L J ELTER & SON

The following refers to service received at the Kensington, MD location.  I had a mower that was running at less than full throttle and sputtering a bit.  Brought it in for repairs, explained my complaints, they serviced the machine, and I was charged $120 for what apparently was their basic maintenance fee.  When I started the mower up at home, it had the identical problems, so I brought it back for a second time.  They apparently looked the mower over a little more carefully, and it had a bent crankshaft that is a $200 repair and isn't worth fixing.  The man I spoke with suggested that this may have happened when running over a root or hitting something solid, but this seemed unlikely in our yard that is perfectly clear.  He did also mention that they might have bent the shaft when removing the blade for sharpening, although he naturally didn't dwell on this possibility.   
I asked if they could refund some of the $120 maintenance package cost, which they refused, this despite the fact that I didn't ask for a "tune-up package"; I asked for a specific problem to be addressed.  I understand perfectly well that some diagnostic charge would have been necessary to assess the problem properly, but $120 strikes as unnecessarily high to tell me that my machine isn't worth fixing.   
Given the way the mower ran when I got home, I honestly suspect that they didn't start it while it was there, or they certainly didn't let it run for any length of time.  If they did in fact jot down the problems I mentioned, they simply assumed that their basic maintenance tune-up would fix the situation, and they didn't trouble themselves to look closely at the mower.  In the end, I wound up paying for their diagnostic failure.

This company was professional, prompt and reliable on their overall service.