Dealer falsified mileage on warranty claim: follow up

I thought I'd start a new thread since my old post is probably buried by
now.

I took the advice of this group and contacted Honda customer service via
phone to file a complaint. It took the rep at Honda about a week to get in
touch with the service manager at the dealership. (Apparently she had left
him a few messages and finally talked to a service writer who agreed to
personally deliver a message to the service manager.)

The dealership admitted the "mistake" and offered to perform the service for
me. The rep encouraged me to let them do the work.

Which, of course, is the last thing I want to do.

After a service manager has lied to you ("...we have to eat this one....you
can still get the service performed at any Honda dealership up to 150k
miles...."), it doesn't exactly encourage one to have their service
department do more work on your car. Plus, this is the same dealership with
whom I had a bad experience when they installed new seatbelts last December:

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&selm=uuo9njl2f66
g4e%40corp.supernews.com

The customer service rep essentially told me they couldn't do anything; this
was now an issue between the dealership who filed the claim and the warranty
department at Honda. I even called the good dealer (the ones who were going
to do this work for me, till they ran my VIN) and they encouraged me to just
let the other dealer do it. They surmised that the other dealer had, in the
perception of Honda, made the effort to appease me and any more resistance
from me would be perceived as beating a dead horse. Honda apparently isn't
overly concerned about the false warranty claim.

I don't want the bad dealership to perform the service...period. And I
don't think I should have to: the mistake was on *their* end, I did nothing
wrong. I pointed out their mistake and they still filed a false claim,
which has the side effect of me now chasing them trying to get a resolution
to this.

In short, I was entitled to take my car to any Honda dealer in the U.S.
between 75 and 150k to get this service done. Now I can't, and it's their
fault.

Now what? Any advice on getting this cleaned up in a timely manner?

tia,
-patrick

 

There are two things about cars that really stink. One is playing
games with the dealers when buying the car. The second is having it
serviced when you have a problem. I have realized that the sales and
service guys are in most cases very difficult to deal with. Honda
products are so good that these guys can be that way (ie, folks keep
coming back). I cant say that about other makers. Anyway, the best
way to insulate yourself from these guys is to buy a car that needs
only minimal service (ie, like the honda).

 

The "Rep" wants the easy way out, the one that doesn't require any changes
in the corporate computer records. That's why he is encouraging you to take
your car to the dealer that is offering to do the work essentially "under
the table."

No doubt.

Yes, and unless you stir the pot, the issue is closed. They like it that
way.

They have to live with that dealer too. Don't expect any help from that
end.

That isn't expected. To them it was simply an "error".

Well, you either get the service done at the dealer that screwed it up (and
hope that they don't do something malicious to your car) or you go up the
ladder at Honda customer service. If you go up the ladder, explain that you
are concerned that the dealer that got caught will not do work up to Honda
quality and that you simply want the options that you were originally
entitled to, that of having any dealer do the work. You might as well try
going to the rep's supervisor as you have nothing to lose if you do.

 

I don't have the original post, but I didn't remember that you had any
complaints about the work they actually did on the car, just that they
took it upon themselves to do work before the specified period. Then
they apparently reported it falsely to Honda.

This doesn't seem worth the time, frankly. I'd have the old dealer do
the service again as they've offered. Verify that the work was done
and move on. If there is a problem with that work, you can always take
the car somewhere else under the Honda service warranty.

You won. Honda agreed and forced the dealer to redo the work at no
charge to you or Honda. As far as Honda is concerned, they've already
paid the dealer to do the work.