Shop Owner Caught Driving Customer's Jaguar Home
Darryl Taylor received a traffic ticket in the mail for running a toll booth in his 2000 Jaguar S-series. The only problem was, the Jaguar was at a repair shop on the day of the violation.
The shop owner, Dale Ferris, says that he was basically storing the car for free until Taylor could pay for the repairs, and it "needed a good run" to make sure the spark plugs were clean.
"I was doing him a favor," Ferris says on the news clip in a jeez-you-guys-need-to-chill-out voice.
But Taylor told WSBTV, "I don't think any other dealership would have driven my car home."
"Car Supposed To Be In Repair Shop; Owner Gets Toll Ticket" [WSBTV.com] (Thanks to Mark!)
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Comments:
Seems to me this is pretty common practice. That's how a Ferrari 305 ended up at my friend's house one day...
@TheFuzz53: Except his "dirt bag mechanic" agreed to pay the toll. And hasn't been charging the owner of the car for leaving it at the shop for many days after it was finished. It's true that the owner of the shop should not have been driving the car except in the course of troubleshooting and testing, but it's also true that the owner of the car left it sitting at the shop for a long while instead of paying what he owed for the repairs.
Yeah this is a really common practice. I know my father's 1969 Camaro has been driven to the shop owner's home many a time. Granted I do believe he was made aware of this. I think, had it been a speeding ticket or reckless driving ticket there would be more of a problem here but watching the video he makes a good point. If it's been sitting for weeks then it should be driven.
@TheFuzz53: If he wasn't the one who committed the crime (running the toll), then he doesn't pay the fine. He just sends it back and tells them who was driving the car.
I get the taking the Jag home part, but how stupid do you have to be to run a toll booth while in it?
Good run to make sure the spark plugs were clean??? Doesn't make a lick of sense to me and I know cars! Even if he had to do that all he had to do was fire up the engine and leave it parked for for awhile.
Makes me glad I'm married to my mechanic :)
Yeah I'm pretty sure this is a normal thing to do. My understanding is that mechanics often drive cars home to be sure that the problem is fixed. In this case it happened several weeks after the car was fixed, but it's not ideal to let a car just sit for weeks at a time.
@tmed: What I could see happening is that the owner had a transponder that pays for the tolls automatically, however, possibly, there was no money in the account, so when he went through the toll and rang up no sale, he got the ticket sent to him.
Yup. He didn't commit a crime, yet pays a fine...unless you can prove who is driving a vehicle, you shouldn't be able to issue them citations.
@Megan Squier: The original article mentions the battery too, which would make sense if the car had been sitting there for a while.
@GrandizerGo:
Or the mechanic is used to driving his own car, which pays tolls automatically, and he forgot that he was driving a car that doesn't have a transponder in it.
@TCama: Yeah, where does THAT work? Here in Davenport, Iowa, they don't care who was driving and now, if you don't pay the ticket, they report it to the credit agencies and send the collectors after you.
I think people are missing the point. If he was testing the car. Why did he have to drive it through a toll booth? Just simply drive it around the block a few times. And there you go.
This happens all the time. Bruce Springsteen did it once. And some dudes running a parking garage in Ferris Bueller. Nothing to see here.
My issue:
Security at a mechanic's shop is often more secure than at a mechanic's home.
If my car is parked at a garage, it may be inside, it may be among a dozen other cars in a lot monitored by security cameras.
Drive the car around if it needs it, but to leave it infront of your house w/ far less security than the auto shop.
@AlteredBeast: *Drive the car around if it needs it, but -don't- leave it infront of your house w/ far less security than the auto shop.
Well... at least the mechanic paid the toll fine....
So in normal situations,
DON'T BREAK THE LAW.
Not counting the jaguar incident, you should know who is driving your car!
@Megan Squier: The battery is a semi-valid point (a battery tender would be a better way for a professional technician to top off a customer's battery, however.) The spark-plug thing is in fact bullshit, if a modern electronic-fuel-injected car is fouling the plugs the mechanic hasn't fixed it yet. In GENERAL (mostly true for older cars) leaving it sitting around at idle is MORE likely to foul the plugs than driving it if there's any chance of fouling them at all.
Well, I don't exactly condone the shop owner driving it to his house. But then again, I don't condone the car owner just leaving his car there because he can't pay for repairs.
At least it didn't end up like a case around here, where the shop owner allegedly crushed the guy's cars to pay for repairs. I don't even know how that works.
@Robert Jason Cervantes: If he was looking to make sure the battery was charged, then you want to run it for at least 30 minutes. Also, I've read before regarding this fairly common practice that one of the other reasons they do it is so they don't have to charge you their labor rate for the time spent driving.
@Cant_stop_the_rock: If they got permission from the owner, sure, I can see this.
I can't believe people are saying it's a-ok for someone to drive your car home without your permission. What if you get into an accident?
It's common practice that employees of car dealerships get to take cars home with them. Maybe this guy had previously worked in such a capacity and was just doing what came naturally.
But seriously, if you're going to pull a stunt like that, all up the owner and tell them that you are going to take the car on the road for a test run and that you will be going on the highway with it. Just so that if you end up on the national news, you can say "I told him I was going to drive the car."
This is a common practice, especially in smaller shops. I've seen it happen many times, nothing nefarious about it. If it's something that happens intermittently, driving it as a normal car (i.e.- something longer than a 3 mile test drive) is sometimes a good diagnostic tool.
There ARE trustworthy mechanics out there...
oh oh oh, can I just add that Jaguars just aren't the cars they used to be? They've been lacking in the respect department pretty much since 1978.
@GearheadGeek: "but it's also true that the owner of the car left it sitting at the shop for a long while instead of paying what he owed for the repairs. "
...And I assume that the owner of the shop gave permission for the owner of the car to leave it there without paying it. That doesn't mean that the owner of the shop gets to take the car home without permission.
@Jabberkaty: Heh... if the scrap value of the car is higher than its value as a car, the customer didn't lose much in that transaction anyway. In Texas (and I suspect in most states) you can put a mechanic's lien against a vehicle if the owner won't pay. If they own it outright, you can go through the legal process and sell the car, but if they have a note you're subordinate to the original lender. I can't think of a reason to crush one to defray repair costs unless the car is just unsellable junk in the first place.
@John Henschen:
In AZ they send the ticket along with the picture of the driver. If it's not you, you don't pay.
I think he kind of loses the right to be angry when he's leaving it on the lot after repairs are completed. No harm, no foul, and just hope no one stole your quarters or masturbated in it.
There is certainly nothing illegal here in driving the customer's car home. When the customer checked in the car he created a bailment in which the bailor is charged with taking reasonable care of the bailed property. Test runs are certainly part of servicing the car. Leaving a jaguar on the auto shop's property overnight COULD even be construed as less than reasonable care depending on circumstances like the shop's location, known theft rate, etc.
The automated ticket issue is another thing. The customer could have challenged the ticket in court instead of paying it - providing the court with the repair paperwork showing that it was out of his custody during the period. It would have been waived.
Relationships with a good mechanics aren't worth ruining over these petty issues. Why go to the press AFTER the shop pays the ticket?
Just because the owner of the shop gave PERMISSION to leave the car there long-term without paying, doesn't mean the owner of the shop can now drive the car home without PERMISSION. It doesn't work like that, people.
If I go into Pizza Hut and get a free pizza, they can't go and take food out of my fridge. "But we gave you something free!!!"
@John Henschen: I think it would be a case where that would be true if it was my brother was driving or something, but if you can pull up paperwork showing it was in the possession of a mechanic, it would be different.
@Megan Squier: I can verify that running a car frequently, but not getting the cylinder temperatures up, will foul plugs. I've worked at some shops, and one in particular had a real low life's car there... for months at a time, since he would drop it off, and not have the money for repairs. If the car was left outside the owner would come take it during the night, that was guaranteed. So every morning it was started, driven to the lot, turned off. Started again later and driven back in. If someone didn't go drive it once a week, it would really start running like trash. Not saying this guy was justified in drive some guys car home for the night though.
The mechanic's actually very correct - the car had been there a while, and jags are notorious for not taking to long periods of sitting around well.
@John Henschen: @TheFuzz53: In NJ, if you evade a toll, and a toll worker sees you, they copy down your plate. They then mail a ticket to whomever the plate is registered to. If you can prove you could not have been driving, the ticket is thrown out. Same for "DaFuzz"'s automated systems.
@Megan Squier: In NJ, you can't idle for more than 3 minutes. And in some cities/towns, you can not leave a car running with no one in the drivers seat. Yes, even auto-starts are illegal to use in those areas.
@Saboth: The smart thing to do would be to change the law so that both the driver and the owner of the vehicle is held liable.
@AlteredBeast: Also the shop has (one would hope) insurance to cover your lost, stolen, or otherwise damaged vehicle.
That coverage may be voided once the mechanic takes it home.
@John Wallace: I won't buy it until he gets caught driving a POS (I know, I know one could argue that this was. I mean one that looks like it)
@fantomesq: Would insurance cover theft/damage at the home? I don't think it would. Not that this dude would admit to the incident taking place at his home.
At least he didn't moon a MARTA bus while driving the customer's car.
During my college years, a friend took her Vega to a shop for repairs. About a week later Atlanta PD pulled her boyfriend over in the car and in moments had him across the hood and handcuffed charging him with indecent exposure.
One of the mechanics was "road testing" the car and his buddy who rode with him mooned the bus. Her boyfriend happened to be driving the car when the police pulled it.
Perhaps we should have named the yellow Vega "Moon Unit".
And this is why automated ticket/extortion systems should be abolished. Now this guy has to pay a fine to the man since his dirt bag mechanic decided to take his car for a joy ride.