On the date of 2/25/05, after a previous bad
experience with my car's transmission with another
garage (not Aamco), I was told by my brother-in-law
that Aamco does excellent work and that I should
consider taking my car to Aamco. My wife and I did
just that and went to Aamco of Orange, California (
store # 18362 I believe) with the utmost confidence
that a good job would be done.
We we're greeted by Kerry who was working the
counter... All smiles and very helpful to us. After
telling him the problem with the car and discussing
what needed to be done, I felt confident that he knew
what he was talking about and surrendered the car to
him at the price of $1,879.22; this was for the price
of the rebuilding of my car's manual transmission, the
replacement of the left and right front axles and a
brake job on the front brakes.
The car was ready to go on 3/1/05; I signed the
contract without reading the back (where all the
warranty information is) as I was reassured by
"Smiling" Kerry that the manual transmission was under
a 1 year warranty; absolutely nothing was said about
12 months or 12,000 miles which ever comes first or
about "90 days"... And I was in a hurry, so I didn't
ask more questions about the warranty (bad mistake on
my part to trust Aamco too much). I drove off feeling
relieved that the car finally had been repaired by
"real transmission specialists" and Kerry giving a big
friendly wave out the door... Hmmmmm
Sometime in June, the transmission started making a
whining noise while in gear; thinking that I had a 1
year warranty, and being a busy man, I didn't get the
chance to take the car back to Aamco of Orange until
7/11/05. This time I was greeted at the front desk by
Kent (Kerry was nowhere to be found - I was told he
now resided in Las Vegas Nevada... Was he "relocated"?
I proceeded to tell Kent about the sounds that the
transmission was making as well as the "vibrating" the
brakes we're doing when I applied them at high speed.
He checked everything out on the computer and said
that the car would be checked out while making out a
new invoice sheet.
Call me crazy, but at this point I am going to ask a
very relevant question; if the transmission was under
a 90 day warranty, why wasn't anything mentioned by
Kent at this point? All of the information on my car
was right there in the Aamco computer and he would of
seen that it had been well past 90 days since the car
had initially been worked on... He basically went about
his business as if he was honoring a 1 year warranty.
It took over a week to get my car back (sigh) but I
returned to get my car back onn 7/19/05 and was told
by Kent that the car's transmission was successfully
repaired and that the brakes looked fine; I was given
a copy of invoice #1568 and I again drove off feeling
confident again.
Around the end of September-beginning of October, the
whining noise returned. Again, thinking that I had a 1
year warranty and being the busy man that I am, I
finally drove the car back to Aamco of Orange on
10/21/05. This time I was greeted by Jeff at the front
counter (where was Kent?) I tell Jeff about the
noise; he goes to the Aamco computer and proceeds to
tell me that my 90 day warranty expired months ago. I
tell him that I have a 1 year warranty and that I had
already had to bring the car back once during the
summer time for the same transmission noise I was
experiencing; he finds "NO" record of me bringing the
car back the previous July or of a 1 year warranty
given to me back in March.?
I still left my car there for them to check out; Jeff
told me he would be giving me a call by the next
morning and he would let me know what he could do for
me.
The next morning, Jeff called and assured me that the
noise was definately the transmission; I gave him the
invoice number from my visit that previous July... He
looked it up and said there was no record of that
invoice number in the computer. He acted very
confused. He would have to wait until that Monday (2
days later) when the owner of that facility would be
there and he would ask him what should be done about
this situation. I agreed to it.
I talked to Jeff that following Monday; he talked to
the owner and he told me that Aamco was absolutely NOT
going to "fix the transmission for nothing" as he put
it because he had come to the conclusion that I did
not have a 1 year warranty like I thought. But him and
the owner would make me an "offer"- instead of
charging me another $2,400 to repair my transmission,
they would do it for the "generous" price of $1,200
out the door.
How was I supposed to feel at this point? How would
you feel if you were being treated like this by a
company you thought would do a good job for you from
the beginning?
I told Jeff I would let him know what I decided the
next day. That is when my wife and I decided to get a
hold of the home corporate office. My wife made the
initial call and I talked to Tawanda Beatty of
Customer Service. I gave her a brief summary of what
was going on and after listening, she said she would
be giving a call to Aamco of Orange and see what was
going on.
The next day, I spoke to Jeff again and he asked me if
I had made a decision; I ultimately decided to just
pick the car up "as is". He proceeded to ask me when I
had made the call to Aamco Customer Service... Before
or after hearing the proposal he made me? I told him
"after" and he said "Hmmmm... interesting", like how
could I have done such a thing after proposing such a
deal to me?
I picked the car up; Jeff made out an invoice sheet
proving that no additional repairs had been done. I
signed it and left.
The next day, Tawanda Beatty of Customer Service
finally called me back and basically backed "Aamco of
Orange" up; by that point, I was done.
I proceeded to tell her how "disgusted" I was with
Aamco and that not only would I ever be taking a
vehicle back to be worked on by Aamco, but I would
tell everyone I know and/or I care about to never,
ever use Aamco... Avoid Aamco if you don't want to be
screwed over!!!
She said that she was "sorry to hear that" and our
conversation was over. $1,879.22 and my car's
transmission is worse off than before I took it to
Aamco in the first place!!!
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