What are your tips and stories about smoker's vehicles?

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KirkH

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Here are my top 2 tips that I came up with from experience:

-Clean the nicotine off the inside of the glass with glass polish.

-Search the vehicle meticulously for cigarette butts, etc. in the floorboard.

I had a customer that said his truck smelled like cigarettes- but he doesn't smoke. When I searched the floors, I found a small pile of dried dip tobacco and a brown stain. Someone had spilled a dip cup. Turns out the customer's son dips and had borrowed the truck.
 
I forgot, I also change the cabin air filter.
 
Clean the seat belts. Use 1 of those Meguiars Air Refreshers with the AC on.
 
Eldorado2k said:
Clean the seat belts. Use 1 of those Meguiars Air Refreshers with the AC on.
Click to expand...

Depends on how bad it is too.

We just had a customer trade in a '16 Fusion and he/she must have been a HEAVY smoker. Little burns all over the drivers seat, caked-on nicotine on all the glass, the headliner that was light gray is now a brownish yellow, and the cloth seats are just saturated with nicotine. No amount of cleaning could ever fix the smell in that car.

Needless to say, that car is unsellable. It will be going to auction.
 
Like Paul said it’s about how bad it is.

I don’t deal with it. It’s not worth my time to address it when it will likely result in the customers ‘sniff test’ being the start of an argument regarding how well it came out.


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Washing the seats thoroughly may help get rid of smell as well.
 
Eric7810 said:
Like Paul said it’s about how bad it is.

I don’t deal with it. It’s not worth my time to address it when it will likely result in the customers ‘sniff test’ being the start of an argument regarding how well it came out.


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Click to expand...

My menu states that there is an upcharge for smoker's treatment and I can't guarantee results.

I recently had a customer bring me a truck she was going to sell. She asked me to "pay special attention to the driver's seat, Dad had some accidents." I was hoping that meant he spilled his coffee, but no. It was urine. I have some pretty good products but I told her,
"it may always smell like pee."

I'm billing those jobs (urine, suicides, ODs, etc.) at $200/hr by the way.
 
KirkH said:
My menu states that there is an upcharge for smoker's treatment and I can't guarantee results.


I'm billing those jobs (urine, suicides, ODs, etc.) at $200/hr by the way.
Click to expand...

This is similar to the guys who trained me. One charges $800 for any type of biological contaminants. The other charges and extra $300 on top of his $350+ for the interior.
 
I SWEAR TO DOG, I just got to a customer's house and she said "Oh by the way, somewhere in there smells like urine. I've tried to find it...."

:doh::doh::doh:
 
KirkH said:
I SWEAR TO DOG, I just got to a customer's house and she said "Oh by the way, somewhere in there smells like urine. I've tried to find it...."

:doh::doh::doh:
Click to expand...

Translation: “The real reason I called you was I needed urine removed, thanks in advance for removing that smell entirely without any up charge”.


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