John S
My wife took our 98′ Nissan Pathfinder in for service to the Cumming, GA Aamco location because the car was “jerking” and she thought the transmission was going bad. After getting an original quote for approx. $1,700, she picked the car up with a $2,500 bill to pay and on the short drive home, realized the same problem existed as when she brought the vehicle in for repair. The car was undriveable and we towed it to another repair shop and they diagnosed the problem as being a broken timing belt. It needed replaced for another $1,000 to $1,500. When we complained to Aamco, we asked if the transmission was bad and now were informed that “it was going” bad and needed to be replaced anyway. The engine light never came on and we were told the diagnostics did not indicate that the transmission needed to be replaced immediately. Yes, the vehicle as many miles on it, but the transmission was fine for the time being.
Bottom line is that if we were told what the “real” problem was initially and not that we just needed to replace the transmission, we would have made a totally different decision. We are now going to pay approximately $4,000 to fix a car that is worth less than $2,000. If I would have known that, I would have had the vehicle towed to the dump. I am extremely disappointed that the real core problem with our vehicle was not identified and/or communicated to us before we were told we needed a rebuilt transmission. I am extremely disappointed (and being very nice with this statement) and we are like most people in this country now that can’t afford to cough up $4,000 on the fly. We are absolutely miserable this has happened to us.
I have left two messages with the district manager and get even get a return phone call. Also, I have worked 34 years in the retail business and know that customer service always comes first for a business to be successful. This is the worse example of customer service I have seen in my life time. If I take one of my children into a hospital emergency room and tell the doctor that my child is complaining of stomach pains where the child’s appendix is, I don’t want them to take my child’s appendix out because it was my opinion. I expect the doctor to be the expert and tell us what the correct diagnosis is and advise us appropriately. This analogy may be a bit dramatical, but my point is that we expected Aamco to be the expert here and paid them a very large sum of money to fix our problem. They failed miserably and we were fraudulently misled and monetarily damaged.
John S