I've been through this twice. Once, I got the car inspected, it failed, I got the repairs done, the guy who inspected it disappeared, had to get it inspected again, it failed IN DIFFERENT WAYS, had to pay another large sum of money to repair OTHER things, and then it was legal. All in the inspections and repairs cost me about $2K, which at the time was a crap ton of money that I had to use all my savings for.

I've lived here for years now and this is the only thing that I personally have experienced that's terrible, and I've said it a long time now and it's definitely a racket. There are ... some shady things going on with it. Some people or parts of the process are certainly on the up-and-up, but it'll screw you every time.

Sorry you went through this.