Prepare: Track a cost limit and the action that still needs approval.
Choose a real repair explanation or a service role-play. Draw three boxes: inspection, estimate, and authorisation. This language exercise does not describe legal rights or a binding contract. A shop may charge separately for diagnosis and repair. Do not combine those prices unless the speaker says how they relate. Keep words such as about, only, and before beside their amounts or actions.
A worked Spanish exchange
This is an invented teaching example. Read the Spanish first. Use the translation to check meaning, not as a substitute for real listening.
| Spanish | English meaning |
|---|---|
| La revisión cuesta veinte euros. | The inspection costs twenty euros. |
| Si es la batería, la reparación saldrá por unos sesenta. | If it is the battery, the repair will cost about sixty. |
| ¿Los veinte están incluidos? | Are the twenty included? |
| Sí, si acepta la reparación. | Yes, if you accept the repair. |
| Llámeme antes de hacer nada. Si pasa de setenta, no la arregle. | Call me before doing anything. If it exceeds seventy, do not repair it. |
Your turn / Evidence before guesses
Make your record
List the inspection fee, conditional repair estimate, and customer's ceiling. Explain when the inspection fee is included. Decide whether the shop has permission to replace the battery now. Then state what remains unknown about the fault. Use the difference between si es and es as part of your evidence. Do not treat the suspected fault as a completed diagnosis.
Open the answer key
Inspection costs twenty. A battery repair is estimated at about sixty if the battery is the cause. The twenty is included if the customer accepts the repair. The customer requires a call first and prohibits repair above seventy. This is not immediate approval to proceed for sixty. The fault is still conditional: if it is the battery. No completed diagnosis, repair, or final invoice appears in the exchange.
Try a changed version
Make two imagined outcomes. In the first, the shop diagnoses the battery and calls with a final price of sixty. In the second, it calls with eighty. Write what the existing instruction permits in each case. At sixty, the customer must still accept; at eighty, the current instruction says not to repair. These are reasoning extensions, not reports of what happens in the original scene.
The detail that changes the meaning
Unos makes sixty approximate. Si acepta attaches inclusion of the inspection fee to acceptance. Antes de hacer nada requires contact before action. Pasa de setenta means goes above seventy, not reaches exactly seventy. In this example the customer's first requirement is still a call, even below the ceiling. Do not let the numerical limit erase the separate instruction to obtain approval.
Take the task to a real video
In a real service clip, put a question mark beside every suspected fault. Record a quoted amount as exact or approximate according to the wording. Listen for permission separately from price. Check the caption around any condition or negative. End with a note that says what is agreed now and what still needs a response. Confirm real charges and authorisation directly with the service provider.
Tool note / Our app
We make Jibber Jabber. Word and phrase lookup can help you inspect unos, si, and antes in a service recording. Keep the cost limit and approval status in your own note. The app does not diagnose a fault, confirm a quote, or give a shop permission to repair an item on your behalf.
Questions & answers
Is sixty the final invoice?
No. It is an approximate price conditional on a battery fault.
May the shop repair it for sixty without calling?
Not under this instruction. The customer asks for a call before any action.
Does the text explain consumer law?
No. It is a language exercise about a stated estimate and a customer's instructions.
Sources for this worksheet
The dialogue, task, variation, and key are original editorial teaching material. They are not a transcript, a quotation, or a report of a real transaction.
- Official Jibber Jabber sources — supports the tool description and plan limits, not a claim about learning results. Retrieved 9 November 2026; source reviewed 28 October 2026.
- Workbook method — explains the evidence labels and the limits of the written key.
Continue this practice path
Connected worksheets
- Return an item in Spanish: exchange, refund, and missing evidence
- A parcel delivery in Spanish: permission, condition, and fallback
- At a Spanish market: amounts, prices, and the final order
Useful task terms: Conditional instruction
See the Jibber Jabber profile for product limits and pricing.
How the related sites connect
This workbook is one of a coordinated collection of comprehensible input guides published by Jibber Jabber. They share one publisher and are not independent endorsements. See Related websites. We make Jibber Jabber.
Cite this worksheet
Jibber Jabber. “A repair estimate in Spanish: inspection is not permission to repair.” Spanish Fieldnotes. Updated 9 November 2026. https://spanishcomprehensibleinput.com/repair-estimate-not-permission/