I've been taking my cars to Kevin, Buck, Beau, and company now for just over ten years, and I keep taking them back because I consider them competent, trustworthy, and generally among the most pleasant mechanics I've ever dealt with. I took my main car to a dealer for the first few years we were in the area, as it was still under warranty service, but when I first took it to Pacific Motor, I was impressed by the fact that as soon as they had it up on the skids, Kevin not only figured out the car had started out the life in a snow belt state, he guessed accurately the number of years it had been there just from the pattern of wear and tear. This was a good indicator of things to come. The prices may be slightly more expensive than some other mechanics in the area -- although on the few occasions when I comparison shopped I couldn't find cheaper estimates - but I doubt you'll find better value. I'm convinced their attention to maintenance has kept my vehicle on the road far longer than it would have stayed otherwise, and that saves money in the long run. The staff always explain carefully what's going on, give me options, and give me good feedback when something can wait and when it can't. I've gotten good deals on parts (I occasionally shop for parts on my own) with minimal mark-up compared to the auto parts stores, and on one occasion Beau directed me to a wrecker's yard to get a replacement part I could install myself. I appreciate the fact they believe in maintenance and keeping vehicles on the road as long as it's economically feasible. In recent years they switched over to a computerized system tied into the Napa system for tracking maintenance and I have a good, verifiable electronic record of what's been done to my vehicle and when (and I am the kind of person who keeps minute maintenance records anyway, even so, this has been useful). I've gotten help from them on a variety of oddball one-off problems, without charge: contacting somebody to help me get rid of an old boat/trailer, finding the right sized chains for tires when I was taking the vehicle into back snow country. I got help with a warranty repair out of state from a related Napa-certified mechanic, which was free of charge, and the front desk guy at the time handled all the back and forth about the warranty (it was a worn part from a third party at fault). They helped me find a used car by inspecting a couple of candidates and had a long discussion about how to get the most (safe) mileage for what i needed the used car for. Once I had a catastrophic failure of my "beater" which was causing engine overheating, and I had to go pick up my son at day camp 45 minutes away right at the end of the day, which was kind of an urgent situation; they just gave me the keys to their courtesy vehicle so I could get him and trusted me to drop the car back off, no paperwork or security required. The only downmarks I can give the place is the hours: there's not a convenient after hours dropoff, and the place closes early enough in the evening that it is occasionally difficult to get in to do a pick-up, and they close for lunch. I can't keep this from giving them a rare (for me) five-star rating for their consistency, reliability, and generally able service.
We are Pacific Motor Service, providing AAA service to the vehicles of Monterey and Pacific Grove.
- Monterey