Before I went on my first long tour I arranged with a local bike shop to sit in their workshop and watch the mechanics do their stuff, as a crude way of trying to learn a little. One day a customer came in unexpectedly to check on his bike and all hell broke loose because he found out they had switched one of his parts onto another bloke's bike. This week I became that customer: took my bike in for a service before heading off on a potential tour (
Possible tour of South America while writing/working?) and today I noticed that one of my XT brake calipers had been switched for a no-name brand grey plastic piece of crap. Hard to put into words what this kind of thing makes you feel...switching a rear brake lever on a bike that you know is going to be doing heavily loaded touring in difficult conditions, just to make a little extra money by fitting out someone else's bike....
Since I've had two experiences of this now and I don't exactly deal with bike shops a lot, I am wondering how common it is.