I always wanted to travel to Albania and since it is a cheap country, I knew I wanted to take advantage of their prices. I am still Dutch and we Dutch love some good discounts.
The project I wanted to get done? Respraying the van! The van was full of bumps and scratches and the van had a spot underneath which was as crispy as potato chips (rust!) Which needed to be welded. It was totally rotten for about half a meter. The hourly work fee in Holland is maybe 10 times higher than in Albania so I wanted it to be done here so I could actually afford it without spending thousands of euros.
I tried to look up prices to compare, and found out the prices in Morocco and Turkey are around 1000 euros for such a job, so I expected it to be similar in Albania. However, many places asked 2500-3500 knowing I was a foreigner. I found a place which could do it for 1200 and the work he had done looked good. In the end you never know what you get and I felt a bit nervous but willing to take the risk.
I paid a deposit of 500 euros for the materials and went with the man to the paintshop. I picked a yellow color. I never realized that there are 100's of tints of yellow! Picking a color is so hard!
The man started with the body work, removing the bumps and after one day of work, he told me he did not want to finish it. But he had a solution: a friend could finish it but he could only start it in 20 to 25 days. That wasn't an option for me. He promised me it would be finished in 10 days and that promise was broken so I didn't trust that the next promise would be held. I suggested a refund but he did not want to return my deposit. I didn't wanna lose my money and I did not wanna start a fight as that would not give me any chance of getting money back. I never really know how to react under these kinds of circumstances.
This is where the guy decided he did not want to finish the job The bumps were removed and the yellow is putty to fill the scratches*
As it is an old company van, there were still letters visable from the stickers which were taken off.
Some days passed and my head was just thinking what to do. Waiting 20 more days to maybe find out it is never gonna happen? Losing 500 euros? Going to the police?
Another Dutch vanlifers gave me a phone number of a workshop in the same city who welded their van and did some partial painting. I decided to go there for at least the welding and see what was possible. They rated the already done work at 100 euro, maximum 150 euros and they offered to finish it including the welding for a total of 700 euros.
I drove the van back to the public parking spot next to the first workshop. The guy saw me arriving and got mad that I had to return his inexpensive work tools. I told him I was busy and I had to go to town to meet someone, which was true. The girl who translated for the guy treathened to call the police, that they would find me anywhere in Albania and that I would get into big trouble. The guy was just talking very angry in Albanian language. I tried to stay calm because I thought that's the best thing to do and even offered to share my live location so it would be easy for the police to find me. I checked if the van was locked and left.
Not much later I got a message: the police are here.. damn things are really escalating.. but when I arrived at the van, nobody was there and the tools were gone.
Minutes later, I got a call that I had to come to the police office. Shit I felt a bit nervous and my head was filled with questions. How corrupt would the police be? I was quite nervous but let's just see what happens.. I kinda enjoyed the thrill though.
Arriving at the office, the police officer asked me to tell my story and what solution I thought was right. I told the story and that I let another shop rate the work and they said it was a maximum of 150 euros. So I asked for a 300 return, so the guy would still actually make too much money but I would feel satisfied with that deal. The officer took me to the room where the cheater was also sitting.
The good thing: we didn't speak each other's language so we couldn't directly talk to each other. That made it better as the police officer translated the necessary information.
The police officer said that there is not much he could do for me by law, as the man does not have an official shop which is common in Albania. However, this man did not pay his taxes so the police officer gave him the choice: refund me the money or get problems with your taxes. Good for me, he kindly gave me the money back thanks to the police officer who kinda blackmailed the guy. Welcome to Albania!
So in the end, I got my money back and let the other shop finish the job.
Somehow, everything seems to work out pretty well for me and I got my van yellow! I really love my van. The job is not done perfectly but I feel very satisfied with it. The van is now back in the garage for the wintertime, but I can't wait to travel with it again.
Thanks for reading my blog and I hope you learned something here, since it is always sweeter to learn from someone else's mistakes! And by the way, most people told me not to go for yellow, Do you like the yellow or would you have chosen an other color?
Regards,
Sascha
Ai, what a story! Glad that it all turned out good in the end!
We've been in a workshop once in Albania for some little maintenance things on the van and we actually had a really good experience. We didn't feel cheated at all. The mechanic even got beer for us all while we sat in front of the workshop talking about all kinds of things with him and his friend.
It was actually one of the best experiences in car workshops I've ever had ^^
I hope you still had a good time in Albania! We'll be back there soon :)
Well, I guess every country has good and bad places to go. I also went to a mechanic in Albania and I had nothing to complain about it. Just did what had to be done for a good price. Very nice people in the shop :)
Well, you probably didn't read my spray painting post on time ;) Thinking it is good to do that job in a cheap country, I know all about it. This week I am going to another garage to fix the paint that is falling off 🙈
Going to the police for reporting unofficial jobs might be a good idea, I might be too late after 10 months...
Oh no! Do you have a link of that post? Did you do it in Portugal?
I had to search in on of my first posts on HIVE... There was a lot about the endless time in the repair shop, but nothing about that crazy paint job. I only posted it on Insta. Thanks, I have another 'nice' subject to post about on a long waiting list :)
You can tag me in the comments when you post it so I can easily find it!
I will :)
Yay! 🤗
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I'm in Albania experiencing something similar… not the stuff with police tough. But wondering if you could share the name of the place that helped you?