About a year ago my wife went to pepboys in Carson to service her front brakes. After the initial service, they came to my wife and told her that the rotors needed to be changed too. Knowing the way my wife drives her brakes down to the metal, I'm pretty sure they were honest with that. So she agreed.
Everything seems ok until January of this year. I go to South Bay Dodge in Torrance CA to get some service done. They also did a full inspection of the car. They let me know that the rotors were under spec. How can this be when I got brand new rotors? The only way it can get that low is if you resurface them multimple times and my brakes weren't touched since Pep Boys. No way it can get like that in less than a year.
My feeling is that they charged my wife for something they didnt do. Because of my schedule I didn't make it back to Pep Boys until yesterday Mar 21st. I tell the service tech my problem and she says, "there is nothing they can do about it because it happen too long ago." I disagree with her and ask her can I talk to somebody else. She says, "yeah, but come back later because he's not around right now."
I go back about 2 hours later and I talk to the guy (forgot his name). He was really cool and seemed pretty concerned about the problem. He says, "we will do a break inspection for free and if they're under spec then we will switch them out." They were a special order item so he actually ordered them right then and there. He told me the new rotors will be in tomorrow. I agreed with his offer.
"Special order", this kept ringing in my head. If you special order something doesn't it take "TIME" to get to Pepboys. So I look at my receipt and I see the time my wife checked in and the time my wife checked out. The car was at pepboys for about 2hrs. She said she was there for about 45 minutes before they even looked at the car.
So the mechanic pulled the tires off.inspected the brakes. Notified her about the rotors. My wife said it took her about 5 trys before I answered my cellphone. I told her to call me if they wanted to do anything extra. They ordered the rotors. They got it delivered. He installed them. Then packed the bearings. Then put the pads on. Then the tires on. Then test drove it. ALL in little more than an hour... I dont know about u but it Sounds kind of fishy to me...
In the mean time I see them grab my car, put it up on the hoist and take the tires off. I asked the mechanic can I come and check them out for myself. I looked at them and can tell right off the back that the rotors were way more than a year old. Im pretty sure they were the factory rotors. They measured it and it was about. 005 away from being under spec.
At this time I'm pretty ticked off about the situation. I dont want these guys touching my wife's car anymore. I go and look for the guy that gave me the offer but he went home for the day. I end up talking to another guy. I tell him, "I want a full refund so i can go buy the parts and do it myself because I dont want you guys touching the car anymore." He says "but we ordered the rotors already and I cant make that decision anyways."
He ends up telling me to come back tomorrow and talk to the service manager "Ronald Kravitsky". I get there the next day and I talk to the guy. He tells me "theres nothing we can do because I could have had the brakes done from somebody else since then." I told him I didn't. He says, "how do we know that."
Now im really pissed off. First they charged my wife for something they clearly didnt do. And now he's calling me a liar. Then he says something about the rotors probably have a sensitive material and they need special pads to go with it (my b.S. Detector is going off at this moment). I tell him that is something that you guys should know about, being ASE certified:), and that I shouldn't be responsible for you guys putting the wrong pads in.
He said, "WELL THATS NOT OUR PROBLEM." I said, "B&SHIT, what kind of sh-t are you guys running around here." I said that pretty loud too so the other customers can here me:). He said, "there's nothing we can do for you so you have to leave the premises now." I said, "I'm not leaving until my car gets fixed." He says, "well im calling the cops then." I said, "call the f&en cops then."
So he called. I ask him who's his boss. He told me her name but she wasnt there. So I left and now Im writing this report.
I'm headed back to pepboys right now its Sat Mar 22nd 11:54AM, so wish me good luck... To be continued...
Matthew
Gardena, California
U.S.A.
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