I recently took my Ford Expedition in to the Merchants Tire and Auto Center in Charlottesville on Long St. (Pantops Mtn.) for an oil change. I was just under 90,000 miles so they recommended I get my 90,000 mile service. I agreed and they proceeded to change all the fluids and check belts and hoses and so on. They charged me over $500 for all this.
Less than a month later, my car starts shifting improperly (over-revving then making a loud pop then shifting). I take it back in and they say "bad news and good news, bad news is your transmission is shot and its an expensive repair, the good news is they fixed the issues and the new transmissions are better, it'll be $3400 to repair it." Well I bought the car with an extended warranty that covered the transmission, they tried to convince me not to use the warranty because I would "get a better part through them".
After 2 weeks of my car sitting at their shop it turns out they never told the warranty company to send the part. I had to do that, it took another 4 days for it to get there and when it finally did it was quote "the wrong part and its broken". I filed a complaint with Merchants Corporate, so the store manager finds out, calls me and tells me he's done working on the car, I'm putting it back together and sitting it outside you can come pick it up.
I get it towed over to the dealer where I bought it from and it turns out that the hoses connecting to the transmission (the ones you would take off during a fluid flush at 90,000 miles) aren't connected properly and the car is 6 quarts low on transmission fluid. The dealer connected the lines correctly, replaced the fluid and now it drives fine!!! Be very wary of dealing with Merchants, they are either incompetent or devious or perhaps both, but one thing is for sure, they are expensive.
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