Do Not Go To Livonia Autoplex In Livonia, Michigan

I went to Livonia Autoplex for problem with my car. My Car was still under warrenty. I asked them to do the work only if it is under warrenty. They said yes no problem we will call you and let you know. They never called me back, i had to call them three times to get hold of them and check on my car. They said they were busy and they can't work on my car today (eventhough i had an appointment). Second day same thing. They got to my car third day (so i was without car for three days). After that the guy said everything we do is going to be covered under warrenty. But they could not fix the problem rather he suggest me that my car is ok but i need to do 30,000 miles service to fix the problems, which cost about $579. I said no i don't want to do that service and the guy said they can't find any other problem. So i said ok i will pick up my car today. When i went to pick up my car they charged me $156 for checking...!!!! I was really upset. Also i have done similar work at other dealership but they never charged me for this, it was always covered by the warrenty. The only reason i went here was because i couden't get appointment at other place. I am telling this, because i don't want anyone else to go through the same trouble. So Please don't go to this place. Also i checked their ranking with mfg.. It was lowest. They don't have any certifications... They don't know how to fix the car, But they do know how to charge....

Reply to
Sam Williams
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So you're upset because you want them to cover their labor under warranty, but you haven't kept the warranty in effect by doing the required service.

You're unreasonable, and may have just lost the rest of your warranty by failing to do the proper required maintenance.

Reply to
Mark Allread

And he wants them to diagnose whether the failure is under warrantee...for free.

Reply to
Stephen Bigelow

This doesn't make sense. OP takes the car to the dealer for warranty work, the dealer says that to fix the problem would require $579 of other work instead, and that the car was ok? So, the OP tells the dealer no, don't do the work, so the dealer charges the OP $156 for not doing the work that was covered under warranty? Sounds to me like the OP got taken. The dealer either couldn't find the problem, or felt the need to try and fix a warranty problem as part of another service that would yield the dealer more profit on the deal. When the OP bailed, the dealer got their money anyway, presumably without doing any work to fix the warranty problem.

JazzMan

Reply to
JazzMan

English lessons are available.

If maintenance service is due, the warrantor has every right to demand that it be done (assuming they don't simply void the warranty due to lack of proper maintenance) before doing any warranty repairs.

The dealer spent time and effort attempting to diagnose the problem.

Reply to
Mark Allread

You seem to be ignoring the basics of the situation. The vehicle had

30,000 miles on it and was under factory warranty. He brought it in for some undefined-to-us problem he believed was covered under warranty. The dealer eventually told him there was no problem. There is no way it would require the equivalent of 2 to 3 hours labor charges to conclude there was no problem. If there was no problem a quick drive around the block would have told them that and even if they were still wondering a quick hook up to their diagnostic computer would still not have run up more then an hours labor.

I've never had a car under factory warranty where I was charged for that kind of diagnosis even if they were not able to find something, such as for intermittent problems.

Combine that with their "you don't have any problems but you need $500+ worth of "maintenance" work and these guys have a big neon sign out front flashing CROOKED DEALERSHIP. It would be an extremely rare vehicle that needs any "maintenance" work at 30K. Aside from lube, oil, filter ($25), AT service ($75), Air filter ($25), there just isn't anything to maintain if you follow the MANUFACTURERS recommendations.

Of course, if you follow the typical crooked dealership list of "maintenance" work you'd have

Flush and refill radiator - $75 Clean throttle body and Fuel injectors - $125 Flush AT - $125 Clean brakes - $50 LOF+air filter - $50 Fuel filter - $50 Rotate and balance tires - $50 Inspect battery, alternator,belts, AC, muffler bearings - $50

and they would try and sell that all to you every 15K.

Yes, some of it's needed at some point but rarely at 30K unless there is a problem, and the dealer in this case said "no problems, you just need this maintenance stuff".

Reply to
AZGuy

Since the make, model and year were not identified, your's is a statement of ignorance. If the manufacturer's warranty requires following the recommended maintenance schedule (a universal requirement, AFAIK), and the 30K maintenance was not done, the dealer has every right to demand it be done prior to doing any warranty work. What the dealer charges for the 30K service is not an issue - the work had not been done, and the warranty may therefore no longer be valid. The dealer may have had every right to simply log the car into the manufacturer's warranty tracking system as improperly maintained. The dealer also has a right to bill for their time and effort if there was indeed no problem found, and the customer is unable to demonstrate a legitimate problem.

Reply to
Mark Allread

You can call a pig a horse all you want, but at some point you're gonna have to get somewhere and that pig you're riding just ain't gonna get you there. :)

JazzMan

Reply to
JazzMan

Are you brain damaged? The OP never told us that nor what his alleged problem was. Yet YOU claim that the problem was caused by lack of maintenance when YOU know neither the make, model, what the problem was, or what the dealer was going to do for the $579 worth of maintenance. If anyone statement is a statement of ignorance, it is yours. You've apparently never bought a new car and brought it in for service at an ethical dealership.

If the manufacturer's warranty requires

Reply to
AZGuy

Of course not, but I, unlike you, am able to read and assimilate written English.

He said "he suggest me that my car is ok but i need to do 30,000 miles service to fix the problems..." It doesn't matter a bit whether the problem was "caused" by lack of maintenance, the warranty can still be invalidated by lack of maintenance.

Reply to
Mark Allread

HI Mark, I am not being unreasonable, i checked with mfg book and it says clearaly that warrenty will be still in effect even if you didn't do the regular maintenance. Also my car just turned 30k and i did my earlier maintenance at 18k and i am supposed to do this every 15k. The only problem here is they could not figure out the problem and they were trying to blame on 30k service....!!!

Sam

Reply to
Sam Williams

Mark, Void warrenty was never issue. As i said earlier Mazda warrenty does not go away just by not doing maintenance. Even they(Livonia Autoplex) people know that. They never told me that i must do 30k service to get my warrenty work done, rather they could not figure out the problem they suggest me to do 30k service which was $579. and i said no for that, but they still charged me $156..

Sam

Reply to
Sam Williams

I don't know, but just 'maybe' the fools knew what they were talking about??

It sure sounds like they are saying that whatever trouble you are seeing, the 30K service should fix it. In other words it isn't a warranty issue, it is simply a tune up issue.

By refusing the 30K tune up, you very well might have been put in the computer system as intentionally voiding your warranty. Gotta watch for that, they can be sneaky buggers.

I can see the price for putting it on the computer plus another hour of screwing around trying to chase a ghost running into $150.00+.

Mike

86/00 CJ7 Laredo, 33x9.5 BFG Muds, 'glass nose to tail in '00 88 Cherokee 235 BFG AT's

Sam Williams wrote:

Reply to
Mike Romain

You still don't seem to understand the concept here. You DO NOT know WHAT maintenance this dealer was proposing. YOu have NO idea whether it's some dealer recommended maintenance or the actual maintenance the MAKER calls for. Again I have to ask, do you have the slightest experience base in dealing with dealers? LOTS of them post all sorts of bogus "maintenance schedules" that call for replacing damn near every part of the car and every ounce of fluid every 10K miles. Yeah, that's a slight overstatement, but not by much.

Since you DO NOT know any of those details, you cannot possibly make a valid judgement that what the dealer did was reasonable and that the OP was wrong in thinking he was being ripped off. His story matches exactly what goes on in crappy dealerships that are more interested in easy profit then in honest profit.

Reply to
AZGuy

Mark,

It was an excuse for them to ask me for 30k service. They didn't say it will fix the problem. They said it should fix the problem, so it it won't fix the problem than... they won't do anything...!!

Unless you are car delear i don't know why are your speaking for car delears??????

Sam

Reply to
Sam Williams

They do not. They can deny warranty work if previous scheduled maintenance was not performed and the lack of this maintenance is clearly the cause of the problem. But even if the vehicle is a couple of thousand miles over the mileage for the next scheduled maintenance, there is no requirement that this maintenance be performed prior to providing warranty service.

Reply to
Steven M. Scharf

I don't get it Sam....

The dealer is saying 'they think' your problem can be fixed by doing the scheduled service on the vehicle and you are saying 'I don't need no tune up, that dirty air filter should be under warranty'. (or whatever part 'you think' is bad)

Am I getting the right drift here or am I missing something?

If you do the proper service on it and 'then' still have the same issue, then they are obligated to spend hours chasing it down under warranty.

As you have already figured, they aren't going to do the labor for free if it is 'not' a warranty issue or do the labor for free to find out if it isn't or is until you keep your part of the service agreement.

And no, I don't work for any car dealers and don't trust any of them farther than I can toss them, I can just see their point.

Unfortunately you have to play by their rules.

Mike

86/00 CJ7 Laredo, 33x9.5 BFG Muds, 'glass nose to tail in '00 88 Cherokee 235 BFG AT's

Sam Williams wrote:

Reply to
Mike Romain

I generally just lurk around trying to become more clever about cars, but the lack of real information here prompts me to provide my useless $.02. Has anyone actually said what the *problem* was or why the dealer thought scheduled maintenance would fix it? I can't find said information in the thread, and can't see how this could be a very meaningful discussion about anything but contractual semantics without it. In particular, if his problem was that his engine was belching smoke, rats were crawling around the transmission, and the stereo spoke to him in a demonic voice, I can't see how maintenance would be relevant at all. On the other hand if he came in and said "well my car's acting, um, a little

*funny* you know, it's just not right, I think it should be faster, you know? I think it's broken!" maybe changing the damn fluids would iron the vagueness out, or at least give peace of mind.

Now onto contractual semantics...

I don't work in cars, but I work in computers, and I know what "I'm not going to say exactly what the problem is, but this general purpose xyz procedure will fix it and cost xyz dollars" can mean. It means one of two things to me:

1 - I don't know what the problem is, and it won't be cost effective to diagnose it under these circumstances. xyz procedure is much easier for me than in-depth investigation, has a small chance of fixing things, and looks better than me saying "duhh".

2 - In my opinion, the customer is incapable of understanding the problem, and I don't want to bother explaining it. Here's a solution which will work well enough and doesn't require much explanation or effort.

It also can mean two other things, but I don't work these ways:

3 - There's no problem, but I'm going to charge you anyway. At the very least, I'm going to overcharge you for a small problem.

4 - I'm not a very bright mechanic/computer tech/engineer/whatever and this wasn't covered in my inadequate training.

I suspect the dealer in question was doing something along the lines of #1 or #3. There is something about the whole thing that makes me wonder, though. I've never been to a place where they didn't make me sign in writing at least an estimate of what they were going to do to the car. Usually I'd sign off on a certain amount of labor (or a flat inpsection fee) before anything was done, then they'd check it out, call me back, have me sign an estimate of the work to be done, and then they'd do the fix. In particular, if the OP really did this:

and they never had him sign off on charging for diagnostic work, I doubt they could legally make him pay for anything, as we're reduced to word of mouth. The final word on the matter can probably be found in the small print of the warranty, where it should say exactly what (parts, labor for fixing, labor for diagnosis, which systems, etc) is covered under exactly what (you lovingly care for the car, you hate it and kick it whenever you can, you've sold the car to someone else, you mod the car, car was struck by an act of god, etc) circumstances. That small print will also clarify whether scheduled maintenance can invalidate a warranty. The OP would have been better off finding that paperwork and reading it that than (cross)posting here.

If the dealer was doing #1, then they're either lazy or over-worked in terms of diagnosis, and possibly lazy in terms of fine print.

If the dealer was doing #2, then I guess the OP is not very car-clever and this thread is useless, or the OP is car-clever but the dealer is a misguided asshole/bitch and the OP was gently screwed. If he had paid the $500+, he'd have been harshly screwed.

If the dealer was doing #3, then the OP probably isn't car-clever, and the dealer is definitely an asshole/bitch. This happened to me once, with an independant shop. I worried but didn't realize how badly they were screwing me until I tried to get some car stereo work done there. I don't have the knowledge, tools, or space to diagnose cars but I sure know about audio and they quoted me triple a reasonable fee for some work and then got all hand wavy and vague when I started asking meaningful technical questions about why the price was so high. From the experience, I have concluded that I need either a warranty with readable fine print for my next car, or need to acquire a garage, some more tools, and a bunch of reading material so that I can become car-clever.

If the dealer was do> Unfortunately you have to play by their rules.

I disagree. You need to read the rules as they are written down and play by them. Unfortunately, sometimes that's harder and more expensive (in terms of wasting time and effort) to do than to just pony up the "unfair" charges.

Dave

PS Here's my transcript of the above mentioned stereo incident. While we're on the whole "trashing specific businesses" kick, it was Steven and Francine's Auto on West 60th in Manhattan.

Dave: I need the stereo unit swapped with this other stereo unit I am providing, and I need you to wire some RCA cables and a cd changer control cable from the new stereo unit to the trunk.

Steven: That will be three hundred dollars please?

Dave: Huh?

Steven: That's going to take me about 5 hours.

Dave: Huh?

Steven: I need to take apart the dashboard to get at the amplifier and take off the doors to get at the speakers.

Dave: The amplifier is integrated in the stereo head unit. The signal cables for the speakers are accessible from behind the stereo head unit's slot in the dash. I'd do it myself but I don't have a pair of those u shaped removal tools and you can do a prettier job with the wiring. Where exactly is this separate mystery 10 watt OEM power amp unit you are referring to located?

Steven: [Waves hands like a wizard] BEWARE MERE MORTAL, CHANGING STEREOS IS HARD!!!!

Dave: [to self] Dear God, I've wasted over three thousand dollars here, haven't I? My Catalytic converter, belts, struts, shocks, etc were all fine, weren't they?

Steven: [aloud] DON'T FORGET, I REPLACED YOUR ENGINE'S MAGIC HORSEPOWER GNOME AS WELL! MERE MORTALS CANNOT COMPREHEND THE COMPLEXITIES OF AN AUTOMOBILE! DON'T ASK DANGEROUS QUESTIONS! [Hand waving intensifies]

Dave: [runs away crying, missing his old mechanic dearly]

Reply to
Dave C.

LOL!

Good post.

One more for you:

Why waste time chasing a ghost if the due scheduled service should fix it? Otherwise if they find it 'is' part of the scheduled maintenance and 'not' a warranty issue, the labor charge would be higher than if you did the whole thing first?

Just 'maybe' they are trying to actually save him a buck? LOL! Sure..., But, it 'is' a possibility.....

Mike

86/00 CJ7 Laredo, 33x9.5 BFG Muds, 'glass nose to tail in '00 88 Cherokee 235 BFG AT's

"Dave C." wrote:

Reply to
Mike Romain

You're right on target but for some reason the OP didn't bother to describe the problem so no matter how clever we are no one can really even try to determine if the maintenance suggestion was reasonable. With the vagueness in this thread even I could come up with lots of possibilities, although with my limited knowledge of cars many will involve rats crawling around in the radiatior and a broken horsepower gnome. I tend to lean here towards crooked dealer and not so clever OP, since a good dealer could have suggested maintenance for less than $150, and also b/c someone else posted a much more detailed and convincing story in response about the same dealership. And a clever OP would have probably described the problem in his post, sparking some interesting technical discussion and then hundreds of flame posts. I must say, of all the newsgroups I lurk, the driving ones have the most raw flaming anger. comp.lang.c has you beat on "flaming off topic posts" and rec.audio.pro has you beat on the "flaming newbies" though.

Also $580 seems high for scheduled maintenance but the OP didn't say what kind of car it was either so no one can refer to the manual to verify.

Also, now that I think of it, I'm sure anyone here could have suggested scheduled maintenance for free. Hell even I could do that. Now I just want to know what the #@$%#$@% problem and car was. And WTF "misc.consumers.frugal-living" was xposted. You guys having fun over there?

Dave "let the flame begin"

Reply to
Dave C.

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