How I saved $400 on my 30k service for my 2005 Toyota Highlander

I was shocked that i actually was able to save so much on my 30k service. I called my neighborhood Toyota dealer and got a really high quote. Since I am all about shopping around, I called a few more places and was amazed to see that car service companies like Precision Tune, Quality Care etc were able to beat that price by over $200. I decided to investigate why there was such a big price difference, and went online to see what car maintenance  work was really required as per the manufacturer’s guidelines. Got some real good information from their site. It turned out that I only need to do the very basic care, and a whole bunch of inspections at this 30k milestone. Armed with this information I re-called the non-dealer car service providers and the best quote came to $60 + tax.  Of course the inspection revealed i had to flush my steering fluid with cost me an additional $50, but hell, I saved more than what I was initially quoted.  On further investigation i found that with the first quote they were going to do a whole lot more  maintenance than what is necessary.  Moral of the story , it pays to question quotes, and shop around.