Well......the supercharger might have to wait a bit.
My 2018 RAM Longhorn
- Thread starter 1978 NYB
- Start date
What Doba said...
FWIW, the dealer techs often try to get stuff declared "not warranty" and threaten to void one because they get paid more when it's customer pay. Many also try this crap when they're too lazy to do the job. Few, if any, actually care about the manufacturer's pocket.
Bob, it wouldn't be impossible for you to find a dealer who will do what you want... but then all fraudulent warranty claims would have to go through them. Tipping the staff in large denomination bills may help too.
I was generally more motivated by liabilities than profits, but that just made me a weirdo. I also was more than happy to screw warranty back for the love they gave me... just not in any way that would leave me vulnerable to claims of fraud. A flat rate tech's ideal world is the ability to work on a cash job while running up the straight time punches on a warranty job (within reason).
A tech or dealer cannot void a warranty on their own, but they can sure muddy the waters very easily and if they take pictures... they have provided all the legal grounds necessary for the manufacturer to back out of future claims for anything they deem related (like the transmission...).
I already have an ongoing warranty claim on the truck. The satellite radio doesn't work in the truck. They have ordered the wrong radio once so far and called me in to fix it only to inform me that they needed a software code the first visit and ordered the wrong radio. So now the waranty repair is going on 3 weeks and 4 visits to the dealer so far. The truck still isn't fixed. Also....as part of the radio the NAV and the compass doesn't work either. I get a "can't find GPS error" and the map just spins around 360. The compass is also blank on the heads up display.
Document 3 repair attempts or 30 days in the shop and you have "lemon" leverage... Worthless if you want to keep the truck, but will go a long way toward pissing off the service manager.
I love this truck but I will not stand for gremlins popping up. I can understand having a defect radio on a brand new truck but I won't stand for continuous problems with failures in the future.
The first time i had the truck in the dealer for the radio not working kind of pissed me off a week later when they said they need the software code to order a replacement radio. They didn't have an excuse why they did nothing for the first week after I reported the radio problem. And then the service manager came up to me while I was there the 2nd visit and said I know you're pissed off about the service on your new Ram so far....but I have some more bad news. We don't have the right radio for your RAM. That was 10 days ago and I still don't have the replacement radio. I'm going to contact Chrycler Care today if the dealer doesn't contact me. You would think they have overnight express delivery from UPS or FedEx to attempt to take care of the customer as expeditiously as possible. I am not happy with this dealer.....especially since I bought TWO brand new vehicles from him in the last couple of months. Do you think I'm over reacting????
Dang it Jeff....i'm writing Cantflip length responses here. Lol! 
commando1
Old Man with a Hat
Absolutely not. I absolutely detest Service Depts, their employees, their attitude, their... Well, EVERYTHING about them.
And their waiting rooms suck. Next time, I'm buying a Maybach.
The salesmen at Cook Dodge are very nice and helpful. They even stop and say hello when they see me at the dealership and enquire if they can help in any way. When i tell them i have a problem with the service manager they get this "Awww ****" expression on their faces.
What really had me concerned is tbey have some tables off to the side of the service dept and i would sit there instead of climbing all those damn steps to the service waiting area. The dumb *** service manager forgot I was sitting there and he was crying and berating another customer to the service writers that complsined about his shitty service. You should of seen the look on his face when he realized that he opened his big mouth about another customer within earshot of me. You think that would be some sort of embarrassment to him. Not 10 minutes later he came over to me with that lame excuse about not ordering the right radio....
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Bob while I am not defending the service dept there maybe more at play than just incompetence. FCA has tightened up warranty claims so much thay if Dealers do not follow their procedures precisely the claim will be denied and the Dealer will not get paid. In other words do thing A before doing thing B even if thing B seems to be the correct action. Also all radio work is usually farmed out to a vendor who repairs defective radios and ships them back to the Dealer so you may end up with a refurbished unit FYI. 2018 is the first year of the redesigned Uconnect system which is a great system so hopefully you get it working shortly. If you call Customer Care they will open a file and contact the Service Mgr for his explanation. They are a third party company that tries to arbitrate disputes and has little power to provide any compensation. I would ask for a 90 day extension on your Sirius subscription due to the fact you havent had the use of it.
There's two other Dodge dealers within 10-15 miles of me and I'm going to take my business to them for any future service or warranty work. I will probably point blank inform the service manager at Cook Dodge on my displeasure dealing with him and I know to get ANY action done to correct this B.S. I'll have to report my displeasure to corporate "Chrysler Care".
$110,000 (window sticker price) for 2 vehicles deserve better service than this!!!
$110,000 (window sticker price) for 2 vehicles deserve better service than this!!!
Thanks Graham.
Went to the dealer and they did put a refurb radio in the Ram. Everything is working so far and the dealership paid for a one month extension of my SXM contract.
pomonamissel
Senior Member
i'm supporting you on the dealer change , in fact i would have already pulled the job from that dealer and gone with another . purchase price does not make any difference to the service staff , but corp complaints do , write him up ! do you speak italian commando ?
FWIW... Graham is right, the issues may well be beyond the dealers control. You may continue to have more clout as a loyal customer, if you continue where you are. Warranty repairs at other dealers can be seen by any dealer when they work work on the vehicle and look up history.
If you truly feel another dealer will provide you better service, go ahead and make the change, but they will know you didn't spend the purchase dollars with them, and may not give you the same considerations they would try to provide their own loyal customers. On the other hand, they may bend over backwards to get your future business.
MB had a new radio platform with software problems about 15 years ago. head unit would randomly lock up, no sound and just display the logo so you knew who to be pissed at. Nothing we could do, replacements had the same software. MB issued a TSB stating they knew about the problem and don't attempt repairs until they gave us the new software weeks later...
Customers went crazy, and service writers had their hands full trying to appease them. One even gave a customer a copy of the bulletin to read, he refused to give it back and started working on corporate. I think he had pictures of somebody with a goat or something... he managed to keep his job, but started a real shitstorm.
I'm happy to be an inspiration.Dang it Jeff....i'm writing Cantflip length responses here. Lol!
66Newyorker
Active Member
I understand your frustration with the dealerships service department. I worked as a dealership technician for the better part of 18 years. Some issues are very frustrating to the customer who signed over a large portion of their income for the next few years. I have had customers tell me that I didn’t know my job, was incompetent and so forth. I took pride in my job and doing my best to serve the customer. One thing that was told to me while at the training center was if a vehicle was 99.9% perfect there would be still about 10 or so things wrong with it and that was about 15 or so years ago.
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70bigblockdodge
Old Man with a Hat
My GPS does not work in my 1985 Pete either Hmmmm.
I hear you but there is a difference between incompetance because of technical issues and troubleshooting ( which I don't have problems with) a lot of automotive systems can be quite complex. But incompetance from not doing anything or not taking action in a reasonable amount of time is unforgivable and just plain bad business.
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