I read with delight your colleague's article on spare tyres and their likely demise. I recently suffered a puncture in my 13-year-old 2-seater Mercedes-Benz drophead. A young decorator working nearby very kindly offered to change the wheel. I gratefully accepted, especially as the car was loaded with luggage and I was just setting off on a journey.

Whilst he took off the offending tyre, I fished out the temporary tyre, plus toolkit and air pump from the boot. Sadly, neither of us noticed the packet of new bolts among the bits and pieces in the boot wheel housing. The temporary wheel was fitted using the longer bolts from the original wheel. After this, the car wouldn't drive. And it became impossible to remove the locking nut and replace with the shorter bolts specific to the temporary, much narrower wheel (which, by now, we had found). The AA eventually arranged vehicle recovery to transport the car to the nearest Mercedes-Benz garage.

It took a couple of days to price up the repair. In addition to the 'investigation' charge of a few pence less than £80 to look at the job, they told me that I needed a replacement rear nearside wheel bearing and hub at £1,184.40, plus replacement rear brake shoes at £342.13 totalling, inclusive of parts, labour and VAT at £1,526.53. There was no mention at this time of the new tyre I was going to need.

Surprisingly all this could be done as quickly as 'by close of play' the following afternoon. Instead I arranged to retrieve my car and had it delivered to the local village garage. No major replacement parts were required. Including a new tyre, parts, labour and VAT, their invoice totalled £220. Please mention this problem in your column to serve as a warning to your readers on two counts: be sure to use the correct bolts when fitting a narrower temporary wheel, and watch out for heavily loaded quotations from franchised dealers, especially if you are a woman and have a London address.