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Old 10-02-2021, 05:00 PM
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NeighborsComplaint NeighborsComplaint is offline
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Default Business owner is dying and the jackals come out!

We all have families but probably not as dysfunctional as this group. This is long, but the family dynamic is interesting.

A buddy of mine went to work for his uncle as a transmission rebuilder in a small shop. Their reputation was stellar and the owner was one of the few honest people in the business. My buddy (a 24 Y/O kid) stepped up when the owner fell ill and made the place profitable doing both the transmission building and running the front office in the owner's absence. The owner put his daughter in the office to help out but does little more than answer the phone and set up appointments.

The owner's health deteriorated rapidly with kidney and liver failure so he has been in an out of dialysis and hospital stays for about a year and decided he should sell the business and wrap up all his loose ends. He's at death's door at this moment and accepted an offer to sell the property. He's ready to close the deal before he passes..

Next thing you know, the owner's wife is suddenly interested in the business, takes over the finances and proceeds to skim the receivables and run up the company credit cards to the limit with personal purchases unknown to the owner. Now there's no money for payroll and my buddy is hurting.

Now my buddy's father (the owner's brother), a broke low-life who has had a string of his own failed transmission businesses, shows up one morning claiming he is charge and proceeds to bad mouth my buddy (his kid) in front of the owner's wife about how the kid doesn't know what he's doing or how to run a business.

This is the same guy who tried to screw me on a transmission and rear end rebuild. He pulled the same crap on me outlined in this TV news piece from years later in the link below. I convinced his kid to help me finish the car, get his tools out over the weekend, leave and look for a job where you can get paid and not have your father run up your personal charge cards with business purchases and never repay his debts (the guy actually did that to his own kid). He did one better and his uncle offered him a job at his legitimate shop.

Now the low-life shows up at his brother's shop trying to scam his way in and see how much he can steal from them and their customers. His brother has his number and even as sick as he is, told him to get out and never set foot in his business again.

What a mess.

This is the low-life right here:

https://youtu.be/LAoDesqse1o

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Old 10-02-2021, 05:09 PM
Joe's Garage Joe's Garage is offline
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Absolutely disgusting person.

People are pigs.


Last edited by Stuart; 10-02-2021 at 05:40 PM.
  #3  
Old 10-02-2021, 05:52 PM
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tempest1964 tempest1964 is offline
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It’s a damn shame that in these kind of situations people show their true colors. And a lot of times it’s very bad.

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Old 10-02-2021, 06:40 PM
mgarblik mgarblik is offline
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It's another black eye for the business I have been loyal to my entire adult life. It's sad and just continues the terrible reputation the automotive repair business has. (Some deserved, some not). I think the advice to your young friend is wise. The industry really needs skilled, HONEST, shops and mechanics/techs. Sounds like he is one of the good ones.

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Old 10-02-2021, 08:16 PM
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Yeah. I could write a book on what I learned about this career criminal. He nearly ruined his kid financially being a leech. It took years for the kid to get out from under the mountain of debt his father buried him. He's a great kid and loyal to a fault. He "adopted me" kind of like a surrogate dad and I like to think I helped him learn to recognize the fault lines, understand that family loyalty does not include a life of servitude and always have an exit plan.

In my dealings with his ass-clown of a father (someone I regarded as knowledgeable recommended his shop), I got the "rope-a-dope" from the guy with a half payment up front, pull the trans and disable the car, leave it sit, rinse and repeat until you run out of room for all the cars. I laugh now, but no wonder his shop looked so busy. After months of "We're going to work on it next week" I realized none of the cars in the lot ever left. The kid finally told me he calls the line of cars in the lot "death row", He told me mine is on death row but his dad likes my car so it stays inside. My car sat from July to November with no trans in it.

I just came in one day when the guy wasn't around, grabbed some tools and started working on the car myself and didn't leave until spring when I was done with all suspension and brake upgrades. He still hadn't touched the trans and rear end but his kid took care of those after hours for which I paid him in cash.

It could have gone sideways but it worked out.

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Old 10-02-2021, 10:15 PM
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Not automotive related, but my wife’s uncle is in hospice care, living at his home still, about 10 miles away from us. We go over a few times a week to help him with shopping, cleaning and general chores around the house. He tells us how all the sudden relatives of his who he hasn’t heard from in years, or who literally told him they hated his guts, are all the sudden coming around and being nice to him. He sees right through the act luckily.

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Old 10-03-2021, 09:32 AM
1965gp 1965gp is offline
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I had a similar experience the other day. Guys stopped by asking to trim my trees. We agree on $1500 snd they show up to do the work (a little late but whatever) and do a good job on the trees, but the dropped a limb on my pecan tree breaking it (and probably kill it) they also broke two windows.

They didn’t want to tell their dad (the owner) they broke the windows and asked me to pay for it in exchange for more work. I agreed that they would take two big limbs off of this really tall pine tree over my house. They were coming back on Wednesday to do it.

Didn’t show Wednesday, will be there Thursday. Didn’t show Thursday will be there Monday for sure at 11:00. Didn’t show on Monday- ask if they can do it on Thursday.

I’m talking to the dad at this point. He tells me how his kids steal from him and aren’t worth a dime. He tells. E that he will be there with them on Thursday. They don’t show.

So now I am out $300 for the windows, $200 to change my flight to be home on Thursday, a pecan tree and 4 days of having to work from home. So I let them have it. I go off on the girl running the office and the dad. I tell them I am going to place an ad in our newsletter warning people not to use them. The girl in the office then blocks my number from her phone and the dads phone.

I use my daughters phone that evening to call the dad. He has his son with him and tells me that they will make this right tomorrow. I told him I just wanted my money back.

Now, I can’t let them do the work. If they are going to take down some 600 lb limbs over my house and drop it they can cause some serious damage. They have proven they don’t have a problem blocking me to avoid having to finish

They actually show up! So when they get there I grab the two big chainsaws out of the bed and take them inside. I tell them they can give me my money or their tools.

They start whining and I let them have it again. They call their dad and he says he’s on his way with some $$. Never shows. Leaves his kids to deal with it. I ended up taking some smaller saws and other equipment and let them have the big saws back and never heard from the dad.

Sounds similar to your friends dad.

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Old 10-04-2021, 08:48 AM
TAKerry TAKerry is offline
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N C, sounds like this is a good time for your friend to cut ties and pick up his tools and move on, in a hurry. If he is that good at running things and knows his way around a transmission no better time than now to set up his own shop. Legally he has no dog in the fight and worrying about someone elses family problems is a dead end street.

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Old 10-05-2021, 01:22 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by TAKerry View Post
N C, sounds like this is a good time for your friend to cut ties and pick up his tools and move on, in a hurry. If he is that good at running things and knows his way around a transmission no better time than now to set up his own shop. Legally he has no dog in the fight and worrying about someone elses family problems is a dead end street.
Yeah, that's his plan. I told him get out now. lease a space and hire the commission sales guy from the shop (he gets $25 a trans plus gas money and expenses) to line up all the current commercial accounts (local new car dealers, ambulance fleet, Firestones, construction companies, etc.) to come on board for instant cash flow. He's looking at a couple places to lease. He'll land on his feet.

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Old 10-10-2021, 06:21 PM
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Sadly Sam Carbone, owner and operator of Sam's Transmission Center in Aurora, IL has passed away. He was one of the independant transmission rebuilding business good-guys. The carcass of his business is left to the jackals.

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