24/7 roadside repair rates and payment

The best Ive had was when my turbo went out. Had a service guy come out, 5miles to me, looked and said he couldnt do it roadside. He didnt charge me a dime. He gave me a number for a tow company that was very resonable. Its nice when guys help you out with an open hand instead of hitting you with service fees for doing nothing.

 

Why couldn't he do a turbo roadside? That's where I did mine! As long as you were in a safe location to leave the truck for a few hours, there was no reason he couldn't remove the intake parts & pieces (I pulled everything between the air filter and the intake manifold) and take them to his shop to flush out and degrease. Then, return to the truck with an oil drain pan, filters, oil, and the new turbo. Change the oil & filters, reinstall the intake parts & pieces, instal the new turbo, and you're on your way. It really isn't all that difficult.....IF you had the truck parked in a safe location to do the work. I wouldn't have attempted to do that if I was on the shoulder of the interstate...but just off the 2-lane highway at the north end of a town in a big gravel pull off? No problem at all.

 

Short answer: local regulations. Many jurisdictions do not allow such roadside repairs unless there is no way to tow the vehicle to a safer place like a shop or yard. Roadside activity is a magnet for distracted drivers who wind up rear ending the vechicles roadside.

 

Different engines/trucks also have different headaches too.
On my MBE in a Columbia, it a LOT easier to have an overhead crane handy when doing a turbo.
Now, my old pre EGR S60? Piece of cake.

Martin

 

I've had repair services tell me they have higher rates for certain carriers and I don't blame them . Those carriers may have stiffed them in the past or take longer to pay by Commcheck than the repair took . Carriers need to make prompt payment . There is usually another truck down waiting for the service truck that is parked waiting for payment .
I have needed tire service and been at a truckstop that had a tire shop but QC decided they'd rather call a T/A 40 miles down the road because they had a national account there . I lose over an extra hour and that truck is unavailable to others needing it .

 

Burns me up when that happens, too. Sure, you've got an account with the tire shop 40 miles away. So now, you might be getting your "discounted" price for the tire...but then you're also paying the hourly rate for the service truck (which is considerably higher than the typical shop rate) to deliver the tire to you and instal it....plus the downtime for your truck sitting there waiting on the service truck to arrive. Would have been cheaper all of the way around to just pay retail price for the same #### tire at the shop where the truck was broke down. You'd think these pencil pushers would be able to figure that out...but then again I've been on some short hauls (6 miles one way, turn all day long) and seen company trucks have to leave the job & drive 50 miles one way to an "approved" fuel stop, rather than use the one they were driving past twice on every single trip because the "approved" fuel stop gave the company a $0.05/gallon discount, where the one right there would charge 'em full price. Still, though, when you factor in the lost loads, extra fuel burned, driver's time, wear & tear on the truck, etc...they were spending far more than they were receiving with the discount. Makes absolutely no sense to me, but what do I know?

 

You forgot the money and trouble they save just billing it to an account instead of having to write a Commcheck . That's a lot of work for these desk jockies .