I formerly leased a 2001 Galant ES that was due to be returned to Metro Mitsubishi in March. Starting in January I began receiving letters from Mitsubishi Motors inviting me to return my vehicle early and before the lease expiration to lease or purchase a new Mitsubishi. On February 7, again at Mitsubishi's written invitation, I returned my 2001 Galant ES. Since I had in past years returned two other vehicles leased from Metro Mitsubishi prior to the lease terminations I thought nothing of it. That same day, I bought a used 2004 Endeavor.
Not wanting to make lease payments for a car I had returned to the dealer, I contacted MMCA on February 10, and informed them that I'd returned the 2001 Galant and purchased a 2004 Endeavor. The woman I spoke with told me I wouldn't owe lease payments for February or March providing Metro Mitsubishi submitted to MMCA the necessary paperwork verifying my claim that I'd returned the car on February 7. Shortly following that time, I started receiving letters from MMCA demanding 2 months' lease payments for Feb & March totaling $766.01. When I contacted Metro I was informed that there was a glitch at MMCA and they were not properly recording lease termination notices even though the dealers were clearly faxing the information to MMCA. The dealer said he'd already sent the lease termination information to MMCA once and he apologized for the inconvenience. The payment reminders continued to arrive every few weeks and MMCA started calling my place of business and leaving messages. I ultimately spoke with one of MMCA's representatives and told him I'd turned the car in on February 7. He said he had no information regarding that and as far as MMCA was concerned, I still had the car in my possession and I was two months in arrears on my lease payments. He concluded by saying that getting the dealer to send MMCA the information about my lease termination was my problem and MMCA would soon be putting me into collections for the payments I owed unless they heard otherwise.
Metro Mitsubishi repeatedly faxed details about my returning the 2001 Galant on February 7 to MMCA; the 4th time I was told by the dealer I spoke with that MMCA finally seemed to have gotten the message. The manager at Metro Mitsubishi I'd talked to earlier told me that was only after he personally had faxed the lease termination info and confirmed it was received by someone at MMCA. Sure enough, in May the collection letters stopped.
In June the letters demanding $766.01 started coming my way again. I contacted the dealer once again and the man I spoke with asked me to email copies of the letters to him; which I did. Just yesterday I received yet another set of letters from MMCA now saying I owed $383.01 (1 lease payment). What makes these letters particularly annoying is that I did not even possess the 2001 Galant during the time MMCA claims I was leasing it the car was returned to and possessed by Metro Mitsubishi. I additionally now have to determine how these bogus collection proceedings have impacted my credit rating.
I contacted Metro Mitsubishi and got connected directly with the finance manager. I had to recount the entire story to him to bring him up to speed. He told me that I probably was getting payment requests as a penalty for terminating the lease 30 days early. I explained that I'd returned the Galant early at Mitsubishi's written invitation and, like the other two times before, I'd never been charged. The manager said that in those other cases I'd leased a new vehicle, and that when a customer leases or buys a new vehicle, MMCA forgives any outstanding lease payments. He said that because I'd purchased a used 2004 Endeavor, MMCA probably in his view wasn't willing to forgive my last lease payment I told him that was total B.S..
I have been a loyal Mitsubishi customer for more than a decade and I've never experienced anything like this before - the 2004 Endeavor is my 4th vehicle with Metro. I am about to contact the Minnesota Attorney General's office and I also let Metro Mitsubishi know how their finance company is destroying customers' trust.
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