A repair estimate is a piece of writing, and writings have patterns. The parts cannon, the hedge, the fear clause, the “while we’re in there” bundle — once you know what guesswork looks like on paper, you can’t unread it. This scanner marks up yours.
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Ten wording patterns compiled from the same parts-changer playbook every knowledge page on this site documents — weighted by how expensive being wrong about them costs.
Honesty note: this checks how a quote is written, not whether your car needs the repair. A clean scan is not proof of innocence, and a flagged scan is not proof of a scam — it is a list of questions, and an honest shop can answer every one of them.
No. The scan is a set of wording-pattern checks that run inside your browser — no server call, no storage, no analytics on the text. Close the tab and it never existed. That is deliberate: people checking a quote are often mid-argument with a shop and need the tool to be a confessional, not a lead form.
Only how the estimate was written — and that is more than people expect. A quote built on real tests names the tests. A quote built on a guess names expensive parts, hedges with possibly, bundles while-were-in-there add-ons, and warns of catastrophe without a single measurement. The wording is the evidence about the diagnosis.
No — it means nobody has shown their work. Plenty of flagged quotes point at a repair that is genuinely needed; the problem is that needed was never proven, so you cannot tell the difference between the $1,480 converter that has to go and the $1,480 converter that ends up on a scrap pile. The flags are questions to ask, and an honest shop will answer them gladly.
A clean scan means the estimate reads like it came from someone who tested. If a line item still feels big, a phone-a-friend review costs less than one part on any quote — and if you would rather the claimed fault be spot-checked on the car itself, that is exactly what the second opinion is.
You bring the quote (paper, photo, or PDF). We read it, then put the claimed faults through their tests on your car — live data, meters, a scope. You get a written answer on every line: needed, unnecessary, or not yet proven. If we can't find the root cause, you don't pay the diagnostic fee. Period. We do not sell repairs, so nothing we find becomes an invoice line.
The scanner is the first pass. These are the rest: