Were we ripped off?

[Worried]

My husband's 1996 Nissan Maxima with about 183K miles on her broke down on Thursday evening and good old AAA sent out a tow truck that took us to the nearest repair shop, even though we asked the driver to take the car to the garage of our choice. Yesterday, we found out that the driver was so insistent on not taking us to our regular garage because the tow truck is also owned and operated by the same shop!

Long story short: they charged us $675 to replace the starter and the ignition switch. $305 for the parts, and the rest for labor!!! Does this sound right? Is the starter and ignition switch replacement such a complex, time-consuming job? Were we ripped off?

For what it's worth, they threw in a 2 year or 24,000 miles 'warranty' on their work. We're in San Jose, CA and the shop is in Milpitas, CA.

Please advice.

Thank you in advance for your feedback.

[inafogg]

hard to say but @ 85.00 hr = 4.3 hrs. being the starter is a fairly easy to replace
that means about 3.5 hrs for ign.switch
what gets me is 305.00 for the parts!! after market prices are around 140.00
is nissan parts that much more??

[jon@af]

That personally seems a bit steep to me for the parts, but that's just me. Labor can depend on the shop.

[danielsatur]

The most important thing is your wife + car is ok.
The problem was with either the the ignition switch or starter not both!
Did you get new keys, and keep the old starter?

[Blt2Lst]

The good thing about AAA and their recommended repair shops is that if you have a dispute with the shop about the work performed, they will help you resolve the matter. I would call AAA and see what they can do for you. The tow truck should have taken the car where you wanted it to go in the first place, let AAA know this and let them deal with the shop.