The term "stealership" wasn't earned for no reason

[1sicbronconut]

You can get bent out of shape over this thread but it is a fact that dealerships take advantage of customers by often recommending unnecessary work and charging an arm and a leg to do most work they perform. I don't blame the mechanics for this. I blame the management of the dealership, the owner and/or the auto manufacturer. Our Edge had major transmission work done under warranty at this dealership just 25k miles ago. They know this work required a drain of the fluid to complete but they still tried to nail us for a transmission drain and refill. I wouldn't mind if they said this is service we recommend if it hasn't been done recently. They wanted to make my wife think their list of items "Needs immediate attention" and this is exactly the bold text in red way they presented the items to her. They wanted her to think that not doing these items immediately would cause major issues. This isn't by far the first experience like this we have had with a dealer regarding service. Just to get the transmission fixed properly was a battle we fought with another other Ford dealer in our area for two years before this dealer stepped up and repaired it properly under warranty. I give them credit for doing this but it doesn't mean they are service angels 100% of the time. Maybe you don't operate this way and if you don't then kudos to you.

Then call out that dealership! As a dealership technician I'm constantly fixing work that was done or claimed to be indy shops, and yes I do fix screw ups done by other dealerships also. The ranks of senior technicians is shrinking fast the term "techagedon" is being used within 10 years there will be very few good technicians left at the dealerships us old timers get stuck with all of the not so great paying warranty work it's the young pups and crappy service advisors that are doing all of that un-needed service work.

 

[12secford]

After all this chiseling, did they actually fix your recall items for free?

 

[94Eddie]

Ill just count my lucky stars that I can fix my own things
And
Can't even afford to think about a dealership
...other than parts ...

The only time I think about having a dealer perform a repair is for recalls and warranty work. Otherwise, I do it myself or use the local garage run by a Korean family. They are honest, fast and do quality work. Also, they have no problem with me providing the parts and fluids for the repairs.

 

[94Eddie]

Then call out that dealership! As a dealership technician I'm constantly fixing work that was done or claimed to be indy shops, and yes I do fix screw ups done by other dealerships also. The ranks of senior technicians is shrinking fast the term "techagedon" is being used within 10 years there will be very few good technicians left at the dealerships us old timers get stuck with all of the not so great paying warranty work it's the young pups and crappy service advisors that are doing all of that un-needed service work.

I have called out dealerships in the past. It made zero difference. Most dealerships have likely determined that gouging customers pays off and the ones they piss off and never uses them again isn't bad enough to their bottom line to justify stopping the gouging.

 

[94Eddie]

After all this chiseling, did they actually fix your recall items for free?

Yes but they are legally obligated to do recall work for free. They probably make a lot of money from recall work by recommending all types of repairs and maintenance. Plus, the automakers pay the dealerships to do the recall work.

 

[Dan IN MN]

I'll go you one better - on a non-Ford product. Truck had LESS than 25K, and was 8 years old (still less than 30K). Took it in for a recall on the airbags - waited for it. They came back 20 minutes later, said my truck NEEDED immediate repairs, over $5,000 worth. I had basically no complaints, the vehicle runs and drives fine, and gets its' oil/filter change on a recurring basis (less than every 4k miles), and other maintenance done at an independent shop.
I gave the guy a bit of a dirty look, and told them to "put in the airbags, and do not to touch anything else"..
Guess they didn't like my attitude - Took them almost 3 hours to get those driver/passenger airbags in, and I haven't gone back there..
Oh yea - Took the truck over to my 'independent' repair shop, which we have a good relationship with. Didn't tell them anything, just said 'give it a good look, front to rear'. Said EVERYTHING was fine. Then, I showed him the invoice from the dealer - he was astounded - said "MAN! You dodged a bullet, didn't you?"..

Here's a 3 video series of dealership failure.

 

[AdamWest436]

Yea really great of you guys to characterize all dealerships as being "Stealerships" as a Ford technician with 33+ years of experience I really hate that term, I'll bookmark this thread and remember the comments and make sure this "Stealership" technician avoids chiming in with help next time around some of you might need my 33 years of experience. rant off I'll stick to my first gen area from now on.

Sorry you feel that way, I wish there was more of you around. These days it's like having the argument bad cops outweight good cops before going off the political deep end. I have a 19 Explorer that I paid $40 for a map update and now the dealership wants $400 to figure out how the $40 update went wrong making most the radio not work. Sync team just been leaving voicemails saying still looking into it. Luckily I still have access to apple car play or it would be FM only.