rktsci
11-10-2007, 12:21 PM
Hey guys...i need to see that i'm not being unreasonable on this.
Today I was planning to mount my winter tires and at the same time replace my rear brake rotors and pads. I brought my car to a heated warehouse in Maple where I could do my work in comfort. I went to take off my front left tire and noticed that it took an astonishing amount of force to loosen the nuts - my 7.5 amp electric impact gun wouldn't do the trick. I nearly had all of my weight on a breaker bar to get the nuts loosened. So pretty much the service guy at Prima over-torqued my wheel nuts yet again when they did my last rotation. Every time I go for service I always mention for them not to do this since it happened the very first time I went to mount my winters two years ago. I eventually got the one tire done.
So now I was going to make my way to the rears. I jacked the car and put it on stands and I went to loosen the wheel nuts...and the same thing happens...but I get all of the nuts off all except the one with the wheel lock. I tried my breaker bar and nothing, I tried my impact gun and nothing, back to the breaker bar and again to the impact gun. On my last attempt with the impact gun, the wheel lock BROKE!!!
So now I'm just pissed! I call Prima Mazda and speak with the service manager (John) and he tells me to put the other 4 nuts back on and leave the one with the lock alone and bring the car in. By the way I was at Keele & Rutherford. He assured me that this would be ok but I wasn't very comfortable with the idea and so I drive to Prima.
Once I get there I show the service manager the wheel lock key and the bits that broke off the wheel lock and explain how pissed I am because one of his mechanics didn't feel like following the service manual specifications and tighten the shit of the wheel nuts. He tells me that they will get the lock off and loosen the other nuts back to spec. I insisted that they also swap out my rear rotors and pads since I just lost all of my time allocated to this task.
1 hour later they call me to tell me that I can have my car back and at that point the service manager offers me a mazda blanket and a free oil change. At this point I had lost 4 hours of my time over carelessness. At this point I ask to speak with the general manager of Prima to explain how pissed I was and to see what he was going to do to keep me as a customer. The moment I asked for the GM, the service manager takes the blanked off the counter and probably docks the oil change off my account.
I sit down with the GM and recount my story yet again and inform him that the only way that he will keep me as a customer is to make the time i lost worthwhile by installing the rear brake pads and rotors at no cost (I already had the parts!). He flat out refused and didn't even attempt to compromise.
I then went out to tell him that heaven forbid I ever needed to change my tire on the side of the road because of an emergency I wouldn't have been able to do it with the simple tools that are provided with my car and therefore would have had to have it towed just to change a wheel! I also tell him that overtorquing bolts is just careless and can create its own safety issues. He tells me that they exceed the factory spec for safety reasons which is a pile of crap.
I proceed to take his card and leave with the intention of following up with Mazda Canada and tell him that he has just lost a customer.
So now as i type, my car has one winter tire mounted which I'm going to take off and put my summer back on, my brakes still in the box, and apparantly properly torqued wheel nuts which I'm going to verify once I finish here. So now I need to devote yet another Saturday morning to do this!
Am I being unreasonable here?
Today I was planning to mount my winter tires and at the same time replace my rear brake rotors and pads. I brought my car to a heated warehouse in Maple where I could do my work in comfort. I went to take off my front left tire and noticed that it took an astonishing amount of force to loosen the nuts - my 7.5 amp electric impact gun wouldn't do the trick. I nearly had all of my weight on a breaker bar to get the nuts loosened. So pretty much the service guy at Prima over-torqued my wheel nuts yet again when they did my last rotation. Every time I go for service I always mention for them not to do this since it happened the very first time I went to mount my winters two years ago. I eventually got the one tire done.
So now I was going to make my way to the rears. I jacked the car and put it on stands and I went to loosen the wheel nuts...and the same thing happens...but I get all of the nuts off all except the one with the wheel lock. I tried my breaker bar and nothing, I tried my impact gun and nothing, back to the breaker bar and again to the impact gun. On my last attempt with the impact gun, the wheel lock BROKE!!!
So now I'm just pissed! I call Prima Mazda and speak with the service manager (John) and he tells me to put the other 4 nuts back on and leave the one with the lock alone and bring the car in. By the way I was at Keele & Rutherford. He assured me that this would be ok but I wasn't very comfortable with the idea and so I drive to Prima.
Once I get there I show the service manager the wheel lock key and the bits that broke off the wheel lock and explain how pissed I am because one of his mechanics didn't feel like following the service manual specifications and tighten the shit of the wheel nuts. He tells me that they will get the lock off and loosen the other nuts back to spec. I insisted that they also swap out my rear rotors and pads since I just lost all of my time allocated to this task.
1 hour later they call me to tell me that I can have my car back and at that point the service manager offers me a mazda blanket and a free oil change. At this point I had lost 4 hours of my time over carelessness. At this point I ask to speak with the general manager of Prima to explain how pissed I was and to see what he was going to do to keep me as a customer. The moment I asked for the GM, the service manager takes the blanked off the counter and probably docks the oil change off my account.
I sit down with the GM and recount my story yet again and inform him that the only way that he will keep me as a customer is to make the time i lost worthwhile by installing the rear brake pads and rotors at no cost (I already had the parts!). He flat out refused and didn't even attempt to compromise.
I then went out to tell him that heaven forbid I ever needed to change my tire on the side of the road because of an emergency I wouldn't have been able to do it with the simple tools that are provided with my car and therefore would have had to have it towed just to change a wheel! I also tell him that overtorquing bolts is just careless and can create its own safety issues. He tells me that they exceed the factory spec for safety reasons which is a pile of crap.
I proceed to take his card and leave with the intention of following up with Mazda Canada and tell him that he has just lost a customer.
So now as i type, my car has one winter tire mounted which I'm going to take off and put my summer back on, my brakes still in the box, and apparantly properly torqued wheel nuts which I'm going to verify once I finish here. So now I need to devote yet another Saturday morning to do this!
Am I being unreasonable here?