My wife was out of state on a trip to Mobile, Alabama on March 24th when the transmission in our 1996 Dodge Caravan locked up in 2nd gear. Since the Dodge dealer in Mobile was too busy to see the van for a few days, I decided to have my wife take the van to Mr. Transmission.
As a free service, Mr. Transmission removed the automatic transmission pan to look for evidence of the problem. Mr. Transmission informed me that the next step would be to remove and disassemble the transmission in order to determine the cause of the problem and that the labor cost would be $400 to perform this. I agreed after I asked them how much it would cost (worst case) and I was told about $1200 including parts and all labor (this seemed reasonable since the Dodge dealer total cost would have been about $2500 for for a complete new unit with a 3 year, 36,000 mile warranty).
Later I received a call from Mr. Transmission stating that after the transmission was disassembled it was discovered that problem was worst than what they had estimated and the actual cost in parts alone would be $1800 plus the aforementioned $400 in labor.in my haste and realizing the $400 in labor was already spent toward the repair, I agreed and gave him the last 4 digits of my social security number as Mr. Transmission required. While complaining to the district manager Mike May, about the high cost of this repair he reassured me by giving me his word that even though the repair was guaranteed for only 12 months or 12,000 miles, he told me that the transmission would outlast the engine in the van. A statement such as this from a district manager should have been creditable. I told him I wanted an itemized receipt available when my wife picked up the van. When I received the receipt from my wife, I was surprised to find the receipt was not itemized. I had to make numerous phone calls to Mr. Transmission for a week to finally receive a fax copy of the itemized bill of the parts several of which cost nearly double the local Panama City Dodge dealer retail prices! I have never known any automotive repair facility to charge more than dealer retail prices for parts. Mr. Transmission apparently has no problem with this.
Little did I realize that the worst was yet to come.in July (which was 16 months and 14,000 miles after the repair) my family and I were on a vacation trip to the Tennessee Mountains when the transmission began to slip to the point that the van was undrivable. The transmission warranty was for 12 months or 12,000 miles (whichever occurs first). While ascending a hill on a previous trip a year earlier to the mountains, the transmission violently shifted back and forth between different gears until I took my foot off the accelerator. That day I called the Asheville, NC Mr. Transmission. He told me it would be at least 3 days until he could look at the van and besides this was normal for a Florida van in the mountains since the computer has to reprogram itself for the different driving conditions. Unfortunately I did not get this in writing by taking the van in.
I immediately called Mike May (the Mr. Transmission district manager in Mobile involved in the original repair). He told me he understood the van was just 2,000 miles over the warranty and that the transmission would have to be inspected before he could commit to having it fixed free of charge. He suggested having the van towed (at my expense) back to the Mr. Transmission in Panama City, FL (near our home in Lynn Haven) since he could work with this shop. I was informed they would inspect the inside of the transmission and decide what to do from this point.
The van remained parked in the Mr. Transmission lot for 8 days until the local Mr. Transmission owner Marlon Ducker test drove the van and spoke to the Mobile AL district manager Mike May to reach a decision on what to do. Marlon Ducker called me and offered to repair the transmission and install a transmission cooler at cost all to the tune of a total bill just under $1500. He informed me that this was a very reasonable price for the transmission repair. This would have brought my total expenses to $3900 plus towing costs all within a 16 month period. What an outrage! This is my wife's van driven 90% of the time on Florida flatlands used to ferry my kids to and from school and various activities. The van was never used for towing or subjected to any sort of abuse.
Mr. Transmission's Chicago based customer relations employee Jackie McNeil offered no help either. Her comment basically was "after all the van is out of the warranty period". Again, this flawed repair cost $2400 and was only out of warranty 2000 miles and 4 months. Needless to say, I did not allow Mr. Transmission to do any type of work on the van. I had a reputable local transmission shop do the rebuild.
I have never been so ripped off in all my life. Mr. Transmission has proven to me to be incompetent and unethical from the corporate headquarters to the district manager level. They successfully ripped me off for $2400 plus towing expenses for a repair that malfunctioned and eventually failed after 14,000 miles. Please consider this incident before giving them your business.
Todd
Lynn Haven, Florida
U.S.A.
0 comments