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Letter to Folsom Dodge and Dodge

6K views 26 replies 13 participants last post by  citrusDARTrallye 
#1 · (Edited)
I'll be sending this once I get a chance to grab the tech's name off my paperwork at home. Input or corrections are welcome.

To whom it may concern,

My name is Christopher MacDonald. Back at end of May I purchased a 2013 Dodge Dart Rallye from you and from the start my experience with your business has been less than stellar. First things first, I used to work at a dealership in Chico, CA and have spent the better part of a decade working in customer service and service related fields. That being said I have a basic expectation of service that includes attentive and truthful interactions, frankly my multiple experiences with your dealership have failed to meet my expectations. Eric the sales person I worked with seemed extremely rushed and less than interested in anything other than closing the deal, at the price and financing he wanted. After 4 hours of sitting in your store and a lot of back and forth we arrived at a deal I was ok with. I know you need to make money, and I understand there is back and forth in closing deals; however the clear frustration in Eric and the Sales Managers voices and faces should have been my first warning.

I test drove the car before closing the deal, the whole time Eric sat passenger with his face buried in his phone, my buddy in the back seat asked more questions about the ride to/of me and provided more feedback than the guy trying to close the deal. After I bought the car I was told to bring it back in for detailing, I got “hooked up” with a rental (of which I had to produce a deposit, something not explained when I agreed to the extra warranty coverage) and got my car back the next day, interactions aside happy as a lark to drive and enjoy my car.

That same week I signed up on a Dart Forum in which users stated that they were having issues with their Darts starting and/or stalling in traffic. At this point Dodge had placed a recall on Darts made within a specific time frame of which my car did not apply. I noticed some strange idling approx. the week of June 10th at which point I contacted your Service Department and was told by the gentlemen on the phone that there was no recall on my car. I chalked it up to weather or just my mind playing tricks on me and let it go. Two weeks later, the week of June 24th I double-checked with your service department again and was told there was no active recall on my VIN. The idling behavior continued and after more research on the forums I joined, the symptoms matched with the CEL U0101 of which I would eventually have my car serviced for.

The week of July 1st I once again contacted your Service Department and was told there was no recall. The week of July 22nd I received my notice from Dodge stating I needed to bring my car in to address the recall. I work Monday – Friday approx. 50 hours a week so I had to wait until Saturday to get it serviced. Obviously the work was covered however at this point I was pretty frustrated with the brushing off I felt by the service department. Working in my own field if I had a user/client/customer tell me they were experiencing the very issues a recall notice was issued for, (regardless of if their machine/device fell into the MFG stated time period) I would have advised it come in for service. Instead your service department left me feeling like I was on a wild goose chase and an idiot for inferring such a relationship existed between my car and the safety recall. This is yet another weakness in your business.

On Saturday the 27th when the car was brought into address the recall, I was set up with a rental of which I again paid the deposit for and another 15 dollars in gas. I was told I would be contacted once my car was ready; 6 hours later I came to pick up the car thinking crisis averted…I was wrong. But I’ll get to that a little later. In regard to this interaction, the service person I worked with left me with a wham, bam approach to service. I get that you are busy, I’m busy at my job too and I would never rush through the folks I support in such a manner. Additionally, the gentlemen that sits to the right of the door (has a placard about 20 or 30+ years of Chrysler Certs) in Service was presented with everything I was able to research including the need to flash the PCM components, to which I was given a glazed over, halfhearted attempt at eye contact and acknowledgement of the issue. I realize I am no mechanic however I am a computer tech and customer service rep with management experience, I am able to research and verify data as well as spot bad customer interactions. The exact thing I told the rep was wrong was the work that was done on the car; to be treated in such a manner was insulting and rude, regardless of if it was intentional.

Fast-forward to September 9th. I awoke at 6am, hoped in my car at 6:30am and my car wouldn’t start. Gear shifter flashed red and car refused to turn over. After a few attempts I gave up and tried remote start, the car started up with a CEL. I got to work, called you guys and set an appointment for 4:30 to drop off the car for service. Before bringing the car into you I pulled the code and low and behold it was a CEL U0101, the very code associated with the behavior that the recall was supposed to prevent. At this point I am beyond mad. My sale experience was less than stellar, your service folks failed to address the issue the recall was supposed to prevent, and my interactions with service have been equally lack luster.

Having dropped my car off for service for my appointment on the 9th, I decided not to get a rental. Frankly it was in order to avoid additional exposure to your folks, not to mention the rentals I received from AVIS in my previous interactions are riddled with body damage and in poor condition. I just borrowed my girlfriend’s father’s truck to drive in the interim. I contacted your service department at 9AM the next day (on my work break) to find out what was going on. When I spoke with _________ I was told the car had not been looked at, no big deal, it’s only been with you guys for a total of 3.5 hours of your operating hours. ______ told me he would contact me with any updates when he could. I then received a call shortly after noon letting me know that my car had still not been looked at as only one tech is certified to work on the Dart. You have one person in your team capable of working on the newly mass produced subcompact Dodge is producing? With their 11% increase in sales and an increasingly growing amount of Darts on the road? If this is true your decision to only have one person negatively affected me as a customer and I would suspect others have felt this too. Anyway, _________ was pretty much the only good interaction I have had with your business. I was told he would keep me updated. Now as of 1PM my car had been with you for 1.5 business hours the day prior, and still untouched 5 hours into your new business day. Later that day I got a call letting me know my car was done. I went and picked up the car and things seem to be fine now.

At this point I will no longer be visiting your business or recommending it. After a good amount of online research I uncovered a decent volume of folks complaining about similar issues. Yelp has you rated with 2 Stars and you aren’t even accredited by the Better Business Bureau, based on my own experience in conjunction with the data found online I will not purchase my next vehicle from you. I will be sharing this letter with my online Dart Community and sending this to Dodge as well. I understand my car is a 1st generation car, my frustration with your business is not due to the need for service rather the extremely poor customer service I have continually received from your business with the exception of __________ whom really ought to find a better dealership to work with, one that holds all of its employees to the same standards I believe _______ to hold himself to.



Christopher MacDonald

















**************************************UPDATE**********************************************

Went into the dealership, they gave me my mats, said that they have had multiple issues with Eric on his phone and they think this can all be reconciled.
They taped my letter to the door of the GM's office and took my phone number to have him call me tomorrow. Not sure what can be done to change how I feel
about Folsom Dodge but we'll see.
 
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#5 ·
Sorry to hear about your troubles with the dealer but well written letter, there are a lot of stories around of dealerships of all makes that have this mentality, not sure what the problem is with these people, if you don't want to deal with the public or can not at least put on a happy face and try to be helpful for the 5 minutes it takes to deal with someone then maybe you should find yourself a new field to work in, you should send it to chrysler and maybe someone will read it, weather or not they do anything about it is a different story but in the same token maybe the owner/general manager of the dealer doesn't know about the problem and if there is no complaint then they can't fix the problem, good luck in the future and i hope you have a better dealer in your area to work with as i know there are a lot of good ones around that will be happy to get your business
 
#10 ·
That's a great letter. One word of advice - never underestimate the power of a few well-placed CCs - the sales and service managers, the owner, some to various persons in the corporate office - a car mag or two - perhaps a copy to the "good" service person. Every time I've used the CC gambit. I've received a quick and positive response.
 
#11 ·
Nice letter, tweet the link to dodge and chrysler. I wish we had someone like dodgecacares for us Americans on the forum. Oh, go get those floor mats! Don't forget you can always go get repairs at another dealer.
 
#17 ·
I was surprised when I went in to talk to them, said they had multiple issues with the folks I mentioned and their GM will contact me tomorrow. I'm glad I didn't have to yell, I don't have it in me to do that and having to go into character to be that mad, loud, angry person is extremely draining and not who I want to be see or know as.
 
#23 ·
well i called chrysler today, and guess what... mine was suppost to come with floor mats, she even gave me the code for them thats on the build sheet... rairdons done slapped the bull on the arse for the last time, either they need to poop me some floor mats, or give me a mopar credit... i will be more then happy with a credit, and i can go get my trunk mat
 
#27 ·
well i spoke with chrysler, and my rallye was coded to have floormats, so i spoke with the dealer i got my car from at first the guy was like you bought an aero right? i told him no, citrus peel rallye, and all of a sudden he had a hell of a memory jog, he told me he was gonna speak to his parts guy, and get back to me... 20 mins later he called back wanting to know how much i paid for my mats, i told him it was around $100 for my mats... so i guess i will be getting a mopar voucher... looks like i will be getting a trunk mat
 
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