Boat Maintenance Situation

I always seem to get myself into these situations...

Back story:

A friend of a friend has a new boat dealership that has been open a couple of years. We hang out at Mardi Gras and our mutual friend introduces us and says, "Clyde has a boat and fishes all the time. Give him a card..."

I'm recently separated from my last boat maintenance guy so I agree that I'll bring it in for service after spring.

I take it in about a month ago and get a fast turn around time of about 15 days. Impressive because he was slammed busy. I asked to service the motor, change the water impellar, fix trailer lights and wiring, and fix live well fill.

I go to pick it up, and motor is running great, new trailer lights all working and when they do the live well switch, I can hear a buzzing sound of a pump running. I was also billed for a 7.5 gpm pump on my invoice. All good, so I pay the guy. He doesn't cut any sweet heart deal, but it was a fair price for what I had done.

I go to Toledo 3 days later and as I'm motoring out I cut on the live well just to make sure everything is legit. It's not. The buzzing sound was the aerator. It's bubbling, but only the 3 inches that sit in the live well from leveling out with the outside water level. I flip the fill switch to pump it full of water, but it does not work.

So after the weekend, I take my boat back up to the shop. Such is my luck, the "guy I know" is not there. New guy at the desk ask my for my name and phone number and begins writing out a new service ticket. I tell him the live well fill pump is not working. He ask what else I need done. I reply, "Nothing. My boat was just in here for maintenance last week. The live well issue was supposed to be addressed." He stops writing, looks up at me, and goes right back to writing on the new service ticket.

"What's the make and model?" He asks.

I tell him and he says, "Just drop it in the parking lot and we'll get to it as soon as possible, we're pretty busy."



I say, "Well at least follow me out there so I can show you what switch corresponds with what I need running so there is no confusion." He huffs and puffs and follows me outside. As I am trying to show him he gives me the, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, I got it... We fix these all the time."

Just not on mine obviously.

So my question is, how fricked am I? Do you think they will bill me? Do you think it will have any priority since it was just in there and the issue was not fixed? Did I rub this guy the wrong way for pointing out their failures?

I don't want to be that guy that has to call a friend, to call this guy, to make sure he "takes care of me".

How do I constantly get myself into this shite?