BEWARE, DO NOT GO TO THIS CAR SHOP: My hometown mechanic found a cracked oil pan because the bolt was over-torqued. Through my carfax, they were the last place that replaced my oil. I contacted them concerning the issue with pictures of the damage and said I’d like the oil pan replaced free of charge. However, they dodged my hometown mechanic’s and my emails and phone calls for weeks until I had a MALE relative call on my behalf (they even said it was my fault that I didn’t reach out sooner to the owner’s/manager’s personal cell phone when I wasn’t given the number in the first place until my relative called). It was very obvious that they thought they could take advantage of a naive girl and bully me into not taking further action with them. Eventually, they agreed to replace it if I drove 1.5 hours to their shop (instead of writing a check) because they understood that “the optics look bad” (but they still deny any responsibility). They admitted that when I got my oil changed, they had someone new on staff who cracked someone else’s oil pan around the same timeline. So, I went to them first thing in the morning for the repair and I got a text 2 hours later that they looked at the car and refused to replace the oil pan because something else was leaking. They also said the leak wasn’t bad enough for a repair. My hometown mechanic spoke to them and explained to me that it’s obvious they don’t know what they’re talking about and that they probably don’t know how to do the repair (ex: Daren (owner/manager) said my car takes 8 qts of oil when it actually takes 5.8 qts). The entire time he was only being outwardly friendly to my boyfriend and being defensive and dismissive to me. Instead of fixing something he agreed to fix (I have the agreement over text and a couple of witnesses to the verbal agreement), he did not care about doing the right thing and customer satisfaction. He is a chauvinist who only cares about saving a couple of bucks and preserving his ego. My next step is contacting the BBB. Thank you Daren!
Olivia, You (and your hometown mechanic) accused us of cracking your oil pan by over torquing the drain plug. Giving you the benefit of the doubt we admitted that nobody is perfect and it is possible that the tech that did the oil change may have indeed done just that. After researching the time of the repair, we found that your oil change was not over torqued and that the drain plug was properly tightened with a recently calibrated digital torque Wrench. Our mechanic did admittedly have one drain plug torque issue and has since then with no exceptions, hand torqued every drain plug. I explained this to you in a phone call from my personal cell phone. I also mentioned that since we had been unable to reach your mechanic at all and had called the shop several times, that you should save my cell phone number and contact me directly. I also told you to have your mechanic call me directly any time. We further researched your vehicle history and since you insisted that your "trusted mechanic" was convinced it was our issue, I decided to help you out with your repair. we special ordered the drain pan from Mercedes along with the filter and bolts because you were so far away, I wanted to have the parts here and ready. when the vehicle arrived, we saw the drain pan had a very small crack that was not leaking at all. it had been a month since your trusted mechanic had changed the oil and there wasn't even a drip from the crack. the radiator however was leaking and in the process of changing the oil pan, the radiator may start leaking worse. I showed this to you and your boyfriend. I did speak to him mostly because you were on the phone with your mechanic the whole time. I tried to explain things to your mechanic but he just accused me of lying. I gave you the oil pan, bolts and filter because you obviously didn't trust us and I didn't feel that any repair would be possible without additional parts and labor. I didn't want to put you in a bad spot and your oil pan was clearly not leaking. I felt that the best thing for you, was to give you the oil pan and let your trusted mechanic do the work. I see that you and your friends are all joining together to try to give us one-star reviews and I'm sorry that you don't feel like we did the right thing. I feel like a free oil pan is more than we owed you. please understand that we did the only right thing to do for you. We gave you all the information you needed to make a good decision for your car. We told you what was actually leaking, and didn't put you in a bad spot by disassembling your car. You need a radiator. Your radiator is leaking. Your oil pan has a small crack. The oil pan isn't leaking. I would have spoken more to you directly but you were on the phone with your mechanic and I spoke to the person that was paying attention to me. (the young man you brought with you)
- Lansing Location