shantha, such a nice person to work with. explained everything they are doing to the car with detailed. And all of them have done. I mentioned some DON'Ts at the cleaning, they have done accordingly as I mentioned.

Thanks should go to Evergreen for directing me there.

[jdnet]

Maybe you should get a pressure washer. It's relatively cheap and will start saving you a significant amount on getting the car washed and at the time a mistake is made, you only have yourself to blame, and it's a lot easier arguing with yourself. lol.

[kelum_wj]

Bro, Afterall it's your hard earned money. Nobody else would care for it as you do. So never leave your car at any service joint

[devindarocks]

That place u'v mentioned is a useless, ones i gave my car a full cleanup (interior, exterior, cut & polish) from them, i handed over the car in the morning and took it around 7.30 pm, since it was dark i could not examine the work the have done, but the guys there said they have cleaned everything. next day morning i saw that they have not even clean the fabric carpats. cut & polish also not done properly, but they charged the full amount. so again i had to rush to them with the car and had to pin point them what they have missed. then they said today we have more bookd vehicles, so some on next week. what a shi*.

since i already paid and even have to get the car cleaned i came back next week. and that day i put a leave coz i really wa not sure what they are doing.

so i do not want any of u guys to visit this place and face the same kind of experience.

[harshansenadhir]

Similar thing happened to me soon after i've re painted the 406. Went to a tire joint to get a small job done. A trishaw guy reversed to the front bumper and scratched it off. Not even a week after the paint job and needless to say i was pissed off. I've put the blame equally to the trishaw guy and the shop owner because no one attended when he was reversing. I firmly said my car was fine when i brought to your place and see how it is now.

Took the documents of trishaw fella to my hand and brought down my paint guy. He said it won't even cost me 1000 bucks. Owner said he'll bare half of it and trishaw fella was saying it's hard for him to find that.

Then I refused saying i'll get it done coz i felt bad to get that from the trishaw fella and this gentlemen. Further i appreciated his attitude simply it wasn't typical sl business men attitude.

Moral of the story, always don't show that you'll not settle or claim from your own insurance easily. Show them that you'll take every possible action to recover the dange, show the gravity of the issue and further show that they won't be able to escape from their responsibilities that easily.

[rangerover]

So far i have had no bad experiences at my regular sports. KP odel and crescat. I always try to hang around. But now after hearing these i shall religously hover around my car

[vidu]

I never move when my car is in someones place specially situations like above mentioned.Most of service centers has untrained and unexperienced crew.

[VVTi]

Since of late I stopped getting my car washed at any of these places. You have to understand that most of these places are staffed by low IQ monkeys Whose only experience with cars is either watching them go by or getting run over by them. two incident back to back convinced me to invest in all the goodies and get used to the DIY for car washing and grooming.

The 'famous' place in Obeysekarapura does the final grooming of the car downwind from the hoists, as you can imagine all the oil, kerosene and God knows what else that they spray gets blown on to the cars being wiped and vacuumed. The staff and the foreman was oblivious to this fact. That was the only time I took it there as it took me 2 days to wash off the oily residue.

Next time was when I took the BMW for a wash at another popular place, they took ages to do it and finally some lazy bugger comes to wipe the car, uses his finger wrapped in the rag to wipe between the front kidney grills and break 3 of the grilles. Worse part was he was trying to cover it up. 2 pf the pieces fell in to the fan housing and it took more than an hour to pull them off before starting the car.

Owner was however, was very apologetic and offered even to buy a grille for me. I said no thank you and decided that Car Washes in SL are staffed by Monkeys and went and bough all that I need to do a good job at home.

For those who still prefer to let a monkey wash the car, follow these rules.

1. Do not leave the car at their mercy.

2. Do the moving around of the car yourself.

3. No matter what, do not let them near the engine bay.

[rangerover]

How necessary is it to get the undercarriage pressure washed? getting the wheel wells cleaned is a different thing, but the undercarriage could have sensitive sensors and parts that can get affected due to high pressure washing.

[VVTi]

Actually not very important. Normal driving conditions will not get any dirt or muck in the undercarriage. However if you have waded through water, driven on salty, sandy areas, mud, etc, you should get it washed. For obvious reasons.

[RWD]

more than anything else the actual 'washing' of cars at these places leaves much to be desired. its a well known fact that you shouldn't wash your car if the body is hot, but a lot of these places don't have shaded parking and after a long wait, you end up washing a hot car, which means you get streaking. secondly a lot of them use sub standard car wash products, and horrible rags to wash and wipe the cars instead of wash mitts and chamois. the idiots at the car wash just try to get the job done as quickly as possible with minimum attention to detail and rub the cars too vigorously. the result: you get scratches and swirl marks. the car ends up looking in worse shape than what it was before! my take on this is invest in a quality pressure washer,car wash liquids, wash mitts, chamois, microfibre and do it at home. good for your health and your wallet!

[Az]

Thanks for all the replies guys. I have made up my mind not to go to these car wash places again. Ironically, my car met with the accident not because I left my car behind, but because the owner of the other car left it behind, and a young car wash chap who didn't know to drive reversed it directly into my car. The other car also had some significant damage to the buffer and a broken reflector. I never met the owner of the other car and simply drove off after the guy who was in charge almost tried to punch me. Sadly, we pay money for a sub-standard job, get our vehicles ruined, and also have to get abused

[jdnet]

more than anything else the actual 'washing' of cars at these places leaves much to be desired. its a well known fact that you shouldn't wash your car if the body is hot, but a lot of these places don't have shaded parking and after a long wait, you end up washing a hot car, which means you get streaking. secondly a lot of them use sub standard car wash products, and horrible rags to wash and wipe the cars instead of wash mitts and chamois. the idiots at the car wash just try to get the job done as quickly as possible with minimum attention to detail and rub the cars too vigorously. the result: you get scratches and swirl marks. the car ends up looking in worse shape than what it was before! my take on this is invest in a quality pressure washer,car wash liquids, wash mitts, chamois, microfibre and do it at home. good for your health and your wallet!

I think complaining about the fact that they don't use quality products, mitts and chamois is a little absurd considering the fact that they charge you like 300-400 rupees a wash. Do These car washes aren't non-profit organizations so at the end of the day they do need to make a profit to keep the business running. Using good products, microfiber towels together with the cost of labour, water, power will most certainly leave a big loss. Now if you were willing to pay more than 1000 for a regular body wash then that would not be the case.

[RWD]

I think complaining about the fact that they don't use quality products, mitts and chamois is a little absurd considering the fact that they charge you like 300-400 rupees a wash. Do These car washes aren't non-profit organizations so at the end of the day they do need to make a profit to keep the business running. Using good products, microfiber towels together with the cost of labour, water, power will most certainly leave a big loss. Now if you were willing to pay more than 1000 for a regular body wash then that would not be the case.

well, i'd much rather pay 1000 for them to do a good job than pay 400 bucks and have to give my car paint treatment to cure the mess they've made. if i'm not mistaken, even a premium place like pi*stop costs around 1000 and as good as they are, i doubt they'd use the kind of quality products i'm referring to or have that kind of attention to detail. by all means make a profit, but low cost does is no excuse for shoddy work.

[jdnet]

Actually, low cost is always an excuse for shoddy work. I don't see to many people who would go out and spend 1000 a week on a car wash. Those who can afford it are more likely to head to a better place. And yes even premium places use cheaper products. That too is due to the cost of these products. If you want to get a car wash done with armorall or what not, then the best solutions is to do it at home, but expecting a car wash to spend 800 something on just two liters of soap is expecting a little too much.

[NPP]

Hi Az -

I think this is the place that I go to as well. Since of late, i have been washing in long intervals because of time and today it was time bt after this im thinking twice.

But I never leave the car and go elsewhere. I also do all the moving inside the place. The main reason I go here is that they're open for a long time 7am-10pm i think so I can go early morn or late night. Late night its tough to check the work but it has been the trust so far.

I'm considering to shift to another place now. I anyway was thinking about it.

@ EK - I think they repeated the wash process for you

[mcpguy]

Yes, I was wondering the the amount they charge and the service they providing. Profit margin should be more than 100 % . Not only these Service Centers, even other car spare part shops as well doing the same. Just do a search for a parking sensor on ebay and compare the price with what they sell here

[rangerover]

Yes, I was wondering the the amount they charge and the service they providing. Profit margin should be more than 100 % . Not only these Service Centers, even other car spare part shops as well doing the same. Just do a search for a parking sensor on ebay and compare the price with what they sell here

So why not buy it off ebay?

[jdnet]

Yes, I was wondering the the amount they charge and the service they providing. Profit margin should be more than 100 % . Not only these Service Centers, even other car spare part shops as well doing the same. Just do a search for a parking sensor on ebay and compare the price with what they sell here

Yeah it's ridiculous how much they charge considering the fact that they don't have to pay shipping, taxes and leave a profit for the importer and the reseller too. Oh wait.....

Edited March 15, 2011 by jdnet

[rockerz]

DAMN! you should have beaten the crap out of the person in charge/manager!!

[Pericles]

DAMN! you should have beaten the crap out of the person in charge/manager!!

So your solution is to have a damaged car AND spend time in jail for assault?