I'll give you another reason to do as much work yourself as you can. I just got my Goldwing out of a 2.5 week stay at the dealers for replacement of the ECU (Ext. Warranty work). I noticed there was a N/C item on the receipt for replacement of two trim pieces that I had just removed 3 times myself so I knew they were in perfect condition. Odd, but I figured I was ahead on the deal until I checked closely and found a 3" scratch in a saddle-bag that wasn't there when I dropped the bike off. I failed to check it closely before I left so my bad. I once left forks for new seals and when I got them home I couldn't insert the axle through the lower forks.
They had boogered up the original bolts in the bottom of the both forks and replaced them with hardware store bolts whose heads were longer. When I disassembled the forks to replace those bolts, I found they had assembled the forks with no washer between the spring and spacer. One bump and I would have driven the spring up into the spacer, and probably crashed.
The moral of the story is, if they work on your bike, they will screw something up, so the less chance you give them the better. A service manual will pay for itself many times over, and it makes most work pretty easy.
