Since vehicle was returned, vehicle had broken down three separate times in 5 months, once with a broken water pump, and two other times with catastrophic transmission failure.
First breakdown was a transmission failure on a major freeway, which Thunderbolt handled, although because they had no paperwork for me to sign stating that they were repairing it when towed to their facilities, they refuse to even disclose that anything had broken.
Second breakdown was an overheated engine due to a broken water pump when vehicle was taken 1500 miles away. Thunderbolt failed to honor the warranty because the vehicle broke down out of town.
Third breakdown was another catastrophic transmission failure on a freeway, again 1800 miles away. Transmission would not shift out of first gear. Due to the prior two breakdowns of this vehicle, I felt that Thunderbolt would not honor this warranty repair of over $2,500 with a transmission rebuild. I ended up selling the vehicle rather than having it repaired due to this. I later found out that Thunderbolt is a member of ATRA, which is a service that would allow warranty repairs to be handled on vehicles. Nothing was ever detailed in writing, nor verbally told to me by Thunderbolt about this.
Thunderbolt's take is that we did not use care in operating the vehicle, and have repeatedly tried to place the blame on me for the vehicle breaking down. They have told repeated lies about the status of the vehicle, and my hesitance to work with them on this.in truth, they refused warranty of the water pump, except to give me a replacement water pump for future use. They claim that if I had mentioned ATRA to the repair facility that determined that the transmission had failed, that this could have been taken care of. I did not know a thing about ATRA, plus with the prior reputation of their so-called warranty service, didn't believe they would honor it.
Thunderbolt's offer of restitution was to give me a new water pump with a return of the broken one (put one in my hands), and to give me $300 off the next installation of an engine or transmission. This was after paying them $6,422 for the original repair, plus $400 for the water pump repair that they didn't cover.
Since I no longer own the vehicle, this would do me no good now. I have offered to settle with them for $1,000, knowing that the vehicle has broken down three separate times. But, they responded to me that they have no record of the first transmission breakdown, and that the other two breakdowns were all my fault for not exercising good judgment in the driving of the vehicle.in reality, we had the oil changed per the instructions given by Thunderbolt which they verified, vehicle was transported to its destination by car carrier, and we adhered to proper speed during it's break-in period of 1,000 miles or more.
Vehicle had never broken down before we took it to Thunderbolt. After we received the vehicle, three breakdowns had occurred with this newly rebuilt engine and transmission.
0 comments