Quote:
Originally Posted by stugray
Two things:
1 - I have read many cases on this forum where a dealer refused to work on a modified car whether they intended to deny warranty work or not.
I can see numerous reasons for this:
A - the dealer cannot perform their stock diagnostics on a car that is not nearly 100%. Even a non-stock CAI can make the engine diagnostics give different answers that lead to a misdiagnosis.
Now if they refuse to look an a CEL because you have tints, then they are playing hard ass.
B - They INTEND to deny warranty work, and are hoping that you just take your car somewhere else instead of going through the trouble of chaning back to stock parts.
SO NO just changing the car back to stock before a dealer visit is NOT neccessarily "fraud" in and of itself.
2 - Dealing with a dealership for warrantly work is similar to talking to the police. NEVER give any information that is not required to give.
Even if you think you are helping, "anything you say can be used against you".
Is it "fraud" to not provide any information about a failure of the car? - NO.
So to change back to stock tires & brakes, drop the car off with a simple "Clutch seems broken" and there you are. Fraud? - No.
In fact you are more in violation of the law by accusing someone of committing fraud then by what I suggested above.
AND $1100 for a new clutch and the labor to replace it? I think the OP got a deal.
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I actually do agree with you. Mods should only void a warranty if they're directly related to the broken part. Most dealerships are not willing to dig that deep into the problem just to figure out if the mod contributed to it, though. They'd rather say no and let it be your problem, not theirs. Which is illegal, but if you don't fight it they get away with it.
And I wasn't accusing him of fraud. I was responding to a specific comment that said that if you track your car (which is provided in the warranty as an example of misuse) then you should convert it back to stock to get work done under warranty. That IS fraud by its legal definition, no matter what he wants to call it. By converting it back to stock and denying any usage on a track, he is deceiving the dealership in order to have maintenance paid for by Toyota, instead of out of pocket. The dealer should have looked further into it to discover that the clutch broke in a way that is atypical of normal usage, but they saw evidence that it had been tracked and drew the line there.
And yes, the warranty says racing, blah blah blah. Two things though. First, it uses racing as an example and not a definitive list, and second, do you really think that just because there isn't an official timing source that driving on a track is no longer as hard on the car?
If someone wants to defraud Toyota out of parts and maintenance, fine. I really don't care. I do illegal things with my car somewhat frequently. The difference is that I know it and I'm fine with it. If I get called out on it then it's no one's fault but my own and I'm not going to whine about getting busted. I'm certainly not going to try to get someone else to pay for it.