About six months ago I had the Dist Cap replaced in my van with one I bought at autozone. While driving home one evening the engine developed a miss, I took it directly to the garage that works on my vehicles, Greg the mechanic, found that the dist cap was not firing on #1 cylinder, no spark at all.
The cap was not cracked nor did it show any failure. It had just stopped working. We replaced the spark plug and the dist cap. It was firing now but the engine still had a miss, due to the raw gas that was being dumped in the cylinder with no fire the oil had been washed away and the rings wore so the cylinder lost compression.
I took the defective cap back to autozone and asked what the brand was. I intended to contact the manufacturer. The person behind the counter told me it was duralast cap, and offered nothing more. I didnt know that duralast was a private label for autozone till I googled it. I emailed them with the problem.
The next day the manager of the local store called me and told me to bring the cap in with a estimate and they would put in a claim. If the cap was found to be defective they would fix the engine.
I took the cap in on a Friday along with the estimate. On monday I received a call from the manager, telling me that the cap was not a autozone cap and I should come back.
I went right to the store and he was right it was not a duralast cap... It was not the one I dropped off either.
I called the district manager, thinking that if I told upper management what happened they would surely make it right.
I talked to a lady named Judy that basically called me liar. Said that there is no reason for their manager to do that. I told her that someone there did switch the part. She got very defensive, asked me if I thought autozone "out to get me", told me that if I brought a reciept and the cap along with the estimate they would look at it.
I told her that the cap I had was not the one that I bought at autozone, and I asked why I was not asked for a receipt with the first one. She said the manager was just trying to help me out so he did not ask for a receipt. She then said this conversation is over and hung up on me. I then called the Regional Manager. He was much nicer and said he would look into it.
That was the last I heard from them.
If they did not want to take care of the damage their defective part caused that would be fine. I could have taken them to small claims with my mechanic and the faulty part to back me and taken my chances.
They made sure the cap was gone.
This has to be the most blatant example of a business taking advantage of their customers I have ever seen.
0 comments