Bait and switch

This one is on me. For months now, my hooptie 1994 Mercury Sable has been making a groaning noise in the rear suspension. I've hesitated to have it looked at because it's 14 yeras old and has 136K miles on it. The only reason the car is still in my posession is because it was my father's company car years ago and I have personalized plates that I don't want to loose. I won't go into the details of why either is important to me at this time.

I spoke to some friends and decided I would get some estimates on what it would cost to replace the rear struts. I got a few estimages and decided to bring it into Sears Auto Center. I've heard good things and Sears isn't going anywhere anytime soon...

Here is the sequence of events.
-I arrived, said I think I need my rear struts replaced.
-Sears said they would do a front-end evaluation, look at the rear as well and call me when the tech has an estimate.
-I also asked if they could investigate the belt squeek under the hood.
-They said they would investigate that as well.
-Katie, Amanda and I went out to lunch.
-Sears called me back 30 minutes later and said that the driver's side front spring was broken and that the rear struts looked fine. They also said that the serpentine belt was possibly too small for my car.
-I could not believe that the front end has any issues, so I came in to have a look on my own.
-Sure enough, one was broken and it was only a matter of time before the other side caved under the extra load.
-The cost to replace the front struts and possibly the front sway bar and alignment would cost me $820.
-Ouch. I said for them to only investigate the squeeky belt and get back to me with an estimate on that.
-Katie and I went shopping in the mall; bought nothing.
-Sears called me while shopping and fixed the squeek. The squeeky belt was due to a bad pully on the power steering pump. The total: $320 - much easier to swallow.

To sum things up: I came in thinking my rear end suspension was shot. It turns out that it was fine, but it was the front that needed replacement. Instead of doing that, I had my power steering pump (which was working fine) replaced to stop the squawking that eminated from under my hood. What a day.