r/FuckDealerships

I spent most of the day yesterday negotiating via email on a 26 Honda Passport TSE with 12k miles listed at $47k. After reaching out for the quote and receiving it, they had added on a "protection package" worth $2800 (which isn't advertised on their listing mind you), a tag agency fee of $439, and a dealer doc fee of $1200. After all fees and taxes the OTD price they quoted was over 54k. They refused to remove the protection package after going back and forth multiple times and told me thanks for their time so I said the same. This one is in FL and I'm in TN. I know FL is known for the highest fees. Why can't this be easier?

Shopping for a Telluride Hybrid EX or Carnival Hybrid EX in Queens, NY. Our family car was stolen, insurance already paid out and we're ready to buy this week.

The problem is no dealer will put an out-the-door price in writing.

When we visited one dealer in person, the salesperson started with a markup. We told her we weren't buying at that price and the manager came down to $1,000 under MSRP. When I went to snap a photo of the numbers sheet, she took the paper back.

Since then she has been texting constantly. Asks what time we can come in Saturday, says inventory is moving, asks what other offers we have. I've asked for an itemized OTD price at least four times. Still no number. Just "come in and we'll beat it."

I've emailed four other Kia dealers asking for the same thing. Nothing yet.

I've been watching Tommi's channel and he makes it look so easy. 'Hi, stock number, is it available? I'm ready to buy today, what's your best OTD price?' And dealers just text him the OTD number. Real life hasn't been quite like that lol.

For people who've done this successfully:

How did you get a dealer to commit to an OTD number in writing? Is it worth calling the internet sales manager directly? And what's a realistic discount on these in the NYC area right now?

For me, I bought a used car and they promised in writing on a signed we owe, a dent repair on a dent with cracked paint to bare metal. Turns out they only intended to PDR pull and slap touch up over the rust. This was not written or even verbally told to me. Only that they would fix it. I should have gotten the excruciating details, I know. I have reasons why I didn't, mostly that I thought they would honor the word repair and the car is in great shape otherwise, but that's irrelevant to their misleading use of the we owe as a sales tool.

They also promised a timing belt service at cost (meaning the dealer cost before any markups) and proceeded to invoice full MSRP. When called out, they invoiced a discount retail rate. I know the dealer, who has access to a franchise network which includes the brand i bought, isn't paying any retail price for parts.

Both invoices itemized only the parts explicitly listed on the we owe (timing belt and water pump) but no tensioner, coolant, etc. I asked about this and was ignored. If it was an error, they could have corrected it. I doubt they were going to eat the cost of a $200 tensioner and $50 coolant out of the goodness of their hearts. The GM later stated on tbe record at the DMV that he would never quote a timing belt service without a tensioner, if this is true why didn't be clear it up when I asked and why was it not on both of the clearly itemized invoices?

Were they going to reuse the old tensioner (a gamble on whether it will last another 105k miles) reuse the old coolant or not even change the water pump(replacing it is just standard practice because it's an expensive PITA if it breaks in 30k miles)?

Don't know, wasn't going to gamble my car on it.

Took it to the DMV board, they rubber stamped whatever the dealer said but I got a lot of juicy admissions from the GM and sales manager out of the audio transcript which the state provided so it's on to small claims.

I didn't want to sue them. I would have preferred the work done or more transparency to begin with so I could have decided whether to buy it knowing all the information.

What's really puzzling is they're a multi million dollar franchise and they've possibly already spent more fighting my complaint than simply doing the work or coming to a genuine compromise regarding the dent misunderstanding. Something like "hey we didn't mean we'd do full paint blending but if you pay for the paint we'll honor our word at our attached collision center."

Anyway that's my story and I'm interested in hearing if other people have been deceived in similar innocuous, borderline shady ways and what you did about it. I'd almost be willing to bet the amount of liability they shirk doing things that are borderline like this eclipses the egregious violations like hiding flooding damage or a bad transmission.

I've been going through this nightmare for over a month. I went to Maserati of Monmouth 807 Route 35 Ocean, NJ and I purchased a car. I gave the dealership $30,000 as a deposit. It took them a month to deliver the car and the car wouldn't perform. It immediately started shaking and making noise and wouldn't go over 55 mph. I contacted them immediately, but their attitude was like, it's your car now. I finally complained to the manager and he offered to buy the car back, but not what I paid for it. I only had the car for 2 days and lost close to $8,000 from my deposit. Not to mention, I paid $500 to have the car towed back to the dealership. I need representation to take them to court, someone please chime in to help me. And lets blast this company on social media!!

My favorite dealers where the ones that understood the game, submit, waited pymt, knew to ask for the exception that would make us book the deal, and then moved on when its time to. Because there's nothing worst than a dealer that's hungry.. Or how many time have I had a generic dealer strait up asking "hey man, I gave everything in this deal, isn't there somewhere I can make money?" ... You know that most time we have a place we can add a small 200$ to 450$ fee. Their are threshold thought, you cant have too much of certain "things" on a deal that's not a car and im not talking about the ltv (loan to value), most dealer learns about them pretty quickly but its a very fast revolving door. Side note the scam doesn't work in Quebec because they have laws in place that makes it illegal to sell extra crap not on the window sign they put on the car. And yet, I still got the occasional generic dealer/f&I/commercial directors calling me to complain the system doesn't let him send the application in with that extra fee.. sorry mister generic dealer, your applicant lives in Quebec so our system doesn't allow that fee, oh whats that you dont mind and are willing to take your chances anyway and go against Quebec's law, ok them mister generic dealer ill send that application right back to you. At this point its his problem if he gets cut, most likely it could happened if we where to repo the unit and they notice the contract isnt in order.

My first car was off craigslist so its my first time dealing with dealerships. Went to buy a used 10k car at toyota and they said we couldnt get GAP because the car wasnt that expensive so legally they couldnt do it and only on leasing. They also said they cant because im married to someone in the military. But everywhere says they just cant force me into it. Is the dealer right? We backed out of buying because i didn’t want to have no gap insurance and the car already had problems that needed to be fixed.

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I just have to rant!
The issue is trying to get sorted at the moment but we are absolutely livid at what's transpired with this vehicle, the service and the BS outcome!

We currently have a short bed Jeep Wrangler that won't make it the distance we are about to travel for our holiday. We've been in the market for a new car so we ended up purchasing this vehicle for 35k.

3 weeks in the Steering warning light comes on. We take it back to dealership and they said "it should be fine" plus... we're getting the 1k check done, they'll look at it then. We had tried the Google search and any possible fixes but nothing worked. Battery is fine, alt is fine, tried to re-calibrate it... nothing.

They say..... We Can't find anything wrong, but we can't let you have it back due to duty of care. It's a steering issue. We say... we NEED this car... A car! We have a jam packed full on day tomorrow PLUS we are leaving early Friday morning to drive to our destination. (today is Thursday as I write this).

They tell my wife, take it home (this was yesterday) but drop it back into us tomorrow morning (today).
So she does, but do they call her or text her or give her any idea's what's happening with the vehicle? NOPE!!! 1pm comes around and she needs to leave for a hair appt at 2pm. Still no car, no phone call, no text, nothing! so our daughter drives over to the dealership and gives them some words.

So to make matters worse, they won't release the car because it's a steering issue and they won't give is a loaner car because we need to driver over 200k with the vehicle. WTAF!!!!

We just spent 35k on this vehicle specifically because we knew our Jeep wouldn't make the trip and we get shafted BIG time by this phuking company!! You phuked us over, MAKE IT RIGHT!

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I am going to state that just prior to the light going on, I was backing out of a tight parking spot with a vehicle parked beside me and a metal beam/post in between us. I do recall the car attempting to "correct" me because it "thought" I was going to hit the car parked beside me. I did feel the steering wheel jolt a bit.... then the light came on. So if anyone has any ideas, please throw them my way.

I HATE computerized shit in vehicles! I KNOW how to drive! Been driving for 45 years! I don't need a car deciding my fate! I'm the one that turns it all off when I get behind the wheel. It's simple BS!

Just picked up our new Leaf. Fantastic car for $30k. Washed it for the first time this weekend and was surprised to find lines of tape residue all over the place.

Why would there be tape residue everywhere?

Are they wrapping new cars in some form of wrapper for transport?

Is there any way to find out if this new car has sustained any paint damage prior to sale? (Is the tape residue a result of paint masking?)

Sales guy of course oblivious. “This was probably a dealer exchange…” indeed the car’s software was already registered to another local dealer in town.

They graciously offered to give us the floor mats for free.

Of course the usual dealer slime part of the sales process. Gap insurance? No thanks. Extended warranty? No thanks. $672 for nitrogen gas tire inflation. (This is good topic for a whole other comedy routine: short list of benefits for filling tires with up to 78% pure nitrogen gas, apparently the marketing department slept through their Junior high school chemistry class. Isn’t the air we breathe, the ambient atmosphere itself already 78% Nitrogen?)

There’s more, but I’m looking for ideas on why there would be tape residue everywhere for starters.