The Daily Rant

Today I stood in the service department of a Toyota dealership and listened to someone say, “I’m not sure we have anyone here right now who can work on a Toyota.”

I ended up in this service department because my friend cut her hand at work. I took her to Walgreen’s in Laurel for bandages. When we came out of the store, my car wouldn’t start. My friend called her husband who came and gave my car a jump start. They went home. I went down the road to the Toyota dealership because I live alone, and I didn’t want to go home in a car I wasn’t sure would start the next morning.

I sort of objected to the idea that they might not be able to work on my Toyota at the Toyota dealership. Maybe I objected in a loud and cranky voice. The end result of this was that I waited around for an hour for someone to stick a new battery in my car. They charged me $150 for the battery. They didn’t bother to check my car out to determine what was wrong or what it might need. They just stuck a battery in, which I probably did need, but this was my first encounter with a dealership that didn’t bother to give the car a general checkup as matter of course. This didn’t exactly ease my state of crankiness.

The credit card machine wasn’t working. I had to write a check I wasn’t sure I could afford.

The drink machine took my money and didn’t give me a drink.

The person at the register stood there playing with a baby while a line of people waited to be helped.

I won’t go back there again. I’ll take my car to Walmart before I take it there to be serviced. I certainly won’t buy a car there. And not because everything they did was annoying when I was already stressed out over my car not starting. They lost me at “I’m not sure we have anyone here right now who can work on a Toyota.”

If you work for a Toyota dealership, this is not a sentence that should pass through your lips. It does not inspire confidence. If you own a Toyota dealership, and you hope to grow your customer base, you might want to consider keeping some Toyota certified mechanics on hand. Just a thought…

Regardless, my car does seem to be cranking now. It may take me some time yet to become uncranked.

4 thoughts on “The Daily Rant”

  • Don’t go to Walmart! Dang! I went and got an oil change because of problems with the Toyota Dealership and now my maintenance light will not go OFF! @#$**O*@&$@ It took 1 hour and 45 minutes for them to change the oil. I started timing them after the hood was raised.

  • Since you’re my baby sister, I’ll keep my comments to myself, but you know what you should do……lol….

  • Um…let me guess. Your opinion is that I should trade my old Toyota in for a new car from a dealership I can trust. 🙂

  • This is the same Toyota dealership that tried to charge me 90.00 for an oil change. I was atypically loud and obnoxious in my response, and they had to honor their original price of 39.00. NOTHING makes me angrier than being “little ladied’ by a car dealership. I would re-name the place if I were Kim……

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