I didn't let this company rip me off, because I asked a lot of questions after finding a great deal of shady information about it online (besides all the complaints at this and other similar sites, they currently have an "unsatisfactory" rating with the Missouri Better Business Bureau: http://stlouis. BBB.org/WWWRoot/Report. Aspx? Site=142&bbb=0734&firm=310016763).
I received a letter stating that the factory warranty on my 2008 Subaru "has expired or may be expiring soon." I called the toll free number (866-847-6655) and spoke to Tony, who gave me a quote of $3,320 for an extended "bumper-to-bumper" warranty of 6 years (from a point in time 30 days from when I would purchase the new warranty) or 100,000 miles, with a $100 deductible. It sounded like a lot of money to me so I told him I would have to do some research online and then get back to him.
I immediately discovered online that Subaru offers a 7 year (from the time I purchased the car, 10 months ago), or 100,000 mile warranty, with the same $100 deductible, through a service called Added Security. The cost: $2,000, or $1,300 (39%) LESS that Dealer Services.
I called Dealer Services back to see if maybe they gave me the wrong quote (I thought surely they couldn't be that out of line with what my Subaru dealer was offereing). This time I spoke with Josh, who told me Tony was on another line. I told Josh I thought the other representative must have given me a bad number, since it was almost 40% more than Subaru's offer, and asked if he could give me the 2008 Subaru (with 11,000 miles, for my state) quote for 6 years or 100,000 miles, with a $100 deductible. He said he couldn't do that because "he couldn't open my file." When I asked what that meant he said that since another agent had given me the quote he couldn't open my file and therefore wasn't allowed to give me a quote. I asked him if this was in case the two quotes didn't match, and he said that was possible since the quote depends on a lot of factors, such as type of car and mileage. I said all Tony had to base that quote off was that I had a 2008 Subaru Foreseter with 11,000 miles on it (I didn't give the VIN#), so I didn't understand how he could somehow come up with a different quote less than 20 minutes later.
After I told him that the Subaru web site lists all their quotes in a straightforward chart, and that it seemed shady to me that Dealer Services can't repeat the same quote twice in a 25-minute time span, he told me his manager had just walked by and given him authorization to "open my file" and give me the quote. He gave me the exact same $3,320 quote that Tony had given me. That the quote didn't go up, at least, was encouraging to me. But I told him I could get the same thing for $2,000 from Subaru's Added Security plan, and asked why their coverage cost $1,320 more.
He told me you get what you pay for with a lot of warranty services, and that a lot of dealer-promoted warrantys have gone belly-up in the past, leaving customers high and dry. He also said the Subaru warranty likely didn't cover as many parts and services as the Dealer Services one. I agreed that these might be true statements, but that I didn't have that information all in writing in front of me for comparison, so I couldn't really make a decision right now based on that.
I asked if the $3,320 quote was a final offer, or if there was any kind of leeway in trying to meet or beat other company offers (i.E. Could they offer me the extended warrany for $2,000, like the Subaru affiliated company). Josh said he could put me through to his manager, and he did. This was after about a half hour of round-about discussion.
Neil, the "financing manager" then got on the phone and reconfirmed all the information that I'd gone over with Tony and Josh. I asked straight up if he could meet the Subaru-sponsored price, and he took a few moments looking things up, then said he could offer me the same thing for $2,313, or almost exactly $1,000 less than the original Dealer Services quote of $3,320. I asked what had changed between now and that first quote to make the service worth $1,000 less, and he said that he had gone and searched "lower prices" for me. At this point I almost lost the total calm and cool I had going throughout this whole thing, and said "Why didn't you do that for me in the first place?!" I'm still asking myself why.
I know there's nothing illegal about quoting a high price and then making the customer talk, argue, and browbeat you down. But given the examples of Progressive Insurance (not a warranty company, but still a good example of customer service), and even the Subaru web site (which at least listed a chart of prices for comparison) who practice transparency in their pricing structure, why should customers have to go to all the trouble of haggling on the phone for 45 minutes. I told Neil, the finance manager, that I completely disapproved of his company's lack of transparency, and that I certainly didn't ever intend to buy anthing from them. I didn't plan to buy from them from the moment I dialed their number, but I just wanted to get some concrete information on their business practices that I could give to other people. I also calmly and politely told him I would plan to tell the maximum amount of people I could about my negative experience with his company.
To his credit Neil was very calm and polite as well (all three reps were polite, except that one was eating, or chewing on something the entire time we were talking), and he wished me a good evening before hanging up, and said he was "glad that I had satisfied myself."
I know this wasn't a "rip-off" report pre se, but I felt strongly about letting people know at least if they're going to call this company, they might as well hang on the line arguing for 45 minutes, and get transferred to a financing manager, to get the price knocked down about $1,000. It doesn't give me a really good feeling that they have their prices set fairly if they're able to do this kind of thing so freely. More people have to ask more questions to stop companies like this from taking advantage!
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