Reviews

  1/5 Marilyn R. on Monday, March 2, 2015

If I could give them zero stars I would. What a rip off!! The lady tries to make you think she's on your side cause you're a woman but she's like all other mechanic places. Just out to take your money. I don't recommend this place at all.

  1/5 Chris N. on Monday, December 29, 2014

I brought my vehicle in for a water pump replacement. After looking at my vehicle they informed me that it was not my water pump but a part attached to my water pump that needed to be replaced. The part that they said needed to be replaced was a little cheaper, great! I decided, since I was saving a little money in parts, to go ahead and spend more money and get my coolant flushed. My final bill ended up being a few dollars cheaper than my original quote. After about 8 days, I noticed the coolant was still leaking from the engine compartment. I took my vehicle back and they told me that my water pump needed to be replaced. AT FULL REPLACEMENT COST! They were not willing to work with me on the labor cost due to their mistake. I was looking for a good and reliable local mechanic to return to in the future......well, the search continues. I will not return to this establishment!!

  1/5 Addis Ababas on Monday, November 24, 2014

My previous experiences with Mad Hatter Auto Service were at the location at Waters Avenue for muffler/exhaust jobs. However, recently my ’89 XJ-S refused to start and the Waters Avenue location referred me to their location at Linebaugh Ave. I called beforehand and described the kind of car and the problem with the car; and I was told they could fix it. Upon arrival with my car on the tow, the lead mechanic reassured me that my car is in good hands. I told him that I want a phone call prior to any work needed to be done. I was called to authorize a diagnosis test for $150.00 which I did; 3 days later I had to call them to ask for the result of the diagnosis. In short, two weeks later with my car at their shop and I having to call them multiple times about the status of my car, I was fed up. The lead mechanic then gave me the excuse that due to the age and the brand of my car, they do not a reference data to test and properly diagnose the car. My grudge is that knowing that working on my kind of car is beyond your shop’s capability you could have easily tell me from the get go that you can’t fix it and I could have find a much competent shop with no hard feeling. Yet this shop charged me a total of $495.00 just to tell me they Do Not know what is wrong with my car. In all, this was the worst mechanic shop experience I have ever had. My advice is that if you do not want to get rip off like I experienced then don’t take your car to this Mad Hatter location. Horrible service, no communication, and no end result. Good luck!

  1/5 Neuro Nix on Thursday, June 12, 2014

I can't believe I put up with these guys for as long as I did. The first time I took my car to the Hillsborough location for the brakes. The woman managing the shop told me it would need a lot of work, and so it would take a few days to get the parts and fix it due to rust damage. I told her to go ahead and fix it. Three days later, I called, and they hadn't done anything. So I took my car home, and she agreed to order the parts and call me when they were in. A week later I called, the parts were never ordered, and the original manager was fired. The new manager apologized profusely. I told them I wanted to bring it to their more established location on Linebaugh. They refused telling me: "no, we own the building at Hillsborough and want to move more of our business there." Ok fine. I brought my car back and it was a lot of work (all of it necessary, I have no idea) and cost was reasonable for the extensive job. I got a little something else fixed there that was reasonable not long after. They told me that if I gave them a great review online and showed it to them I'd get a free oil change in the future. That is why this place has so many positive reviews,I dealt with them more recently for the air conditioning. I called the number for the Hillsborough location to make sure they weren't too busy, and they told me to come over. So I went to Hillsborough to find the shop closed up. I called them to find out the Hillsborough location closed. UGH. So I was told to go to Waters instead. There they recharged my air conditioner and the technician left a long socket wrench under the hood when he was finished.When I was there, I got a quote on routine maintenance I wanted done. I called again the day before to confirm that they would be able to do it the next day. I came in that morning to learn that one of their technicians called out sick. I offered to come back later in the week if they were too busy. Oh no no, we can still do it today I was told... THREE HOURS LATER, I get a call that they brought the car to their Linebaugh location and they can't replace the timing belt on my car. What, you can't replace the timing belt on a completely standard car with a completely normal engine after I confirmed twice before I came in that that's what I wanted done? When you type in Subaru Repair Tampa on Google you get the Mad Hatter website claiming they can service Subaru cars, and it turns out they can't even do the most basic of engine work. They try to tell me the engine on my completely standard Subaru is somehow special and difficult to work on. The engine on that car hasn't changed in 25 years! When I came to pick up the car, I was told that the mechanic who called out sick is the only one who knows how to replace that timing belt. Ok, but why didn't you tell me that when I offered to come back another time? I was told "we'll let the owner know about the problems you had." Of course no call from the owner or anything. I'm a very patient guy, but this shop has wasted my time for the last time.

  1/5 Tito Flaque on Sunday, June 8, 2014

Decided to go with the shops version of their Magnaflow muffler instead of Magnaflow brand name muffler. Got the mufflers installed and it drones like crazy. The drone on the car now is excessive and just not enjoyable anymore. Just really disappointed in the way the mufflers drone so much wish I could take them off. Also, one of the tips was crooked so will have to find the time to get back to the shop to get it fixed. Service was good but the final product was less than desirable.