One of my pet peeves is mechanics who do a crappy job because they figure the customer will never find out. My 02 BMW 325 came with free oil changes for 3 years or something, and I dont put that many miles on it. I changed it myself at 7500 miles, got the free one at 15k miles (when the engine computer said it needed it), now I am just doing it myself at 22.5k miles. The bottom of the engine is covered. There is a plastic access door that is held in by 2 hinges and a cam-lock type screw. It's pretty friggin well held on. So it was there at 7.5k miles, now the 2nd time I am changing my oil, its gone. Its been 1.5 years since I got my local BMW dealer to change my oil. There are no break marks at the hinges and the screw hole is not stripped out - in other words, it did NOT come off during normal driving. That sh*t really pisses me off. They just couldnt be bothered to take a few minutes to put the g*d damn flap back that is supposed to keep crap and dirt out of the engine bay. How hard is it to put a f***ing FLAP back on? I wish I knew who the mechanic was so I could wring his neck - for real. What do we need to do these days? Take our car home and do a complete inspection before we know it's not been molested by incompetent mechanics? BMW service is supposed to be good, coffee and donuts and the WSJ in the waiting room - yet they hack the cars up like a damn Chevy dealer. I swear, I need to check my order at Burger King these days because 50% of the time they forgot something. I need to check my car wasn't hacked when I let someone touch it. I need to check shipments coming to me to make sure stuff wasnt forgotten. WTF!!!!! So should I call and ***** them out 1.5 years later? I KNOW it was those mofos that left the damn flap off. If they just gave me a new one I would be happy, and I will just have to be extra sure they didnt hack my car anytime in the future - and if I ever catch them doing so, I will raise holy hell.
year and a half is a stretch. I suppose it depends on the dealership and from the sounds of it, they'd more than likely to politely tell you to go piss up a rope.
i can honestly say i've never heard that expression before... Very colorful... Mike, i don't think you should call and b!tch... i think you should go down there and b!tch in person...!!! You bought that car new, right...? Part of buying a new BMW is getting excellent service and all that jazz, right...? i'd go down there and make them give me a new door and a free key chain or 1:18 model or something...
Wait until the warranty is up and then you won't be required to put up with sub-par service. Its not just BMW, its with most dealerships because they deal with volume not individuals. At a specialist, its in their best interest to make sure things are repaired correctly and you receive appropriate/acceptable customer service. In other words, more likely to mind their P's and Q's. Dealership screw up? Unhappy customer? Very unlikely to affect the bottom line of the mechanic at a dealership. Where's the motivation? 1.5 years is a bit of a stretch. If you want to piss them off or get back at them, call BMW customer service and fill out a survey and ding them on everything. Say you never received one. That affects the management where as *****ing at a service advisor/manager gets you nowhere and earns your car even less attention when its there for service. Sunny
*****ing will get you nowhere. What you should do is take a deep breath, call the service manager, and politely explain what you posted above. You will get a new oil filter cover door. Calling and insulting the dealership and it's employees will most likely get a pound sand reply. There IS a chance it fell off by other means. I am a fixed ops manager at a dealership, and when people come in with a cool head and explain themselves without looking down on my shop or it's employees, I try to honor any reasonable request and even some that are over the top. When people come in flying off the handle, I usually analyze the situation a little harder and am not as likely to go beyond the ordinary. If it's something we clearly did, I will take care of things either way, but your case isn't so strong with 1 1/2 years gone by. People make mistakes. Maybe you haven't made any yet. Good luck, John
I had a tech swap out my Optima battery! Like I wasnt going to notice. He tried to say he forgot to swap it back out. Please. I was so pissed I wanted to break a stick in his @ss, instead I made the dealership give me a free 14k service.
first heard it used in the military along with a few other chioce ones the 'ol Sarge uses from time to time.
My opinion: It would be very easy for your BMW dealer to pull the record on your 15K service and see which mechanic did the actual work. If you go to the service manager and tell him what happened, he could go to that mechanic and ask him if there was any chance that he left the cover off, either by accident or on purpose. If he did it on purpose, chances are that he doesn't work there any longer, because he's a crappy mechanic, and they will buy you a new cover. If he did it by accident (forgot it), he will probably admit it and you will get a new cover. Maybe it's still sitting under his workbench. I highly doubt that any professional mechanic makes a habit of throwing cover plates into the trash. Ask them if they have had other reports of the plates falling off. I used to work for Acura. We would see the lower cover plates on Integras falling off all the time, because the plastic clips didn't stay in place, and eventually they drooped to the point that they got snagged on something and torn off. It wouldn't hurt to call and report what you found, but don't automatically assume that it was due to incompetence. If they automatically dismiss your question without even investigating, then they probably ARE incompetent. 2,000 posts without offending anyone, hopefully!
Excellent advice. A calm explanation with a clear picture of what can be done to resolve your unhappiness will win over a rant EVERY time. Mike, I feel your pain. I have come to expect incompetence everywhere and am rarely dissapointed. When it comes to dealing with cars, whether buying or servicing, relationships are everthing.
I would think they'd replace it. It obviously didn't come off on its own and besides, how many car owners typically climb under the car after a service to look for missing parts?! An upper-end dealership like BMW should respect your issue and take care of it. I would also expect them to give the exposed areas a good detailing as well.
Well, I finished changing my oil. Guess what ELSE I found? 1) There was NO crush washer on the oil pan bolt. There is a flange on the bolt for one, but this dip#hit didn't put it on there 2) The oil bolt was not torqued correctly - it was barely more than finger tight 3) The 3-series E46 uses a oil filter that looks like an air filter. The compartment it is stored in is like two halves of a shell where you unscrew the top part. It was way, way, way overtightened and you can see impact marks on the bolt on the top, like the guy really cranked down on it. I know they are difficult to remove when used, but this was ridiculous, I had to REALLY crank on it to get it off. The washer really pisses me off. There is no way in hell that was anything more than just someone who didnt give a #hit about the customer. I also dont think the panel being gone was an accident - when you see how it mounts, I just don't buy that it flew off.
Now you should DEFINITELY go down there and say something... Oh, and "finger-tight" should be hyphenated...
The door hinge thingy I would not worry too much about. Crush washer? Yes. Considering you admit to working on it yourself, they could try to blame you. Might want to take a picture or two. Have them do a oil change, and see if they fix it. Could be interesting watching them try to backpeddle when you confront them with pictures prooving their service is poor and mechanics are just plain lazy. I'm sure they would make good if told about the problem. You probably just got a mechanic that had a case of the Mondays.
Then they have an interesting list of credentials and moves around a lot since we've all had them at one point or another. Regarding the crush washer, why wouldn't you just file a complaint with BMW in the form of a negative survey and take the car elsewhere? Why would you offer someone who has consistantly (or at least in your mind!) offered poor service to continue to offer you poor service? If they really back up their customer service line, they will pay for you to have it fixed elsewhere. Sunny
Have you ever dealt with BMW's customer dis-service? they will leave you out to dry. I would rather just buy the parts and take the car to Jiffy Lube.
Wanna hear the story of the 120 day service on my Z8, heads off, was told and written on ticket "NEW HEADS", I find out later I got heads reconditioned by a local shop that had never seen a set of M52 heads before?? Or the story of 5 trips for low coolant on our E38 750iL, 1.5 weeks each? Car after second trip "you bet, it is fixed" popped radiator after 6 mile trip home, sat in garage overnight? Or the 2 flatbed trips for the same problem in 105 degree weahter, and they wouldn't bring loaner to my wife and infant son, despite my buying the car from them, and a loaner is specified IN THE OWNERS MANUAL (only on Z8 and 750iL). I spent 750k with them in 7 years. They lost their ADP(add'l dealer profit) money since their CSI sucked. I will never buy another BMW from them, nor any car they sell. BMW told me to pound sand too. OK, I did. To another brand. I have more stories about BMW/Mini, but I just get all pi55ed off. Like now. Bangle and these a55holes killed my favorite daily driver brand of all time. Don't call, just buy diff brand next time. You'd be surprised.
NOBODY cares as much about your: car health house pool retirement plan motorcycle yard taxes AS YOU DO. ----do it yourself-----.
Wow. You guys have some rat @ss dealers out there. We service Toyota, Scion, Chevy, and Suzuki. Our Suzuki customers get treated with more respect than I just read in Sfumoto's post and none of them have spent 10% of the $750K you did. I guess some old sayings are true, "Good help is hard to find." But then again, "You get what you pay for" doesn't seem to apply! I'm soo confused, John
Ever see BMW flat rate times? Maybe you should reasearch how the techs are paid at the dealership before you jump down thier throats. You should be directing you complaint to the upper managment..not the tech. He is not making any money doing your oil change. So yes he is not going to be careful when doing it, and is indeed going to leave a part or 2 off, if it means that he is the next in line for the nice WELL PAYING brake job. He is going to rush the oil change to snag the better job, before sombody else steals his paycheque. Oil changes are the tac in the ass of every flat rate tech out there..because they don't get paid to do them (well they get paid but not enought to justify burning yourself with hot engine oil). If you want good work done to your car..take it to a NON flatrate shop, where the techs get paid on a salary basis. That way if they take their time it oies not kill them come payday. Time is everthing in a flat rate shop and comptition can be very high between the techs when things are slow. battles for jobs can turn into fist fights, because both guys are trying to put food on the table.
After 1.5 years I imagine they could claim "Act of God" or the new guy did it or something. I think under the circumstances I would approach them quietly and explain that through an unrelated activity you noticed the flap missing and there was no evidence of it falling off or being torn off, relating the possibility that it may have been left off at the last oil change. You can then express that you are quite upset about all of the crap going through the hole into your engine bay (without sounding like it) and in the interest of protecting the car could they replace the flap under "warranty." Using a reasonable approach like this has gotten me service above and beyond in some cases but when they can't even fulfill the original task at hand it makes it very difficult NOT to sound off. It also makes it very difficult to trust them again. Try to get the flap replaced by the "stealer" then go to The International Association of Independent BMW Service Professionals for your needs. (No affiliation) Here are some members that may be near you, Autobahn Automotive, Ernie Prete, Chip Myers, 127A W. Central St., Natick, MA 01760, 1-800-228-8136, [email protected] Bavarian Performance Group, www.bavarianperformancegroup.com, John Mariani, 35 Pomeworth St Ste 3, Stoneham MA 02180, (781) 279-4444, [email protected] Bentley Publishers, www.bentleypublishers.com , Michael Bentley, Charles Burke, 1734 Massachusetts Ave, Cambridge, MA 02138, (617) 528-4010,[email protected] Landshark Automotive, www.landsharkautomotive.com, Dimitri Limanovski, 24 South Ave., Natick MA 01760, (508) 655-3957, [email protected] Schneller Motoren Technik BMW, http://machschnell.com, Michael Morris, 26 Middle Rd Unit 1, Newbury MA 01951, (978) 465-2002, [email protected]
