Halfords Garage Services Stockport — Attraction in Stockport

Decided to go to Halfords to have some new wheels fitted on my partners car as Halfords is an established brand & had more variety /selection of tyres as compared to other garages such as quick fit.

We purchased a "premium" booking slot to have the tyres done, so on Saturday 6 July we was booked in for 11:30 & dropped the car off around 11:20 ish, we spoke to the technician/engineer & request tyre but in a certain place & there rest in the other positions/slots in the car. (This part of the work was done).

Upon exchanging the key they confirmed the work would take 2.5 hours to do, so we went into town and did a couple of things and came back around 14:00-14:10, when we walked in we didn't get seen for 10-15 mins as the engineer was busy and was understandable & we also noticed our car was in the air when we walked in however around 14:30-14:40 we was notified to say we've just finished the tyres however the car isn't done it as it needs to be tracked can we wait 30 mins for it to be done & we said sure, an hour & a bit later the car was still sat in the car park & it was until around 4pm the car was put out onto the ramp to be tracked. Then at 5ish the car was finally ready. 5.5 hours we waited to get some wheels swapped & tracked with a premium delivery slot absolutely shocking.

The other thing that is absolutely shocking is the state of the facilities & waiting area. Walls different colours from all the dirt & dust, same with the floor. The toilets I've never seen a more unhealthy disgusting bathroom, I know its not a 5* restaurant but I've seen cleaner public bathrooms in town or at McDonalds then this place. If you have a dust allergy or OCD I would avoid this place at all costs cause it would it either drive you insane or have a serious allergic reaction.

The other thing that shocked me was the concern for customer Data for the length of time me and my partner was sat in the waiting room the PC they use was unlocked & unsupervised for so long, like someone could have come in and installed a virus & they wouldn't have known, secondly the other concern is they have text file open with all the credentials & logins for each site in plane old notepad file which was also left unsupervised & unlocked for anyone to take. For a company that handles sensitive customer data & Also had to report data to Gov/DVSA it was quite bad to see like anyone could have come in and stole them details

The problem they seemed to have was either favouritism towards certain or regular customers or due to the test type we seen people whilst we were waiting to drop their car in for an MOT then 1 hour later their car was ready to collect which was insulting to considering we been waiting as long as 5 hours to get our car back.

Lastly there's a door inside that takes you to the main garage bit from reception an elderly man came through there and almost tripped and fell over thankfully he stopped himself after tumbling a little bit & we asked if he was okie thankfully he was but no staff in sight to be seen to check on him and from the looks of it no sign for customers to say mind the step etc. which is confusing cause the door says for colleagues only & I understand it saves a few customers time or make it easier for less mobile customers but that simple trip could have easier harmed the customer & if you wanted to claim on it could have been a debate about it being for colleagues only & customers shouldn't being using it etc. should have a sign to say mind the step on both side for those less mobile to make them more aware & update the colleagues only sign to say colleagues only unless authorised to do so etc.

The staff are nice people none of them came across as rude & spoke to customers really well. However there's things that need working on inside.

PS: your probably fine getting an MOT as people were dropping the car off at something past the hour then get the car back passed or failed 1 hour later, just seems to be the tyres that took a stupidly long time which we long to be claiming a...

I had my car booked in at Halfords Autocentre, Edward Street, Stockport. My car was booked in online for 8:30am. Yet when I arrived early after dealing with the rush hour traffic in the city, I got there to find out that my car would not even be looked at until 12:30pm. Had I have known this beforehand, I would not have dropped it off so early. I had hoped to drop it off, and wait for the car for a couple of hours in the city as getting public transportation back home was rather difficult. Unfortunately, due to the bad communication from the team at Edward Street. Waiting the entire day for my car to be looked at wasn't an option so I ended up paying £20 for a taxi home.

Later that day, once the work was completed, I had a phone call from the team again letting me know that my car was ready to pick up, but unfortunately with the work that they were doing, they apparently had to replace my ABS sensors.

They advised me that the ABS sensors would be added to my final bill, but I am very disappointed that I was not informed beforehand that the sensors would need replacing.

In January this year, I had all of my ABS redone completely on my car. So to then be billed again 6 months later for my ABS, even though it was in fully working order is not acceptable. Especially because I wasn't even told that the ABS work was being done until after the job had been finished.

I have also had a quote for a completely new exhaust system as an advisory on my paperwork from this autocentre. They have quoted me almost £1000 to get it redone. I have since taken it to another garage, and all it needs is a bit of wielding and other than that the exhaust is not in a bad condition. It looks like this garage is far from customer focused and are in the business for commercial gain. Instead of helping the customer, they try and take as much money as possible from them.

This has really put me of going back to your garages in the future. I feel that I am now out of pocket and that I've been ripped off...

I don't like leaving negative reviews, but I feel like this can be helpful to other customers or indeed the staff. So my A/C had suddenly stopped working so I booked an A/C diagnostic appointment at Halfords (really convenient doing it through the website, no need to call). I dropped my car off at 8:30am and they told me that they would call when it's ready to be picked up. 5pm and still no call when the garage closes at 6. Called them myself - told me to come at 6. After a small wait receptionist came around and simply said something along the lines of "Nah mate, it's gone, it's leaking - you have to contact Hyundai". That was literally it. After paying £35 and waiting for 10 hours - this is the feedback I got. No details, no referral to another garage, no offer to fix it - nothing. Funny thing is that I was also really busy that week and would've probably accepted anything reasonable had they offered. I tried probing the receptionist for at least a phone number and he replied with "Nah I'm not local mate". Great attitude. I also received a "vehicle health report" email from Halford's a day later which was completely empty and basically assumed my car works well. A week or so later I go to a local garage, told them that Halfords told me that my car's A/C is leaking. Later in the day got a call from the garage and the caller was surprised. No leak detected - the A/C just needs to be re-gased. The guy from the other garage also suggested that it was difficult to diagnose A/C problems on my car so Halfords might have told me it's leaking because they ran out of time. In conclusion, this AC Diagnostic at Halfords was too long, not detailed enough, misleading - and I could use a lot nastier words here. Dreadful experience, fair to say I'm not using Halfords again for...