Repair at dealership vs elsewhere

[Anonymous]

I had to have a bulb replaced as part of inspection and the dealer charged me what I later found out was about 6X what I could have gotten done elsewhere. I realize that dealerships are expensive for repairs, but are they that expensive or did I just get ripped off? Do I have any recourse?

[Anonymous]

They are expensive, and I've also had them suggest $$$ work that is not really necessary. I took my cars to dealers for years, but stopped about 10 years ago when one proposed almost $1k worth of work that was all BS. I now go to independent local shops, they are faster and cheaper.

[Anonymous]

Dealerships are often more expensive than independent shops. They also are quick to propose needless "maintenance" which is not specified by the engineers who list service interval requirements in the owner's manual. Dealerships make more money from their service operations than they do from sales of vehicles, and they place a lot of pressure on their service writers to upsell services. Independent shops will tell you if they see something needing repair you're unaware of, but usually won't pressure you to add "preventive" services you don't need.