I bought my Genesis Coupé in 2009 and loved it; I loved the handling, the performance, the look, and was more than willing to overlook its few flaws. Even after the dealership told me I needed a new brake assembly and brake pads after only 14,000 miles and that the repairs wouldn’t be covered by the warranty I still loved it. On that day, just to be on the safe side, I took it to my regular repair shop and was told that all I needed were new brake pads - a $400.00 difference from what I was originally told. I learnt a valuable lesson that day but failed to fully understand it.
Years of truly enjoyable driving passed and then one morning as my odometer read just a little over 52,000 miles the car had trouble starting. I was due for an oil change and new brake pads so I managed to coax the car to my usual mechanic and asked him to take a look. The following day the brake pads were in place and the oil was changed but the mechanic told me I should have the car towed to the dealership since whatever the problem was, it would probably be covered by the warranty. I got the car towed, the dealership let me know they had received it and the following day I phoned to find out what the prognosis was. The service representative wasn’t available so I left a message…the rest of the day went by with no call back. I waited a few days and then called again to leave another message which did not receive a return phone call as well. By now I had to rent a car in order to get to work and I was starting to get a little upset, so I finally phoned one more time asking to speak to whoever was in charge to find out what was going on. I was told that the rep in charge of my case would call me back soon. Sure enough a few hours later I got a call informing me I needed a new engine because I went 30,000 miles without an oil change…I explained that I hadn’t, the oil changes had been done regularly (I use synthetic oil and have it changed roughly every 6.5 K) and that I had the invoices to prove it. Unfortunately as the service rep explained some of the places I’d used were small independent garages, and although the invoices said synthetic oil that didn’t mean the garage had actually used synthetic, and even if they had it wasn’t necessarily the right synthetic oil. All my invoices proved was that at some point I had tried to get the oil changed but I didn’t stand there and make sure the garage did it properly; I was not a qualified mechanic who could attest that it had been right. Besides, the oil filters hadn’t been replaced and if they had been replaced it was with the wrong filter model/type/ brand or maybe someone sold me recycled oil instead of synthetic, or maybe one or more garage had charged me for synthetic but put in regular or that they had charged me for changing the oil and done nothing…bottom line I needed a new engine and because I hadn’t had my oil changes done at a reputable service center (aka the dealership) my warranty was null and void. The good news was that since I’d bought the car there they were willing to give me a 10% discount on parts and labor, the new engine was only going to cost a little over $6,000.00 dollars to be installed.
I got an official quote, a letter stating that my warranty had been voided and an explanation as to what was broken and why it couldn’t simply be repaired. The rep told me he would prepare it and call back…he didn’t. A few more days go by, I try calling the service manager, no answer. Finally after another week of unreturned phone calls I contacted Hyundai/Genesis customer service. A very nice gentleman called Bob assigned me a case number (5215266) and explained that if the dealership said I needed a new engine I probably did but he was willing to contact them to see exactly what is going on. A couple of weeks went by and Bob wasn’t having any more success getting a straight answer from the dealership than I was. But Bob agreed with me that at the very least I should be able to get them to send me an official letter explaining why my warranty was voided and why my engine couldn’t be fixed. By now I’d become good friends with the people working at Enterprise Rent A Car; they were actually doing their best to get me the best possible price on my ongoing car rentals. They were also fascinated with my ongoing saga and were curious to find out how it would turn out. Out of sheer frustration I phoned the genesis customer service line one more time and ask if I could have my car towed to my regular mechanic’s shop. At that point I just wanted to know what was wrong with the engine. Bob was on vacation so another genesis rep told me it would be no problem and the next day Hyundai’s towing services charged me $60.00 to tow my car back to where they had pick it up originally. My mechanic opened up the engine (the same day the car arrived) and informed me that I did indeed have engine sludge and that I really should only have gotten my oil changes from Hyundai or from them, but the good news was the only thing they could find wrong with the engine was a broken timing chain. They ordered a new chain and tensioner, ironically the only dealership that had one available was the one from which I just had my car towed from. They wisely decided to order it from another dealership despite the fact that it would take an extra day. Two days later the new chain and tensioner were in, I took the car for a test drive and all seemed well. Total cost of repairs at my regular mechanic qas $828.88 for parts, labor and taxes (including another oil change to replace the oil the dealership drained out to look at the engine) and extra time (at my request) spent going over the engine trying to figure out why I supposedly needed a new one.
Everything seemed to be working fine but I waited until I had I driven over 3,000 miles ( just to make sure everything was in fact working properly) before phoning Genesis customer service back to ask what was happening with my “your warranty is voided “ letter, why would Hyundai/Genesis via their dealership try to sell me a new $6,000.00 engine when all I needed was a new timing chain (Note: I probably would have left the old engine at the dealership and refurbished Genesis engines with 50,000 miles were selling for about $3,5000.00 at the time), and why was I left hanging for 6 weeks and forced to pay over $1,100.00 in car rental fees while the dealership gave me the run around? Why was I forced to have my car towed to my regular mechanic to get an answer while their Genesis certified mechanics ignored me? But Bob was not at work that day and I left my questions with a very nice customer service rep who told me that whatever issues I had were between me and the dealership.
By the time I made it to the end of that experience I was angry and I swore to myself that if the car ever made it past the 100,000 mile mark with the original engine I’d write this story. In my mind there was no shortage of blame to go around; I blamed the dealership, Genesis, the dealership service manager and most of all myself for not having been more attentive. But in the years since that experience I’ve come to see things differently. Bob is a great customer rep agent, he listened and gave me the best advice he could based on the information he had. Genesis was simply enforcing rules that make sense i.e. if you don’t take proper care of your engine you shouldn’t expect us to pay for your negligence. The dealership was just trying to maximize profits and my service rep was, just like the rest of us, simply trying to keep his job and pay his bills. At first I wanted to complain and say I was treated unfairly but if I did I would only be proving that I’ve managed to learn nothing from what should be a valuable experience. Let’s face I’m the one who allowed that mess to drag on for as long as it did. The lesson here isn’t that the system is out to get you and you’re powerless to do anything about it. It’s just the opposite, everything that happened was the result of me not paying attention to what I was doing and only when I decided to take charge and start making my own decision did things start to improve. My car now has over 130,000 miles, it hasn’t needed any major repairs since that incident and even the brake pads are working fine. And it has taught me that when I allow other people to make my decisions for me by passively accepting what they say /do or by refusing to ask the right questions, ignoring the signs, or going along with what I’m being told, I should expect a $6,000.00 repair bill for a new engine when an $800.00 timing chain replacement will do.
Submitted August 01, 2017 at 12:35PM by Fractal314 http://ift.tt/2uVo509
