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Note: this post is about my bad experiences from the service department of DARCARS VW. (If you are going to buy a car from DARCARS, my comments may not fit as I saw feedbacks on some dealer rating websites are mostly positive for the sales department.)
I'll give some background first to facilitate your understanding in the scenarios I describe below. I'm a University of Maryland-College Park grad student. I got my first car in early 2012, and I know nothing about the car when I got it, but eventually I learned how to DIY from many friends here. (Even I don't post often, I do come.) I live in College Park so when I went to a dealer, I chose the closest dealer, DARCARS VW. However, for several trips I've been there, experiences with their service manager, KF, turned out to be extremely uncomfortable.
My first unpleasant trip there was to change a drive side headlight bulb. I didn't want to change the bulb myself since it has been widely known here that the handle of plastic latches for the headlight is easy to break, especially for an old car as I got. I assumed a dealer would do a far better job than myself, but it turned out that they might have broken the latch handle and I wasn't informed (it was my fault that I didn't check the latch after they changed the bulb immediately). Three months later when I was checking engine oil level, I saw the broken latch and went back and asked them to fix that. During the three months time, I had my local mechanic to do timing belt, axle shaft, and oil change, and I suppose these jobs do not involve jobs on the driver side headlight and airbox. The interesting story now comes. The service manager, Mr. KF, after his technician replacing the latch, alleged that I, or the local mechanic was the one who broke the latch handle, because he was told by the technician that the airbox was not properly seated. He added that if he were the technician on duty, he wouldn't fix the latch for me. You see the way he "dealt" with this particular customer, and the tendency he has to prejudge his customers.
Now the second unpleasant trip. My car recently had CEL on, but I was busy with my projects having no time to go to dealers for checking so I used a VAGCOM to pull the codes, clear them, and see whether it will come up again. The coded never come up again. Later when I had time, I went to DARCARS, described the problems I had, and gave them the codes I retrieved for reference purpose. Mr. KF, as if I humiliated him, unpleasantly stated their policy that they won't look at ANY codes besides those codes retrieved by themselves. Umm, the policy is reasonable. But Mr. KF, why do I feel like as if you were a customer, and I were a manger to serve you?
I later asked my local mechanic about DARCARS VW on how good they are. He said they are good to him at least, but he agreed with my words that, their service department is rude to customers, since "they are the only VW dealer the areas around College Park," he added. I checked on VW website for the service coverage. Yes, DARCARS seems to serve a larger area. The other possible reason in my mind comes out: are gentle people in the area, so nice that they are easily satisfied inferior services?
I'll give some background first to facilitate your understanding in the scenarios I describe below. I'm a University of Maryland-College Park grad student. I got my first car in early 2012, and I know nothing about the car when I got it, but eventually I learned how to DIY from many friends here. (Even I don't post often, I do come.) I live in College Park so when I went to a dealer, I chose the closest dealer, DARCARS VW. However, for several trips I've been there, experiences with their service manager, KF, turned out to be extremely uncomfortable.
My first unpleasant trip there was to change a drive side headlight bulb. I didn't want to change the bulb myself since it has been widely known here that the handle of plastic latches for the headlight is easy to break, especially for an old car as I got. I assumed a dealer would do a far better job than myself, but it turned out that they might have broken the latch handle and I wasn't informed (it was my fault that I didn't check the latch after they changed the bulb immediately). Three months later when I was checking engine oil level, I saw the broken latch and went back and asked them to fix that. During the three months time, I had my local mechanic to do timing belt, axle shaft, and oil change, and I suppose these jobs do not involve jobs on the driver side headlight and airbox. The interesting story now comes. The service manager, Mr. KF, after his technician replacing the latch, alleged that I, or the local mechanic was the one who broke the latch handle, because he was told by the technician that the airbox was not properly seated. He added that if he were the technician on duty, he wouldn't fix the latch for me. You see the way he "dealt" with this particular customer, and the tendency he has to prejudge his customers.
Now the second unpleasant trip. My car recently had CEL on, but I was busy with my projects having no time to go to dealers for checking so I used a VAGCOM to pull the codes, clear them, and see whether it will come up again. The coded never come up again. Later when I had time, I went to DARCARS, described the problems I had, and gave them the codes I retrieved for reference purpose. Mr. KF, as if I humiliated him, unpleasantly stated their policy that they won't look at ANY codes besides those codes retrieved by themselves. Umm, the policy is reasonable. But Mr. KF, why do I feel like as if you were a customer, and I were a manger to serve you?
I later asked my local mechanic about DARCARS VW on how good they are. He said they are good to him at least, but he agreed with my words that, their service department is rude to customers, since "they are the only VW dealer the areas around College Park," he added. I checked on VW website for the service coverage. Yes, DARCARS seems to serve a larger area. The other possible reason in my mind comes out: are gentle people in the area, so nice that they are easily satisfied inferior services?
