Greetings! I need your honest opinions to see if I have any recourse with a repair facility. Here is the scenario: My Jeep had a stalling problem. For the first half of the day, almost everyday, when the car came to a complete stop (ie. red light), the car would either stumble, cough and stall or just stall quietly like turning the key to the off position. However, the Jeep always re-started. I finally had the time to bring the Jeep in to a "reputable" facility to diagnose the problem. I left the Jeep overnight so they could attempt to duplicate the stalling problem, which they did. After they got the Jeep to stall, the hooked up the diagnostic computer to pull codes. Showed the car needed a crank position sensor and ignition coil. Fair enough, but here's where is gets kind of interesting. After they pulled the codes, they attempted to start the car, but it would just crank and not start. They then replaced the 2 parts noted above, and guess what? It started and stalled immediately. Then the Jeep would crank and NOT START AT ALL. This is something that NEVER happened before I brought it into this shop. It ALWAYS STARTED. So, once again I had to leave the car overnight. The next day, I get a call from the service manager stating that the reason the car will not start is because my ECU (computer) needs replacement. I stated I brought the car in for a stalling problem, not for a no-start problem! He replied, yeah but this is your problem, blah blah.... So in the end I whipped out my credit card for a $ 750.00 invoice because I desperately needed to get the car back. I had no choice. I have a strong inclination that they fried the computer, because as mentioned, the Jeep ALWAYS started! Finally my question is, do I have any recourse in getting any of the money back? (I can dispute the charge on my credit card). Could it be that they screwed up the computer by plugging in and pulling codes? Why would it all of a sudden not start at all while in the tech's possession? Sorry for being long-winded, but I would greatly appreciate your opinions if you think I have any recourse in this matter. I feel like I got screwed. Thank you so much!
Not if they are a factory authorized service center. They will have the goodies to pull the codes with a certain (high) degree of safety. A baked ECU is going to make life really bad for a tech. I had an old SAAB with a flaky CPU and it fooked with everything the whole time they were trying to figure out the root cause of the problem. I had a new ECU shipped in and installed and it fixed everything.
Korr - The shop is not factory authorized, but the shop is a large chain with a big name. Rather not mention the name at the moment.
