There are ways to protect yourself. One is you ask for an estimate and make it clear there is no prior authorization to do any work until an estimate is provided. When they call you with the estimate is the time to question the cost and work a deal. Afterwards you can sometimes work em down if you think the bill is too high. You can certainly still ask for a detailed bill with labor breakdown and they'll give it by the book and then say it didn't really take as long so they'll lower the bill a little bit. Depending where you are, you have a right to the replaced parts as well. If you ask for them, that'll usually piss em off but get you a lil break too because they already threw the junk in the garbage, lol.
Anyways, buyer lament falls under the W.C. Fields rule... There's a sucker born every minute!
