Brakes Plus – Phoenix Ahwatukee Hills

I’ve been coming here for several years with at times as many as 6 cars when my kids were all under my roof and we’ve not really had any problems I can remember in over 2 decades of service. There are several places I won’t ever go back to but my wife is going for alignment and oil this afternoon at Brakes Plus Ahwatukee. After seeing the complaints I felt compelled to add a good Unilocal to the mix to represent my own personal experience over a period of many years and many visits. Nobody’s perfect but these guys do their job well enough to stay busy

Will not go back ever. Took my vehicle after being directed there by Discount Tire because my alignment was off and discount gave me a coupon well they must be in cahoots with each other. Walked over there from discount while my tires were being put on and made an appt for the following day. They remind me of cheesy used car salesmen with their corny one liners and fake attitudes. Of course they found more issues for an additional $ 900 saying my wheel arms were loose. I said no just do the alignment. Took my car home and seemed to drive nice until I backed out of my driveway and turned the wheel left and heard a grinding noise from my right wheel now every time I back out or turn left it makes that grinding noise and it didn’t do it before I brought my car in there then the next morning I get in my car and running late get on the freeway looked down and noticed none of my gauges are on my entire dashboard is disconnected I call the shop while I’m on the freeway telling him what happened and asked if they something with my dashboard wires and the guy was defensive and rude. It was the day before Thanksgiving and he told me I could bring my car in but they were very busy and he have to get to me when he could. I cancelled and took it somewhere else I will never go back there again and they still effed up my car

I’m actually pretty surprised by their Unilocal star rating… I’ve gone here a few times since moving to Maricopa and I always seem to work with Todd who’s always friendly and helpful. These guys seem honest and priced similarly among their competitors. One thing they’ve always done for me is take me outside and show me exactly what the issue is. I like this, it proves to me that I’m not being swindled. They also let me know what is needed immediately and what I can get away with waiting on. Although, I have had a couple snafu’s; they gave me back my car with a blown tire but they righted this by replacing the tire. On another occasion they put on bad shocks but again I called about the issue and they replaced them free of charge. Additionally, they always allow me to borrow their Jeep free of charge while my vehicle is being repaired.
Recently I was there for an oil change and they let me know my engine mounts were bad and this was a costly fix. However, after the new ones were put on I couldn’t believe how quiet and smooth my 2008 Mazda 6 was running! It was so quiet that I wasn’t sure it started when I turned the key. Seriously, I didn’t realize how loud and how much my engine and transmission were vibrating and moving around while I was driving until they put new mounts on. The vehicle feels like it did when it was new.
So far, so good for me with this location but it’s sad to read my fellow Unilocalers having such difficulties. Due to the couple issues I’ve had I’ll leave it at 3 stars until I see a little more improvement with getting my car back right the first time. Plus it’d be nice to see some better prices to really out beat their competition.

I took two vehicles here at close to the same time. My 98 jimmy and my wife’s 2006 RAV4. I was pleased with the staff as they seemed very nice (yet fakishly 50’s in how they spoke). They gave me the option of going with either generic or premium breaks about a $ 65 difference in price.
I went with generic with my Jimmy and premium on the RAV4. After about 3 months, both sound like a horror film whenever I apply the breaks. Also, since getting them, the breaks feel loose and don’t have the stopping power like they used to, even with bad breaks.
I’m going to wait a little while longer (so I can build the funds for what I am sure are going to be replacements) before taking them to another shop to get them checked out.

If I could give zero or negative stars I would. I’ve had extremely similar experiences as the other disappointed reviewers.
I originally went in six months ago to get work done on my brakes and was quoted $ 99 and once everything was done it was $ 260?
Okay…
Well being that spent that amount of money I would expect that the work done to my vehicle would be quality. Wrong again.
Only a couple of months later and my brakes were squealing like before and now grinding horribly every time I applied the brakes. So because my previous visit had a lifetime warranty I brought my car back to have them take a look and supposedly whoever test drove my car didn’t hear or feel anything, so I was told that they can’t do anything for me, but if it gets worse to come back? How the heck does that even make sense?
So a few weeks pass and the squealing is continuing and the grinding is getting so much worse that I bring it back. I get a phone call from them and they basically tell me that the pads I have are cheap and I should upgrade to premium ones because that’s what the squealing is from. Well how about you don’t install crappy quality material to people’s vehicles to begin with? So I refused to pay for the upgrade and was eventually upgraded for free and had my rotors replaced which I was not aware that they didn’t do the first time when they just machined them. (Turns out when I looked at the paperwork from the original visit that they charged me for premium anyways. So either they charged me and didn’t put them on or were lying and wanted me to pay again).
So this last visit that should have been free cost me an additional $ 140. Totally unnecessary.
Then as we were paying the man who was at the counter, Todd I believe, definitely made sure to make some passive aggressive statements about being upgraded to the premium pads free of charge and some remarks in regards to what my fiancé had said on the phone. Absolutely unprofessional.
Never coming back here again. Screw all these guys, so dishonest.

Stay away for any significant service work. They charged me more for parts than the dealer, and will look for ways to increase the work needed, even if it isn’t neededf. To top it off, they’ll try to be as folksy as possible while ripping you off!

Stay away from this place! They talk people into services that are not required. They use scare tactics to get women to pay for services not needed. These people have no conscious!
Do yourself a favor and go somewhere else!

Extremely disappointed. Convinced they tried to pull a fast one on my wife.
My wife dropped the car off for brakes and asked them to call her with an estimate.
They called about 2 hours later and spoke to my wife and estimated the full job at about $ 800. She OK’d the work and asked that they call her when the work was done. The shop called about 2 hours later to talk to my wife to inform her that they had identified over $ 800 of additional work that was not necessary but recommended. She respectfully declined the work. Here is where it gets fishy …
Another hour or so later, the shop calls to inform my wife that they had identified an additional $ 300 of required brake work that needed to be done. REALLY!!!
Why inspect them in the beginning and provide someone with a quote that is bogus.
Or, was the shop trying to make up for the sale of additional work my wife did not agree to buy by slapping on some additional brake work? Smells fishy to me and like the were trying to take advantage of a woman. My wife expressed great displeasure with the whole thing and suggested that her husband (me) was very irritated.
When we got to the store to settle up, they came up with some mysterious $ 200 discount to offset the additional work that we were disputing (funny because the largest coupon that was out there was $ 50 — where did this come from??)
Avoid this place at all cost. There are many other brake shops you can take your car to and not have to put up with this kind of customer service.
To avoid this happening to anyone else, I will be notifying the Arizona Attorney General as well as the Better Business Bureau — this cannot be tolerated.

Don’t let the fact that it is a part of a ‘chain’ put you off. They are as close to a neighbor business as it gets. The manager Todd, seemed to know (many by name) more than half the customers that came in while I was waiting, and you could tell they were happy customers, coming back for regular service.
I have been here in the past for an alignment and was pleased and went back for a few 30,000 mile service items that I do not do myself (I am old school and still do my own oil/​rotate tires/​wipers, etc). They were among the cheapest of the non dealers I called after you check for coupons on the web. AND, they ended up being slightly less than they quoted me on the phone as the Trans flush required slightly less fluid than standard.
Service was even done slightly ahead of schedule! (PS — Several eating establishments in the same parking lot if you decide to wait)

Friendly service, upfront pricing. No nonsense. Have had 3 brake jobs preformed here. A/​c coupons are a plus when I recieve them in the mail.

This is a great location to go if you need work done.
We were out on a Saturday afternoon when I realized there was a major issue with my brakes. I realized it had been quite some time since I had had them checked so we looked for a place nearby. A friend of ours had a good experience here recently so we gave it a shot. I dropped off my truck to have them look at it. A few hours later they called me with the estimate and with what was wrong. It was comparable to what it would be elsewhere so I went with it.
I found some coupons online and when I went to pick it up they honored them without issue. The staff here is great and very friendly. They advised me on a couple other issues that may arise based on wear and tear and simply let me know what their prices were if I were to use them again. No pressure, just information to use at my discretion. I will definitely be back to see them again and I highly recommend them to others in the area.