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Dealership Rant

Father Seth

Go Kart Newbie
Location
SoCal
Car(s)
2015 Golf TSI
I bought my car used in May 2019, and since then I have had nothing but problems with the dealership trying to screw me in different ways.

The Body:
First, when I bought the car there was some paint damage (chips, small scratches, and the infamous sun roof trim peeling) which I was told would be touched up and there was a crack in the bumper that I was told they would do some fab for. The contract is says extra "Paint and Fab" as extra conditions.
Part of the purchase was also a protective coating that I was already skeptical about.

After the sale I was told to wait until their service department called me so they can schedule my paint and protective coat. A month went by and I decided to start calling them to see what the deal is, and was told that the service dept should have already contacted me and gotten it done and they would relay the message to service to get on it.

Queue dealership dodging me. Now, I'm usually pretty patient and I hate being the guy who bothers but I got really impatient with them already having waited about a month and a half at this point so I started calling them every other day or so. Everytime, nobody is service was available or my call would "drop" mysteriously. This went on for almost a month before they finally gave in and got me scheduled. I was told they would handle the paint and bumper on the same day.
I got the car back at the end of the day and it was dirty... How do you touch up the paint and put a coating on the car when it's dirty? I asked them about it and they assured me that the coating was on there. The chips and scratches were still just as bad as before and my sunroof trim looked like they didn't even bother looking at.
I asked them about it and they just told me,"That wasn't part of your sale, those would require a paint correction which isn't what you were told would be done and we can't touch those up." On the contract it doesn't say touch up, it says paint. Still vague but I was frustrated. I asked about the bumper and was told they weren't required to do anything to it.

The dealership wasn't worth my time at that point and I realized how they operated and figured it would be best to bite the bullet and step back from them as nothing would be done.

The AC:
Shortly after the paint debacle, I noticed my AC was not blowing cold anymore. I still had part of the 3-month sale warranty and decided I wanted to see if they could get that fixed as part of the warranty work.

Again, they dodged me.

I called their service department once regarding the AC and got quick and great service for the first call. At the end of the call they said they'd gladly get me scheduled so they can take a look at it, but they would need someone else from service to give me a call to get that scheduled. End of call. I was already preparing to be thrown for a loop again.

To prevent myself from being repetitive, I'll fast forward. It took two weeks to get ahold of someone from service again and I only had one more week left on my purchase warranty so I called everyday trying to get scheduled to go in.
ONE DAY before the warranty expired I got an appointment for the day of expiration to bring the car in. Which happened to be a friday.

So the day of expiration comes by and I bring my car in and get checked-in and all that jazz. When I'm told by the service desk guy,"We actually can't inspect your AC today and our service department will be closed this weekend, we're going to need to keep your car for the weekend so it can be inspected on monday."
I felt my face turn red and I asked him why they need to keep it at the dealership if they aren't going to do anything to it. I told him it was the last day of my warranty and asked if it would still be honored given how long I tried to get into contact with them. I was told, I signed the contract and whether I left it or not, it wouldn't be covered. He told me I shouldn't have waited to schedule and appointment.
I left frustrated and decided to get into contact with a higher up at the dealership.

After the last issue with this dealership, I started keeping track of my contact with them through email so I can have a written record of my contact with them.
I explained my situation to him and showed him my records proving I tried to get serviced WELL before the expiration date and was getting dodged the whole time. He told me that he'd get me scheduled and would contact me to get a service done at no cost. SO I figured, finally a decent conversation with someone there. He told me to come in the next week so they can inspect it.

The DAY OF the inspection, I get a voicemail, "Hello Seth, this is Mr. Manager here at Bad Dealership. I just want to tell you that unfortunately the AC is not actually covered under the warranty in the first place and that there's no need to come in today."

I understand maybe I should have taken a look at the specific warranty information but it took about a month of dodged calls, cancelled services and frustration only to be told it was a waste of time.

So, me being frustrated, I contacted Mr. Managers boss via email and told him about my experience so far. I get a call from the boss giving me the apologies for bad service spiel and then he said,"I want to make it up to you, is there anything I can do for you to regain our trust or make you feel more confident about your service with us?" So, foolishly I got excited and asked If he can either have the paint fixed or the AC at the very least inspected.
His response:"I understand your frustration but unfortunately I can't do any of those for you, is there anything other than service or monetary compensation I can give you?"
So I got annoyed again and told him that all I wanted was for the issues I had in the past to be sorted and then he apologized again and say we wouldn't be able to work anything out.

I hung up and decided I wanted to forget the exist.

Registration:
This one is actually very recent. I've been waiting for my registration tags to come in since I first bought the vehicle. I figured it could take some time to get them.

Last night, while coming home from dinner with my family, I get pulled over. The officer tells me that my registration is expired, to which I say, "I Just bought this car a few months ago and paid registration at the time of purchase, I'm waiting on my tags." I show the officer my purchase contract date since he was curious.
The officer tells me they it still expired in September of this year. He let me off without a ticket and I looked through the contract again and look at my status on the DMV website.

On the contract I paid $275 for registration, but it expired September 2nd and now with late fees I have to pay almost $400 ($375 to be a little more accurate.). So I was upset yet again and emailed the dealership finance dept to see whats going on. I don't expect a response.

This morning, I was transferred around and dodged by the dealership so I left a voicemail with two of their finance people. I still don't expect a response.
I called the DMV to get more information and was told that they sold me a car with ??expired?? registration and the fee I paid was back-pay owed to the DMV, not for a current registration. They told me to go into and office in person and let them know about my situation and they would most likely waive the late fees. I was told this is a pretty common switcheroo done by dealerships and they get plenty of calls about this.

SO that's where I'm at right now.
I get that I could be in the wrong for some of this for not being up to date or being too diligent but in either case I felt like ranting.
I'm just kinda irritated and thought I'd share in the off-topic section.

In case anyone is wondering, the dealership is Orange Coast Nissan and I think they recently changed their name to Nissan of Costa Mesa.
So I would reccommend avoiding them for anything.

The car just had low miles and a decent price for what I was looking for.
 

sterkrazzy

Autocross Champion
Location
United States
Car(s)
Turbo. Blue.
They aren't even trying, that's just bad.
 

MonkeyMD

Autocross Champion
Holy cow. I know a dealership that would have had a ton of cars with engraved pinstripes. Of course at different times to not make it worth it to do an insurance claim.
 

Charlotte.:R

Autocross Champion
Location
Charlotte
Car(s)
'18 Golf R 6MT
That's pretty bad. Are you at all local to them?

I had issues with a Dodge once--shocker--and I literally went into the dealership every day to get the status of my car since they completely dodged me (pun intended).

If you have all your correspondence documented, I'd keep escalating through management in hopes of getting some escalation.
 

jimlloyd40

Autocross Champion
Location
Phoenix
Car(s)
2018 SE DSG
Go to a local TV station and see if they have any interest in your story. Call the BBB and file a formal complaint.
 

DiscusInferno

Go Kart Newbie
Location
Kalifornia
So, why did you buy a relatively new vehicle without being a Certified Pre-owned from VW? Why didn't you buy it from a VW dealership, there are plenty in Orange County, not too far from Costa Mesa? And VW dealership technicians have some knowledge of working on the car compared to other manufacturer dealership

CPO usually carries an additional warranty, opposed to As-is warranty.

Sent from my moto x4 using Tapatalk
 

Father Seth

Go Kart Newbie
Location
SoCal
Car(s)
2015 Golf TSI
So, why did you buy a relatively new vehicle without being a Certified Pre-owned from VW? Why didn't you buy it from a VW dealership, there are plenty in Orange County, not too far from Costa Mesa? And VW dealership technicians have some knowledge of working on the car compared to other manufacturer dealership

CPO usually carries an additional warranty, opposed to As-is warranty.

Sent from my moto x4 using Tapatalk

Mainly because of the price point, and I had already planned to mod it so the CPO wasn't wasn't a priority.

That's pretty bad. Are you at all local to them?

I had issues with a Dodge once--shocker--and I literally went into the dealership every day to get the status of my car since they completely dodged me (pun intended).

If you have all your correspondence documented, I'd keep escalating through management in hopes of getting some escalation.

Yeah, I'm pretty local to them it takes about 20 minutes to get there. I would have never expected this from a real dealership though, maybe a mom and pop but not a legit one.

I'm assuming you got things worked out with the Dodge dealership though right?
 

Father Seth

Go Kart Newbie
Location
SoCal
Car(s)
2015 Golf TSI
Update 10/28/19:
I visited the dealership this last saturday since, like I expected, they didn't return my email or voicemail.
I went to their finance office and asked what the deal is and what I paid for to which I was told since there were still more than 3 months on the registration their policy is typically to cover it for me. They took scans of my current registration and DMV fees and sent them over to their "DMV Guy" so he can see whats going on.
Finance guy told me they would give me a call sometime monday (today) with an update. Hopefully that's not just another dodge.

He had a look on his face when I showed him everything that leads me to suspect he knows exactly what happened and it may be happening to their other customers. I could be paranoid but I think they did this purposefully and didn't expect me to do anything.
 

Charlotte.:R

Autocross Champion
Location
Charlotte
Car(s)
'18 Golf R 6MT
Yeah, I'm pretty local to them it takes about 20 minutes to get there. I would have never expected this from a real dealership though, maybe a mom and pop but not a legit one.

I'm assuming you got things worked out with the Dodge dealership though right?

I'd definitely swing by if possible, at least that way they can't totally ignore you.

Yes, but I was in a rental for almost 2 months while the Dodge dealership argued with extended warranty company and the dealership I had purchased the car at. This was back in the 90s though lol.

Be persistent, polite, and document everything. Good luck.
 

Father Seth

Go Kart Newbie
Location
SoCal
Car(s)
2015 Golf TSI
Update 10/30/19:
Got a voicemail from the finance dept yesterday telling me to call them because they needed more information. I called back and he didn't ask for any information at all.
He told me that the dealership is under new ownership now and they sent my paperwork over the the dealership next door which is owned by the old owners, and that he'll call me soon to give me an update.

That's all, I guess it's better than nothing though. I didn't even expect a call in the first place.
 

Father Seth

Go Kart Newbie
Location
SoCal
Car(s)
2015 Golf TSI
What?! A crappy SoCal dealership?? I don't believe it!!!

I feel bad for all the shit you have to go through.

What caught me by surprise is that it's an official dealership too, I'd expect them to try to make a couple bucks off of me then just leave it at that or play dumb them fix the problems I've had. But no they haven't helped me with anything.
 
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