I've had decent luck with these guys in the past - overall they charge a lot compared to the competition, but the quality and thoroughness of their work has always been superior - though I did get some of that "you're a dumb college boy" attitude in past visits, it was not a big deal.
I moved away from Madison over the winter, leaving my bike (valued at less than $1000) behind with a known electrical problem. I called MP to tow it to their shop and investigate the problem. Within a day or two, I was given an estimate for almost $900.00 for:
towing
diagnostic
replacing the battery and testing the rest of the electrical system
replacing worn front tire
gas tank line cleaning/fuel replacement
oil leak patch
and a seventy-four dollar fee to wash it first, because of the "dangerous pigeon poop" that had accumulated over the fall/winter.
Obviously, most of this stuff is a bit extraneous for an old tank like mine - the only thing that really needed to be done was replacing the front tire and the battery. I told the guy (William Wisenant) to skip everything but that, but he insisted that he would not start repairs without charging me $74 to clean it - and still said it would be ~$600.00 for the tire, tow, battery, and further electrical diagnostics (which I had already said I didn't want)
Since that's obviously ridiculous, I had took the time to drive to Madison, replace the battery myself (purchased elsewhere, thank you very much), and wash the stupid thing (it took like 5 minutes, $74 my ass), and then asked them to charge the battery for me and replace the front tire. I was going to take it somewhere else out of irritation, but they told me they could have it done the next day (they did). Both on this visit and on the return visit to pick the bike up I could hear the mechanic (William, presumably) swearing and yelling about my decision to do it myself, the battery, and the "labor" it took to take the damn seat off. Overall I escaped with about $300.00 in charges, which was not unreasonable for the tow, dead battery diagnostic, charge, and front tire replacement.
The front desk guy (another William) was pleasant and seemed a bit sympathetic about the situation, but overall it was a fairly uncomfortable experience, and I won't be using them again. Motorcycle performance, you are not doing me a favor for getting my bike running again. Even if I'm the biggest cheapskate in the world, I'm still paying you an honest fee for the work I DID have you do. You wasted an entire day of mine to make me come up there to avoid ridiculous fees and unnecessary diagnostics. I don't know if the problem is just with this one mechanic, but this is an unacceptable way to run a business.
Unless you have a really nice bike that you want to keep in tip-top condition (and are willing to pay out the nose to do so), I would stay away. Suter's on the east side works cheaper and more politely, though the quality is not as good. read more