Should I pay for wrong diagnosis?

IanMSpencer

AdrianC wrote: »

Here's the car. The PS reservoir's empty, and "it's making a funny noise". Well, yes. So put more fluid in, bring it back if it does it again.

It did it again, and is empty again. Do you...
a. Refill it, clean up, send home again, come back again if it does it again?
b. Refill it, drive it around yourself until there's evidence of where the leak's from?
c. Replace the wettest, most likely component?

You've replaced the pump. The pump was leaking. The pump is no longer leaking. The fluid is not escaping in anything like the short order.
Weeks later, the pipe fails, too.

The OP didn't suggest that she was advised that it had been topped up to aid the diagnosis - "Simply topped it up".

It is quite reasonable to say "hmm, not sure if this is a bad leak or it is just a slight decrease over 5 years, so I'll top it up but you need to check it over the next week and if it starts playing up bring it back straight away because you don't want to drive a car where the steering pump fails as you are quite likely to lose control."

I think the OP might have remembered that conversation. If that did happen but the OP didn't take any notice, then fair enough, but my sense is that the OP had been quite reasonable, had a problem that they didn't understand, sought advice, in their naivety assumed topping up the oil was a fix for the problem.

At best poor communication.

You didn't include (d) in the list:

d. Stick a new pump in without considering where the oil had gathered and checking the rest of the system.

That is what the OP feels happened.

The point I am trying to get to is that there are all sorts of good reasons why the garage may have done the work properly but there are also indications that they have been unprofessional. From here it is hard to tell what are the facts.

AdrianC

IanMSpencer wrote: »

You didn't include (d) in the list:

d. Stick a new pump in without considering where the oil had gathered and checking the rest of the system.

That is what the OP feels happened.

I didn't include it, simply because the leak went from three days to three weeks after the pump was replaced.