A & L LAWN EQUIPMENT

Overall my experience with this shop was disappointing and I am now $30 poorer and without a generator. When I dropped the generator off with the clerk one week ago he told me that it would be a $30 deposit which would be credited toward the final bill. I told him that the only work that I wanted to have done was to clean the carburetor and nothing more. I even told him that I did not care if the engine would start or not all that I wanted to have was the carburetor cleaned. The clerk began to give me his tap dance about looking at the piston rings and spark plugs when I stopped him and told him again that the only work that I was asking him to do was to clean the carburetor and nothing else. (especially since I already know that everything else was in perfect working order) The man at the counter told me that he charges $45/hour and that the work that I was asking to have performed would cost no more than $60. I agreed to this and paid the man $30 cash. One week later I had not yet heard back from the shop so I contacted them today to find out if the work had been completed. The man first could not find my generator and it took him almost 20 minutes before he was able to speak with me again about it. When he did finally spoke to me he told me that it was ready and that it would cost me $140 for the repair. I asked him what he was proposing to do to the generator and he gave me the same well rehearsed song and dance about piston rings,etc. that he did before when I interjected by asking him if he recalled our conversation about the work that SHOULD HAVE BEEN PERFORMED when I had left the unit with him one week ago. The man then had amnesia and told me that he forgot about that and is now renegotiating the price and scope of work beyond what had been agreed to by both parties. I told him that was unacceptable and that I did not want his shop to do the work since this isn't what we had previously discussed. Later, the man from A&L left a voice mail on my phone and said that he would come down on his "quote" to $81 and change. In this voice mail the man did not offer any explanation about what work was to be done for that amount, why he decided to reduce his quote, and certainly did not apologize for any confusion and misunderstanding that he may have been responsible for. In summary, A&L Lawn Equipment broke their agreement with me and I am left with only these dismal options: 1) I can pay the renegotiated price they are asking and hope that they have performed the work. (Keeping firmly in mind that the shop has not told me what services if any that I am now to receive for that revised quote.) OR 2) Lose the generator and my $30 cash deposit. I feel that perhaps I have been victimized as their customer in either scenario. The only good thing that I can say about my experience is that my financial loss is relatively small and perhaps it was worth getting burned for that amount before I made the mistake of bringing in something larger and more expensive. In fact, that is the very reason I first brought this small repair job in to them to first see if they can follow directions and secondly to see if I would be treated fairly and honestly. Why would I trust anyone with equipment worth thousands of dollars when they can't even follow simple directions even after I had told them that it did not matter if the thing ran or not after they were done with what I had specifically asked them to do? I'm sure that they have their own version of this and it includes that bit about piston rings and such but the fact is that if they want to do big league business they will need to start listening to their customers and commit to what they have agreed to do for them.