Car Dealer Blues.
 

I touched on this story in ZippyT's shitty day thread, but now I've got the whole story, I think.

Prolog~~A coworker owns a black 2002 Volkswagen Jetta VR6 with 81,2xx miles on it. Lots of highway driving. This guy is always well dressed and his desk and car are always impeccable. I mean the jacket on the back seat is carefully folded, now how many of you do that?

Act 1, scene1~~~So anyway the car dies and is towed to Garnet Volkswagen in Chadd’s Ford, PA. They tell him the Mass Airflow sensor crapped out, resulting in too much gasoline going into the catalytic converter, causing it to melt down, constipating the exhaust. Somewhere along the line the oxygen sensor also died, but it’s not clear as to when or why. Could have gone out with the Mass Airflow or as a result of it. Or it could have been caused by the cat meltdown.
Bottom line that will be $2400 please.
Now all these high ticket items are covered under the federally mandated emission system warrantee, right? Sorry pal, that ran out at 80k miles. You’re 1200 over, cash or Visa?

Act 1, scene2~~~Well there’s a silver lining to this cloud of gloom. The VW dealer is a Hertz Rental Car agent and they rent him a spiffy, brand new, arrest-me red, Mustang GT. Hot diggity!
That evening he goes to his brother’s house to show him the Mustang and look at the bro’s brand, spanking, new van.
Backing out of the driveway he massaged the side of the van with the Mustang, resulting in one maybe two chargeable accidents and $1000 total deductible. Oh, and a pissed off brother.

Act 2, scene1~ Back at the dealers he explains the customized Mustang, does the insurance paperwork and pays for his car.
Ouch, but now it’s all over.....heh, heh, heh.
His Jetta, which has not had a rattle or squeak for 81k, now sounds like a handful of silverware in a clothes dryer. U turn!
The service manager says that’s a broken exhaust hanger but they couldn’t replace it because it’s welded to the car. BUT, they are willing to weld it back together for $150. I have to tell you that the victim is easy going and very, very soft spoken....and unarmed. OK, all better now, but driving home it sounds like the mechanic is still under there with a large ball peen hammer.

Act2, scene2~~ Gosh son, you must have hit a whale of a pothole, you have a broken front spring. But it wasn’t broken when I brought it in. Well we didn’t break it...act of God...$500 please.
Driving home the victim notices the steering wheel isn’t straight. Now remember the folded jacket? He would know if the steering wheel had not been straight before, believe me. U turn!

You knocked my front end out of alignment when you replaced the spring. Nonsense, nothing we did could effect the alignment. HOWEVER, we will align the front end for only $250.
Now the victim, although still unarmed, is much less easy going and a whole lot less soft spoken.
Ok, ok, since you’re such a good customer, we’ll align it for free. Care to look at the new models while you wait?

So the car is home at last and the steering wheel is straight. (hopefully the wheels are too?) But it still rattles because whereas the factory exhaust system was as aligned and tight as well as German engineering could make it, the replacement is cobbled together of bits and pieces with lots (?) of clamps and I suspect, not welded.

Epilog~~~Today the victim told me he intends to write a letter to almost everyone in North America and Germany, so watch you mailbox, you may get one too. ;)

Dude needs to go to a different dealer or indepentend mechanic ( PLENTY of VW heads out there IF you look ) , lay out this orgy of hate for the general mngr and the service mngr and get an assment from then if he got fucked , (i suspect he DID ) , get an estement for what it will take to un-fuck his jetta , and get in contact with a lawyer .
Just my 2 cents .
Tell him to be mindfull that he possibly could be sued for slander if he writes said letter , again lawyer time .

I don't think they can sue him if he tells the truth. I was exagerating about the mailing list, just everyone in the VW chain of command and possibly political entities here. ;)

Well I for one am not going to buy another VW and one reason is the local dealers are all CRAP!! One misdiagnosed a major power steering problem on me a few years back. The other is co-branded BMW and charges major buckage for the smallest things.

Uh-oh, my son bought a used Jetta from Garnet Volkswagen.

What do you expect from a car that was originally designed by Nazis?

Oh no, Godwin's Law. :eek:

aren't there other options in the way of VW dealers back there? it sounds like this guy got totally hosed. i recommend he invest in a small arsenal and play hell on the hack mechanics involved. no jury in the world would convict a man for taking out carguys.

Do you want to tell that to LumberJim? :shotgun:

As far as the issue with the rental car, that was the guys fault. When my wife's car went in for service and they gave her a free rental, she paid the extra for the collision insurance. Even though she's the safest driver in the world (the little old lady from Pasedena is a NASCAR champion compared to her), she felt it was prudent.

Considering even a parking lot ding can cost about $100 if the agency gets picky about restoring it, I couldn't argue with her.

As far as alignment goes, I paid $60 for alignment to Garnet Ford even after my car had rods replaced. After thinking about it, I'm not sure that alignment shouldn't be part of the process. I'm not sure, though.

sure - i'm a former carguy myself. we know that the public doesn't like us.

Yes this guy got TOTALLY hosed, but is he clueless? That is the name of the game with car dealers. I'm surprised they didn't push him any further.

I have never met anyone that works for a car dealership that is trust worthy. About a year ago we bought a used Honda Oddysey. 60,000 +- miles, 'certified used' (whatever that means!), the dealer is supposed to do a 100pt inspection, car came with a 100,000 mile warrantee. Now, I love Hondas, I always have, but I HATE car dealers. They are always so slimy they just slide around the showroom like slithering snakes! Well two days AFTER we had the car it is DEAD in the driveway. That's right D E A D. Oh and of course it is a Sunday. I immediately call the dealership and leave a not so in control message and suggest/demand a phone call first thing in the morning on Monday. They didn't call. i call them ask for 'my' salesman, who by the way was about 23 and very anxious to please. Ask him if he got my message, yes he says, why didn't you call , Ah, um, I ah was ah waiting for my Manager to talk to you about it. I told him I was coming down with my two kids and our dog. If he did not replace the battery (thank goodness that is all it was) with a NEW battery IMMEDIATELY I was going to sugar up the kids and let them and the dog loose .

The moral is that the saleman was VERY good, but the maintenance dept. could not drag their feet any slower than if they had cement shoes. They did change the battery but I had to stand their to get them to get them off their asses.

We have an independant mechanic work on the car we are much happier and wealthier for it!!!

Its stories like that which make me want to get fitted for brass knuckles. Dealers suck.

On the sleaze scale, car dealer rate right up there with lawyers.

that doesn't mean we don't exist. by the way, most of our customers lie to us whenever they can because they assume we are lying to them.

we now video and audio record every transaction so we have proof of what was said. more for our protection than the customers.

yes 404 I would agree with you, and all of you car dealers are sleeze (been looking for a tail light for an 87 toyote pickup.... best I've found is 47$ online 10$ shipping. the dealer was 120$ base) anyway, there are always good mechanics if you look for them, my brother and a good friend can work on cars (hell! it might be worth it if you can drive down here!.. the other guy is certified to work on prrches/lamborguinis (no I'l never own one so I don't care to spekk it right :) the really cool italian cars (sorry been drinkin)) let me know though

ps. to that I don't mean you lumberjim

Do you have an auto-salvage operation nearby, cowhead? You could probably halve that price again.

I was talking to a guy yesterday who drove out to a mega-dealer in Big Flats to get a full size Chevy pickup. This guy works long hours and doesn't get much time off, so when he found himself free on New Years Eve he went shopping, except the local dealers were closed. So he drove the extra miles and probably got a better price. Now that he has his lemon, purchased out of town, the local dealers are refusing to service it...

ooops didn't mean to insult anybody. Maybe I should have said 'the majority'?.... :confused:

Not unlike the car dealer lump, at one time in my life of trying to decide what I want to do for a living, I was a real estate agent. I found the same thing to be true, most people found it very hard if not impossible to trust meand they mostly ended up lying or worse not believing me when I told them there was another couple putting in a contract. They would then lose the house and blame who else but me. Needless to say I didn't make much money simply because I was too honest!

I suspect if your brother called the local Chevy representative, that situation would improve.

He's going that direction now. (not my brother though ;))

I hope you are telling your customers this, otherwise I believe that a felony is involved.

oh, we only have the cameras in the ladies room, rich. Hey......ya wanna come by and watch some of the tape? we sell it on the internet. ;)



of course we do. this place is very tightly run, and super super careful of compliance and privacy.

It appears we have the usual showroom gripes and grumbles, real or imagined, but no service department complaints. :confused:

I had a 2000 Jetta for a couple of years. It was one of the best cars I've ever owned. I hated to sell it, but I ran out of job and could only keep one vehicle. The truck had to stay, but the Jetta was a superior automobile in every respect but towing capacity and payload.

It ran well enough that I never took it to the dealer for anything but regular maintenance (which was about $200 a pop, now that you mention it. but still, good car).

bruce's coworker, if he's as meticulous with his car records as he seems like he probably is, stands a good chance to get all his money back, I would think.

I would like to touch on a few things about this matter. As an employee at Garnet Vw, you should at least see both sides. I drive by 4 Vw dealers to come here because they do things the right way. So take it for what it is- this customer has had his car here on 4 occasions. 8/03 at 39k for warranty work was the first time we ever saw this customer, 7/04 at 66k for a 109.00 bill, 2/16 at 81k which is when his major maintenance was done and his cat was bad along with the oxygen sensor and mass air probably for letting it go too long before getting it resolved and then 3/05 for the broken spring and the gratis alignment. You tell me how first of all, how can a broken spring cause the alignment and steering wheel to be off? Replacing a front spring does not cause the alignment or steering wheel to be adjusted. Go ask a technician that knows what the hell their talking about. Secondly, why is it the dealers fault for telling the customer what is wrong with the car? Fedral emissions warranty is 8/80! I don't make this shit up. It is what it is. It was the customers decision to have the repairs done and were valid. Thirdly, how does a coil spring break in half? I have met the customer and don't have a bad thing to say about him, but what pisses me off to no end is the relentless bitching done by a third party who knows little of one side and can trash someone or a company because you have too much time watching the paint dry in your bedroom in your parents basement. Give me a break. I can sleep at nite knowing that I do everything in my power to help every customer. If you or any customer has an issue with us or any company, go to the source first for a clear picture. Your enough to drive anybody in the service industry to give up, because in reality, people like you suck. I know dealers have bad reps, but as for my dealership, go a little further. Inquire about our customer satisfaction scores, read the countless letters in our waiting room of how we have helped customers when everyone else wouldn't, VW included. Excuse me for rambling, but this shit gets me to know end. I just think that 4 visits, from 39k to 81k is not enough to try and push responsability of neglect onto a dealer.

yay, bubba!

boo, bubba's grammar teacher!

i think it's hysterical that you found this site, and this thread. did someone clue you in, or was it just lucky?

or google?

sorry for the grammar
 

absolute google. I don't think I have ever been this fired up about something seen on a forum before. God forbid I commented on what this over zealous Larry King wannabe does for a living. I could talk shit all day too. Maybe he's the reason for all the Osprey crashes.

I think it says a lot that of the umpty-thousand customers at the dealership's service department, he knows this one, based on the problems.

(consider how similar that would be to somebody telling a nutty relative story, and me coming up immediately with which one of the 31K+ (many with multiple admissions) we've served over the years ...)

well, welcome, bubbachuck. you and i used to be neighbors. i worked at family jeep for 6 years. i always had good experiences with you guys, i even had my jetta repaired there once and it was smooth. bruce is a good guy, btw, fwiw.

About ten years ago, a VW dealer service dept slapped my exhaust system into place with hose clamps. I learned about it two years later when the areas around the clamps rusted out. I am not that immaculate with records but it was either Wynn or North Penn. Probably the former.

Hello Bubbachuck, I see LJ has given you a formal welcome. I also see we’re playing shoot the messenger. You’ve made the classic mistake of reading the post and thinking it’s all about you. You in this case being Garnet Volkswagen. Well it’s not, it’s about an expensive run of compounded bad luck that this man had and everyone dreads. You(GV) are just one of the forces the Gods have rallied to make this gentleman’s head spin.
If it’s running fine and there are no warning lights, how is the customer supposed to know VW’s emissions system is screwing up? How did the spring get broken? He says there was no indication of a problem before it went into your shop. Springs break 1% of the time from over compression and 99% of the time from overextension (rebound) unless it’s a defective spring. As I understand it, this car has front struts with the coil spring mounted coaxially. In that case the spring can’t be over compressed or overextended without damaging the strut. That rules out potholes since you say the strut was ok.

Did your mechanic...excuse me....technician, report back that the wheel alignment was not out and only the steering wheel was out of alignment?
Was the car Towed into the shop in the first place? If so, rollback or hook and if hook, front or rear? There’s a myriad of ways to screw up the alignment when towing or working on a car.
Tow truck operators have a habit of throwing the chain hooks on anything handy including steering and suspension pieces.
To change the catalytic converter did they have to jack the engine or the rear suspension? Just letting the lower arm swing uncontrolled when the strut is removed can bend the steering linkage.

So what’s the answer? I don’t know. You probably don’t either. If you aren’t sure what did then all the other possibilities become maybes. Damifino, who said it was? Right...federal law...I thought I mentioned that. Who said you made it up? Yes, that’s why it was there. Most people don’t have a whole lot of choice because the lifestyles we lead make us so dependent on our cars.
I do however wonder why the exhaust system rattles and why the broken hangar wasn’t fixed the first time. It would seem basic to me that if you’re repairing the system, the things that it came with should be put right. That’s a real good question but I think I covered that. Moi? Bitching? Now I see where the bubba part comes from. I related the story of this mans streak of bad luck, for members to discuss. Bringing things to the board that happen in the real world, either our world or the news, is what we do here. It would appear from the responses that car dealers are a hot button with a lot of people. Now why would that be?
btw
1 - My parents don’t have a basement.
2 – I haven’t lived in their house for 43 years.
3 – The paint in my bedroom has been dry for 15 years.
That shows how much you know. :p
Noooo, really? I’d have never known that. Where the hell did that come from? No one blamed you for the emissions equipment failure. All that was requested of you is to make the repairs properly, without rattles, hassles, return visits or having to get medieval on your ass. Oh, and try to return the car with less problems then it had going in.

3 – The paint in my bedroom has been dry for 15 years.

Man, you really like that color, huh? :)

Where the hell did that come from? No one blamed you for the emissions equipment failure. All that was requested of you is to make the repairs properly, without rattles, hassles, return visits or having to get medieval on your ass. Oh, and try to return the car with less problems then it had going in.

You know, this seems self evident, but, sadly, it's not. I've had the whole range of reasons to bring the car back to the shop, ranging from one fix revealed another problem, to not having the crankcase drain plug reinstalled. Yes, and the little red light preceded the engine welding itself into junk by about 30 seconds. *sigh* The garage did replace the engine.

More like I hate to paint. Do you realize how many Dodads have to be moved first? :)
btw, it's peanut butter and pumpkin.

to not having the crankcase drain plug reinstalled. Yes, and the little red light preceded the engine welding itself into junk by about 30 seconds.

Can you say " OH SHIT !!!!!!"

That reminds me of the time i had changed the oil in my 70's something VW rabbit , i hadden't tightented the drain plug tight enough , and as i took the car on a post oil change run , the drain plug came loose , i heard a clunk and saw a cloud of smoke , i watched the oil pressure plunge , i was on the interstate at 70+, i put the car in nutral ( it was a stick shift ) , turned off the engine , and coasted to a PEPBOYS . Luckly they had a drain plug for my car , I replaced this and filled it with oil , i crossed my fingers and started the car , i got 50k+ miles from it untill i had to get the heads re-built . YES I WAS A LUCKY MO-FO !!!!!!! :)

See, there you go again,you don't shoot from the hip worth a shit. I'm strictly helicopter, nothing to do with the Ospreys. I would like Larry Kings money though, I'd buy all my friends VWs. :D

If I have to hear ONE MORE TIME that my friggin' serpentine belt is cracked, and should be replaced I'm going to blow. 9/10 times I have an oil change the shop calls to tell me 'they have a few concerns'. In my 1st car, a '91 escort (I miss her badly) from the first to the last right before I traded her in I heard this line. I had that car for 10 YEARS, and never touched the damn belt. Per my dad, it was fine. So, the car I traded it in for 2 yrs ago was a 2000 taurus. (love it) Guess what? From the very first OC to today, same thing. Firestone today, with a quote for $100 to change my cracked serpentine belt. AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!! Both Firestone and Goodyear places regularly do this to me.

The only place that doesn't tell me the belt needs changing is the actual Ford dealer 35min away that I occasioally go to because they throw in a free car wash with your oil change.

I think both those places have a 'take women for suckers' policy. My ex got sucked in to getting the brake rotors replaced on a practically new minivan at a Firestone shop. They told her they were warped and then conveniently lost the old parts when I went back there to have them show me. Goodyear got her to buy a set of over priced tires we didn't need on the same vehicle.

i went to firestone for a quick oil change because it was close. the comes in and tells me that my belts don't look so good, i am way overdue on my airfilter, and that my transmission fluid absolutely had to be done right away.

i told them that i had changed the K&N air filter myself less than a week before. he apologized and made an excuse about misreading his notes. he went back to the belts and trans fluid. i let him know that i'd just had the 60,000 mile service done a month or two before and those were taken care of. he informed me that whatever mechanic i used probably performed a "walljob" on me and he'd be happy to help me out with my problem. he nearly shit himself when i let him know that my mechanic was my uncle and i was present when he did the work.

he went back out and told the technician. now would be an appropriate time to mention that i can see into the work areas from where i am sitting. important because the technician apparently forgot this bit of info as he slammed my hood hard enough to break the latch. i didn't pay for the oilchange, but they did pay the bill from the dealership where i got the latch fixed.

firestone and goodyear joints are all pretty jacked up from what i hear.

Cars are more reliable than ever and except oil changes will go much longer between major services.
It used to be a choice between the dealer and your corner garage or do it yourself. I'd do everything except automatic transmissions and the actual machine work on engine rebuilds. If you didn't want to tackle it, the dealer was the most expensive but had the tools, parts and know how to get it done right. You paid more but demanded more.
If you could find a local mechanic you felt had the knowledge and tools to do a competent job, it might take a little longer but you'd save a few bucks. You might not hold him to the same standard either.
But now cars are so complex and the tools/equipment so specialized, it would take a major investment (for each car) to do any more than basic maintainance. Hell, the last set of service manuals cost me $150, whereas my '65 Mustang manual was something like $20ish. Even the '69 Corvette manuals, which was three volumes and had dimensioned drawings to make the specialized tools you'd need, were only $50/$60.
I've saved a fortune over the years by doing myself, and fortunately my getting lazier/more prosperous and the increasing complexity in the cars have coinsided nicely. But they have to do it right!
Oh, and I pay the dealer $20 for wiper blades instead of $5 at Pep Boys but by God they're worth it. ;)

Every car make is trying to take the small mom and pop shops out of the formula. With the price of diagnostic equiptment and the software updates for the equiptment make it very hard for anyone but the dealer to check out cars. Also, now that oil requirements are changing, quick lube's I hope will get that information. We have had cars come in with concerns and ultimately the problem was due to the wrong weight of oil. Not a big deal but it could be over the long term.

Eh Bubba, do you guys do body work?

I gave Devon Hill an hour of mechanic time to find my rattle in my 95 GTI VR6 and they didn't find it. To be fair the car has to be driven hard to hear it correctly. Lumberjim heard it when he drove it for a day. I think it's body-related.

There's zero trust between owner and service dep't, but it goes both ways. My car suffered a massive electrical failure about a year into owning it. At that time there was no vwvortex, just a VR6 e-mail list. The people on the list were fanatical about sharing service information. This cause of failure was identifed by them as a specific wiring harness. When I called Devon Hill the next morning to explain why there was a dead VR6 in their parking lot, and what the mailing list had to say about the harness, the guy was non-plussed. They diagnosed it as something entirely different and replaced the battery and sent me on my way. A few days later the weak harness killed the new battery AND took the entire dashboard with it.

Update. So, when I picked up my car yesterday, they said that there was some uneven wear patterns on the tires, and a rotation and alignment was a good idea.($150+) Really? These tires are are only 8,000 Hwy miles old, and I paid for and use the lifetime rotation and balance from the goodyear shop that I bought them from every other oil change (6-7,000 miles). (plus, i just had a bearing replacedshortly after the tires were put on, and they checked the alighnment after that and it was fine.) So, I asked him to show me the wear on the tires, since it wasn't noted on the paper. After much stammering and random rubbing of the tire, he tried to show me this tire was more rounded on the edge than the others --which was total BS. I told him I could still see the little rubber flaps on all 4 that are there from the manufacturing, and could he please be more specific about exactly where the uneven wear was since these were brand new tires. More tire rubbing and stammering, then finally a Well, Mike is my expert, and he really is particular about these things. Blah Blah Blah. Also, The coutesy check they supposedly do said I only had 10/32nds left on the tread depth, and that all my fluids were fine, when in fact they weren't. I was out of washer fluid. I asked him how was I supposed to trust that the other fluids were fine, when they obviously didn't check them? I told him I wouldn't be back for any more service since I couldn't trust them with my car. And I won't.

On the other side of things (I think I posted about this somewhere else) possibly even this thread but I'm too lazy to check ..

I had my car in for 25K service at my dealer and tried to get them to do stuff early ... they wouldn't. They identified some "vibration" over 50 mph ... most places would have done an alignment ... they balanced the tires (courtesy) and all better. See you in 5K, guys.

Is the rattle constant? I'll be happy to check it out for you. As far as a body shop, we use Brandywine Coach Works of West Chester. I will say this, we do not use them because they are the cheapest. Where do you think the rattle is? Body? Chassis? I have a set of chassis ears that we use on special occasions.

The rattle mostly happens when accelerating quickly or sometimes up hills or such. It comes from the rear left of the car, which is suspect because it was hit in a parking lot once. (My car was stopped and a young F-150 driver didn't turn fast enough while parking next to it!) I had Karossierie fix the rear panel. But you know, it's one of those things, I can't say 100% that the rattle is the result of that repair. The rattle didn't start right after that... it was maybe a year on?

Brandywine Coach Works... hey LJ who was it that addressed that rust area...?

If you wanted to stop by, I'll go on a roadtest with you and try to pin point it for you. I do have an auto body background, so it may help. Let me know.

i think it was zingani's. but it might have been brandywine. we used both at Family.

here's that thread