Complain about a product or service

When going over the purchase of my 1998 Toyota Corolla with Lino, the finance manager, I was given several options for added Vehicle Protection Plans.

It was discribed to me in such a way as I would be foolish not to elect to have it on the car. By this point in time I had been there about 3 to 4 hours, so I chose the Silver Plan with debt cancellation and additional theft protection. Lino mentioned the price would be added in the purchase contract.(no dollar amount was given at this time) At that point he excused himself and said he would return shortly with the final documents for signing.

Upon his return we started giong over document after document, with him explaining each one. When we got to the "Vehicle Protection Program" sheet I asked about pricing and he pointed to the area showing the pricing. On the preformatted paper, with little boxes for dollars and cents, everything was moved over one box to the right, making $1,450.00 look like $145.00 and the total of this part of the plan look like $189.00 when it really was $1,899.00. These items were also shown on the Vehicle Contract but were gone over very fast in the interest of time.

The price of the car was $11,760.00 and the price of all these added protection plans was $2,797.00, which were to be financed over 60 months at 21% interest. I signed everthing as needed, got the keys and they sent me on my way with a big smile. (and a full tank of gas).

Later that night as I was looking everything over I was in shock when I realized the amount of money all that added coverage really cost. I knew I didn't need to worry though because Auto Nation assured me that I had 3 days to return the car, FOR ANY REASON.

First thing Friday morning I called, asked for Lino, he wasn't in. I explained what happened and said I would be right up to cancel these items and get a new contract written. I was told it would be a waste of time because only Lino could handle this type of problem, he will call as soon as he gets in. I got nervous and called again in the afternoon, he wasn't in. I was told by Glenda not to worry, all will be made well. I called again Sat. but nothing was solved. I don't know who I talked to on Sat.

When I called Monday morning, Glenda again said Lino was not in but he worked from 12:00 to 9:00. I called again at 2:40 pm and finally got Lino on the phone. I explained to him that I wanted to cancel the added items and just finance the purchase price only. He said that the paper work had already gone to the bank so we would have to wait till he got it back. Than we hung up. I called back soon after and asked for the bank name and number so as I could call them but Lino said that was not possible, but he mentioned that the bank would just reduce the term from 60 months to whatever the term was minus the $2797.00.

I said that was crazy because I would be paying 21% interest on all that extra money over all that time. He than said he would see if he could work it out and out of nowhere he found the loan documents (that he said before were already sent to the bank), so give him time to talk to his boss and see what they could do.

Since this (Monday) was the third day I told him I would drive right up there to settle this but he said he was leaving before I could get there, even though Glenda had told me earlier he worked till 9pm. He said we could resolve this Tuesday. By this time I was frustrated and worried that by Tuesday, for whatever reason, something else would come up (and that my three days would be over).

I had given Auto Nation a $500.00 check on 6/10 and $1000.00 check that they were to hold for 21 days, till 7/1/99. Not knowing what else do to I stopped payment on the $500.00 check (Monday afternoon about 4:30).

I called again about 7:30pm and told whoever answered the phone, in finance) my name and that I had stopped payment on the check). I decided to just take the car back today (Tuesday,6/15) after work. I have a prepaired statement for them to sign saying only that the car was returned in the same condition as when purchased. After days of getting the runaround I would be very leary of doing any business with Auto Nation, whether buying another car or having the returned car serviced.

Good work, David. 

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