“Must have own tools.”

[Sean]

I’m no mechanic but I’ve noticed something after seeing listings for mechanic jobs. Why do they always say something along the lines of “Must bring own tools.” I don’t think I’ve seen a single one that said tools would be provided, they all say you have to bring your own.

I mean you would think some name brand place would provide at least basic tools, but they don’t. I guess any mechanic worth their salt would have their own tools anyway, but still I’m curious.

Has it always been like this in the mechanic profession?
Is this just one of the ways to help weed out the quacks?

Also applies to other things like HVAC, plumbing, electrical. They always want you to bring your own tools.

Topic

[Lorrin Barth]

This reminds me of a story:

Pontiac decided to build parts for 500 very high performance engines. Then they couldn’t decide if they wanted to put them in any car or not. So, the engines as parts sat for about a year. Then Pontiac decided to use them. The problem was they could only find parts for about 200 engines. The rest had grown legs and walked.

It is possible to have the same problem with tools.

[Matt]

It’s the same thing as any of the “hands on” type jobs. Heck, even when I worked for Best Buy fixing computers in college, I had to bring my own tools. Just like the Pontiac example above, the management quickly learned that all your screwdrivers and such would stay in people’s pockets and wander off, intentionally or not.

Also, I suppose it would be impractical and expensive for a shop to have enough tools on hand to equip every guy with a set of tools, even if you just went for the cheapest ones possible. And if you don’t enough of them to go around, the whole place would run to a standstill as soon as 3 people wanted to use the only 12mm socket in the shop.

[Jamie]

Some dealerships do provide some of the tools. But were talking some of the very high end or very vehicle stuff. A friend of mine who worked at an Audi dealer for years and years said that they had no choice in that Audi would send them batches of new tools required to work on a new model line or something like that.

As far as a shop saying its mechanics need to own their own tools, I see no wrong in that. That is a HUGE cost they don’t have to spend.

[Bryan Carter]

Besides the obvious cost savings to the shop, I think it’s sort of a holdover from the days before ASE certifications and dedicated technical schools. One of the easiest ways for a hiring shop to tell if an applicant was “serious” is whether or not they already owned tools.

Another reason is that many mechanical types (myself included to some degree) can be very particular about the tools they use. As such, I can guarantee that no matter what brand of tool the shop provided, you’d get guys complaining “Well I wouldn’t have stripped that bolt out if it wasn’t for the cheap crappy tools you give us to use!”

[Author]

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