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  #1  
Old 06-27-2004, 08:21 AM
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CigarJohnny CigarJohnny is offline
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Finally got my SVX back from the body shop.

As some of you may recall, my SVX was t-boned in the passenger side by my wife while she was driving our PT Cruiser. The side of my door was caved in and the fender was damaged as well. After waiting a couple weeks for the new lower side cladding to come in, I finally got the Batmobile in the body shop this past Monday. I took it to the local Subie dealer, Faulkner Subaru, since they worked directly with my insurance company and they did not do too bad a job on my wife's PT Cruiser (they fixed it first since the parts were easier to dig up). I was told I could expect my car by the end of the week if all went well.

Surprise, surprise, I get a call Wednesday afternoon stating that my car was ready for pickup. Wow! Joy of joys! I did not get out of work until after 5pm and did not get to the dealer until 5:45. THe body shop closed at 5 but the cashier at the dealer was open until 8pm and I could pay and get hte keys at that time. Anyway, I arrive onsite and take a look at the car before paying for it. Glad I did! The paint looked like crap (lots of orange peel) but worse, the door still did not close correctly and you had to close it hard and could hear it bang against the striker and see it lift up a little. Pissed off, I left the SVX there and decided to call them the following morning and ***** to them.

Thursday morning I called just before 8am and left a VM for the assistant manager I was working with informing him that I left the car there because they did not properly align the door. Shortly before noon I called them again and left another VM letting him know that I was not happy that they never acknowledged my call from earlier. Around 12:30 I called again and this time I got him on the phone. He apologised to me and said the car was ready for pickup this time. The hinges were "loose" and needed to be tightened and readjusted. I made a remark before hanging up basically stating my amazement that they would not have noticed this before they told me it was ready the first time.

I went to the dealer on my lunch break to pick up the car. When I got there the guy was busy with another estimate and it took them 10 minutes just to find my keys and the car and bring it around the front to me for inspection. When they bring it around I see that the door, while not binding as much when closing, is now way out of alignment! The bottom of the door is sucked in and the top of the window frame is sticking out with a visible gap in the top door seal! WTF!?? So I go into the office to speak with him and he is busy typing away at the computer entering an estimate. I get his attention only to be told he needed jsut a couple more minutes and would be right with me. After about 10 - 15 minutes I hollered to him again. This time he got really snotty with me and said "it will be another 10 - 15 minutes. I am working on an estimate for the lady sitting right next to where you stand and she had a 12:35 appointment. You will have to wait until I am finished with her." This pissed me off and as I walked out the door I said "Yeah, and I had an appointment with you 4 days ago, jack@ss!"

About 5 minutes later as I wait outside examing the car further while I cool down, the manager runs out apologising to me and asking how he can help me. I explained the whole deal to him and showed him the door and the lousy paint. He agreed that things were wrong and even remarked on what a lousy paint job they did. I also mentioned that I see no red flake in the paint as their should be and questioned whether they even used the correct paint. We looked real hard and managed to see an obscure flake or two and he said that with the orange peel so bad it was hiding the flake so it could not be easily seen. As we examined the door I also noticed 4 big divots in the paint just below the mirror. He said it looked like some water drops got on the paint while wet and left the marks. I asked him what the hell kind of quality control they have there. Do they ever supervise their workers or do they just take their word when they say they are done a job? He apologised profusely and said they would wet sand the whole door and fender to correct the paint and that he would personally see that the door was aligned properly before releasing it to me again. I told him that the next time they tell me my car is ready to be picked up it had better really be ready! Enough of this bullsh*t! He swore it would be. He then offered me a free comp car to drive while they had it for another day or so. I took him up on it and they delivered a new Suzuki Grand Vitara to me at work an hour later (very nice vehicle, btw).

Anyway, Friday they said it was ready and it was. Door now works properly and the paint looks at least as good or better than the crap paint that was on it before the accident. It's good to have my baby back again.

Johnny (I got my baby back)
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Pearl '92 LS-L 179K (Historic 1st 5-speed SVX)
Mods: 5-speed, 4.11's, Group-N motor mounts, dual Magnaflows, cone air filter, Kenwood MP-228 CD/Receiver, white-faced gauges, '97 grill, custom window tinting.

Ebony Mica '92 LS 80K Oct 2002 - Dec 2004: Victim of theft. She served me well.

You can tell the lack of craftsmanship by the wrinkles in the duct tape.

Last edited by CigarJohnny; 06-27-2004 at 08:25 AM.
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  #2  
Old 06-27-2004, 08:28 AM
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immortal_suby immortal_suby is offline
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Wow - what an ordeal - glad you stuck to your guns and made them do it right.
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92 Ebony LS-L. ecutune stage1v4, motorsport 1pc pulley. Garage Queen - sold to Dad in upstate NY 155,000 miles
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  #3  
Old 06-27-2004, 09:43 AM
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ensteele ensteele is offline
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Registered SVX Classic SVX
And some businesses wonder why they don't have referrals.
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[COLOR=”silver”]1992 Tri Color L[/COLOR] ~45K (06/91) #2430
1992 Dark Teal LS-L ~184K (05/91) #0739
1992 Claret LS-L ~196K (05/91) #0831
1992 Pearl LS-L ~103K (06/91) #1680
1992 Pearl LS-L ~151K (06/91) #2229
1992 Dark Teal LS ~150K (07/91) #3098 (parts car)
1992 White LS-L ~139K (08/92) #6913
1993 25th AE ~98K (02/93) #164
1993 25th AE ~58K (02/93) #176
1993 25th AE ~107K (02/93) #215
1993 25th AE ~162K (02/93) #223
1994 Laguna Blue Pearl LSi ~124K (1/94) #2408
1994 Laguna Blue Pearl LSi ~144K (10/93) #1484
1994 Laguna Blue Pearl LSi ~68K (10/93) #1525
1994 Barcelona Red LSi ~46K (02/94) #2624
1994 Pearl LSi ~41K (12/93) #1961
1995 Bordeaux Pearl LSi ~70K (02/95) #855
1996 Polo Green LSi ~95K (03/96) #872
1997 Bordeaux Pearl LSi ~55K (08/96) #097
2003 Brilliant Red LS1 Convertible ~29K (04/03) #8951
1999 Magnetic Red LS1 Coupe ~33K (04/99) #6420

My Email | Old Locker | New Locker | Picture of 15 of the 19
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  #4  
Old 06-27-2004, 12:00 PM
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Chiketkd Chiketkd is offline
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Originally posted by ensteele
And some businesses wonder why they don't have referrals.
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  #5  
Old 07-14-2004, 12:39 PM
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Earthworm Earthworm is offline
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I hope you still thanked him for putting up with you. In the end he did do whatever it took to make sure you were happy with the final product.
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Old 07-14-2004, 04:42 PM
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HighwayUFO HighwayUFO is offline
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Wish I could say that about Tom Scott Subaru here in Caldwell, Idaho. The service used to be good and I guess it still is but the sales personel are getting worse.

Keith
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Everytime I get into my car, it always reminds me that it has POWER
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  #7  
Old 07-15-2004, 06:48 AM
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CigarJohnny CigarJohnny is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by Earthworm
I hope you still thanked him for putting up with you. In the end he did do whatever it took to make sure you were happy with the final product.
Yes I thanked him but I really don't think I owed him anything. The job they did was shoddy and the initial guy I was dealing with was rude to me to start with and the resentment I felt was directed at him. So, David, do you always thank people for putting in the extra effort to do a job that they blew aside and did half-assed in the first place? You think I was being too picky in wanting my door to close properly or be aligned so it seals at teh top when closed? Perhaps I should be grateful that they were willing to retouch a paint job that had missing spots in it? I tried dealing with them on a curteous and professional level in the beginning but when the first guy blew me off all bets were off! The manager that then assisted me was great. I was a little nasty with him in the beginning but considering what led to that and the way the dealership treated me up to that point one can hardly blame me. After all, if I had not given them anything to "put up with" nothing would have been resolved. At any rate, I had been very grateful to his extra effort and made sure he knew it.

I used to never make a fuss about things but over the years I have learned that there is a time and place to be nice and there is a time and place to be a PITA. The trick is to figure out which tactic to use and when. Being nice will get you far in most situations but you have to recognise when it's not working and when being a prick might serve you better. I've gotten a lot in life by being nice at all times but I've also been sh*t on a lot because of it too.

Johnny
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Pearl '92 LS-L 179K (Historic 1st 5-speed SVX)
Mods: 5-speed, 4.11's, Group-N motor mounts, dual Magnaflows, cone air filter, Kenwood MP-228 CD/Receiver, white-faced gauges, '97 grill, custom window tinting.

Ebony Mica '92 LS 80K Oct 2002 - Dec 2004: Victim of theft. She served me well.

You can tell the lack of craftsmanship by the wrinkles in the duct tape.
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  #8  
Old 07-15-2004, 07:06 AM
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CigarJohnny CigarJohnny is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by Earthworm
I hope you still thanked him for putting up with you. In the end he did do whatever it took to make sure you were happy with the final product.
Oh yeah, and I am not happy with the final product either, just so you know. They put some crap they call "dum-dum" in the door to quiet things down and the fumes that are now in my car are horrendous. After two weeks the odor has only just started to fade somewhat and on a hot day the fumes are suffocating and will give an instant headache. My son can almost not even breath in the car due to his reaction to the fumes. They make my wife dizzy and nauseous. And for some reason it comes out of the A/C vents as well.

The window in the passenger door also does not go up and down as quickly as well as it used to. Whatever they tightened up seems to be binding the window a little. It got a little better after a few days but initially it was so bad that it took almost 5 seconds for the window to go all the way up.

If the noxious fumes from whatever they put into my door to not fade dramatically sometime really soon I will be going back to them with the treat of a law suit for using something that has such bad effects on people. And in a car no less! What if my wife was driving the car and she was impaired enough by the fumes to have an accident? You really have to expreience how bad it is to understand how serious a problem this could be. It's all I can do to not go back there and rip someones head off for all they have done to my car. They have ruined the "SVX experience" for me as I have begun to dread driving it and actually loathe the fuggin' thing. And to top it off you have the balls to infer that I have been a nuisance to them and should thank them for "putting up with" me! What planet do you live on??

Johnny (really pissed off right now and fired up and biting my tongue hard. Thanks a lot)
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Pearl '92 LS-L 179K (Historic 1st 5-speed SVX)
Mods: 5-speed, 4.11's, Group-N motor mounts, dual Magnaflows, cone air filter, Kenwood MP-228 CD/Receiver, white-faced gauges, '97 grill, custom window tinting.

Ebony Mica '92 LS 80K Oct 2002 - Dec 2004: Victim of theft. She served me well.

You can tell the lack of craftsmanship by the wrinkles in the duct tape.

Last edited by CigarJohnny; 07-15-2004 at 07:09 AM.
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  #9  
Old 07-20-2004, 03:17 PM
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I was under the assumption that everything was fixed to your satisfaction. I'm sorry to hear that your situation has only changed and not really improved.

When I said I hoped you thanked him, I meant the manager only. And only because is is making an effort to fix the problems.

After reading about the issue you have now I've changed my mind. I hate it when companies don't fix the problem but instead put a band-aid on the problem. Either fix the problem properly or don't fix it at all.

Good luck with your progress. Don't let this bad experience ruin everything for you.
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