I returned from an overseas assignment and was assigned to a local unit in the Phoenix area and needed transportation. I looked at a couple of dealerships and knew I wanted to get either a truck or an SUV.
I found a decent deal at Bill Heard Chevrolet for a 2001 Jeep Grand Cherokee with 24,000 miles on it and I went thru the finance department to see what I would qualify for. I would have gone thru my bank but I had just finished paying off over $20,000 in credit card debt and didnt think I would qualify.
The original offer was $19,000 plus tax, title and license and $2,000 down with an 18% interest rate. I felt this was a little high so I told them I wasn't interested. They told me I couldn't get a better interest rate since the credit report didnt show my having a car loan in the past. I was 30 years old at the time and told them I had a couple of car loans, one of which was solely in my name in 1996, the rest were co-signed. I had spent 7 out of the previous 12 years overseas and either didn't need vehicle due to mass transit or bought clunkers for $500 and drove them into the ground.
I identified the previous vehicle I had financed in 1996 and they went back to seeing if they could qualify me for the loan. They returned and told me I could get the interest rate lowered to 13% so I agreed to the loan. I told them that since I was in the military and my home of record was in Illinois that I didn't have to pay the Arizona registration tax which would have come out to over $600 and that all I had to pay to get a vehicle registered was the $22.60 for registration to get my plates.
I then found out that I could also get my own plates from Illinois since I was a veteran but the dealership had to send in the registration info here and could refund me later when I got my affidavit signed by my commander and my plates from Illinois. Well the plates from Illinois proved to be too difficult to do since I was still in Arizona so I just went with the Arizona plates but I still wasn't required to pay the full registration tax that Arizona residents pay. I was expecting a refund of approximately $600 but when I went in to finish the paperwork they told me I had to redo the finance contract because of the change in registration and they would apply the $600 towards the downpayment and lower my monthly payments.
When I signed the contracts the second time I didnt notice the error even though I questioned the lack of a lower payment and no refund. I noticed a day later when I was re-reading the contract that the interest rate was now up from 13% to 16%?? Guess I should have read the contract a little closer. I attempted to work this out with their finance department but I didnt have the original contract because the finance guy took it from me when I signed the new one.
I attempted to get a copy of the original contract but the finance department failed to respond to my phone calls and said they were working on it but never responded even though I went into the dealership numerous times to complain about it.
I'll never go to a Chevrolet dealership again. Not with the way they screwed me out of a few bucks. Funny thing is after I traded the Jeep in they sent me an email stating they were going to give me a great deal on it because they had a need to buy a lot of them in the near future.
I laughed when I got that. I wouldn't step onto their lot if you paid me.
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