SoCal: Avoid Mossy Toyota

[suaveflooder]

So, I bought my car from Mossy in February. Gonna keep this short and sweet. Avoid them. Had my alarm installed, came away with a dent in my upper window molding. Got it pulled out.

Couple months later my rear driver strut blew. They ordered a new one and fixed it. Today, I went to go lower the car only to find out that they stripped the allen head cut out in the shaft of the strut. I called them right away. I was completely honest and let them know what I was planning on doing (lowering the car) and knew it would void the warranty, but I wanted to have the strut replaced before I did it with one that wasn't stripped. They told me no. They said I did it.

Now, I get their side that I could have possibly screwed up and stripped the bolt. At the same time, I'm STILL going to lower the car (You don't need the allen head really) tomorrow and I could have done it today if I had in fact stripped it because I had other options and this isn't the first car I've lowered with these holes rounded out. Also, I wouldn't have been honest with them about the springs if I had in fact screwed something up. I could have saved my warranty by just swapping stock springs back in if a strut happened to blow.

All the allen inserts on the entire car are fine EXCEPT the one that I have documentation that they replaced. Until today, I had no reason to check their work.

Anyway, if you value the work of your car being done correctly, I would suggest either doing the work yourself, or going somewhere else. I got onto yelp only to find out that this isn't the first time that they half-@$$ed something. There are a lot of stories of stupid things being forgotten (cabin filters either not being installed or being installed incorrectly for example) and for some reason AC units coming out non-functional.

I have filed a formal complaint with scion. Tomorrow, I'm going to call and have it dropped. I honestly just don't want them touching my car again. I look at all the outcomes and a "good" outcome will have my car in the hands of their techs again. Something I'm not willing to deal with. Like I said, there is more that one way to "skin a cat" so to speak, and I can get the springs installed even with that hole stripped. The struts will need to be replaced fairly soon with some Koni's because of the drop. I'm fine with that.

Just a word of warning to the socal people.

Dent from alarm install



And the allen bolt. I was also accused of scarring the passenger side bolt, but as you can see.....it's still perfect. I took pictures from every angle earlier thinking I was crazy. They accused me of having imperfections in this hole as well. I had my neighbor who is a tech for Volkswagen check it out and he told me the hole was fine. Looked like it hadn't been touched.

stripped.


good hole


OUTCOME ON POST 11

[Wo6M]

Ouch, sir sorry you have had to endure such trouble with your dealer.
I hope others would heed this warning as well...

[texasbound972]

Shitty man! Thanks for the heads up!

[whataboutbob]

Lame. Mossy Toyota/Scion is being pennywise, pound foolish here. Word gets around when you don't back up your work and take care of your customers.

[suaveflooder]

Originally Posted by Wo6M

Ouch, sir sorry you have had to endure such trouble with your dealer.
I hope others would heed this warning as well...

The reason why this is hear. Word of mouth can only go so far. Social media can reach millions!

Originally Posted by texasbound972

Shitty man! Thanks for the heads up!

:happy0180:

Originally Posted by whataboutbob

Lame. Mossy Toyota/Scion is being pennywise, pound foolish here. Word gets around when you don't back up your work and take care of your customers.

Thanks Bob. After talking with you yesterday, I thought a lot about it. I spent 3 hours (4 counting the drive) in the Mossy waiting room. It literally took up my entire day before work. I'm working 6 days a week right now and I didn't want to risk having to do that again....I simply don't have that much time.

The valve body is good so everything should be okay. Thankfully that top nut isn't on that tight, so getting it off is easy.

I appreciate the advice yesterday! I figure I could "do more damage" by getting the word out about their lack of customer service and integrity. My neighbor, who is the Volkswagen tech, basically said that even if he KNOWS he didn't do it, if he or anyone else in their tech department had installed a part and something like that went wrong, even though it is not needed for removal, Volkswagen would replace it. He also told me that it would take a couple weeks to iron out. Not worth my time in this case.

[JRoldy]

Brian, When you were there, did you only work with the service advisor? Seriously man you should raise a little more than just a brow at this.

before we start anything, there is a survey that Toyota Will send you in your email about a week after your visit (if they have your email down on file). totally bomb them on the survey, this will instantly bring up a red flag to the advisor, techs, managers, etc. WE READ THOSE SURVEYS every damn day. voice something on there as well.
First step would to talk to manager, service director, or a customer relations manger. (you can call their main line and ask the operator to send you to them)

voice your opinion, but don't be a ****, you can he stern, but don't yell, etc. Trust me, i do this for a living, and it doesn't help when the person your actually trying to do something for just shouts and give you shit, why would i help you then? this should easily get you another one replaced no problem.

If they just jerk your chain around, this is the next step.
The customer's voice shoots a piercing bullet through the dealerships customer relations managers when you call Toyota HQ - 1-800-331-4331 and file a dispute about this. I would seriously give that number a call and tell them what happend. be straight up and say look, they stripped this strut, they dented my car when i had an alarm installed.. I mean.. this is supposed to be a trustworthy dealership? come on.

From a service professional's stand point, this has been taken care of very poorly. the service advisor should have brought this up to the technician, first of the technician SHOULD have told the advisor about what he did, not someone trying to save their job, its probably going to lose it.

Bringing your car to my service center might yield better results, but as far as this one is concerned. you MUST get this fixed by the dealership that screwed up, other dealerships are not around to fix other ones problems (i have done this in the past, and not only does it take forever, it also makes you, the customer, wait even longer (if you decide to wait) pretty much I would have to get the manager involved at Mossy and have him give me the authorization to fix. If they deny me.. i would have to go through my manager, and I can Gaurantee that we do not stock those parts. might even take a few days.

not the first time i heard something bad from Mossy Nissan. Did you work with a dude named Brad Alford? he used to work with me at Carlsbad.

Let me know how it turns out, Brian

[Giccin]

Originally Posted by JRoldy

Brian, When you were there, did you only work with the service advisor? Seriously man you should raise a little more than just a brow at this.

before we start anything, there is a survey that Toyota Will send you in your email about a week after your visit (if they have your email down on file). totally bomb them on the survey, this will instantly bring up a red flag to the advisor, techs, managers, etc. WE READ THOSE SURVEYS every damn day. voice something on there as well.
First step would to talk to manager, service director, or a customer relations manger. (you can call their main line and ask the operator to send you to them)

voice your opinion, but don't be a ****, you can he stern, but don't yell, etc. Trust me, i do this for a living, and it doesn't help when the person your actually trying to do something for just shouts and give you shit, why would i help you then? this should easily get you another one replaced no problem.

If they just jerk your chain around, this is the next step.
The customer's voice shoots a piercing bullet through the dealerships customer relations managers when you call Toyota HQ - 1-800-331-4331 and file a dispute about this. I would seriously give that number a call and tell them what happend. be straight up and say look, they stripped this strut, they dented my car when i had an alarm installed.. I mean.. this is supposed to be a trustworthy dealership? come on.


not the first time i heard something bad from Mossy Nissan. Did you work with a dude named Brad Alford? he used to work with me at Carlsbad.

Let me know how it turns out, Brian

I'm so glad there are good people around left.

[suaveflooder]

Originally Posted by JRoldy

Brian, When you were there, did you only work with the service advisor? Seriously man you should raise a little more than just a brow at this.

before we start anything, there is a survey that Toyota Will send you in your email about a week after your visit (if they have your email down on file). totally bomb them on the survey, this will instantly bring up a red flag to the advisor, techs, managers, etc. WE READ THOSE SURVEYS every damn day. voice something on there as well.
First step would to talk to manager, service director, or a customer relations manger. (you can call their main line and ask the operator to send you to them)

voice your opinion, but don't be a ****, you can he stern, but don't yell, etc. Trust me, i do this for a living, and it doesn't help when the person your actually trying to do something for just shouts and give you shit, why would i help you then? this should easily get you another one replaced no problem.

If they just jerk your chain around, this is the next step.
The customer's voice shoots a piercing bullet through the dealerships customer relations managers when you call Toyota HQ - 1-800-331-4331 and file a dispute about this. I would seriously give that number a call and tell them what happend. be straight up and say look, they stripped this strut, they dented my car when i had an alarm installed.. I mean.. this is supposed to be a trustworthy dealership? come on.


not the first time i heard something bad from Mossy Nissan. Did you work with a dude named Brad Alford? he used to work with me at Carlsbad.

Let me know how it turns out, Brian

So leave the car stock? No lowering? I am supposed to get a call sometime today.

Edit: Car is back down. I had litterally gotten everything up and ready to go. I'll take your advice and @whataboutbob 's and stick to my guns on this. Thanks Jerold!

[JRoldy]

Originally Posted by suaveflooder

So leave the car stock? No lowering? I am supposed to get a call sometime today.

Edit: Car is back down. I had litterally gotten everything up and ready to go. I'll take your advice and @whataboutbob 's and stick to my guns on this. Thanks Jerold!

its a community, and im glad to be here! I want to have toyota represenation here at its best, not at its worst!

The proper justice must be done, how can customers/consumers trust the automtive industry when things like this pop up? simple thing to fix, just no one wants to take the fall.

[suaveflooder]

Just got the call back from Mossy. Because they don't use that hole to remove or install springs, they are not going to touch it. They said that the shock is functional and since it is functional, they have no liability to replace the shock.

Now, I have yet to touch it, Mossy said they didn't do it and the part was new. I am beyond frustrated right now.

Gonna shoot Jason Mossy an Email.

[suaveflooder]

So, I shot Jason Mossy an Email. It was long, but I stated my side of the story.

Here is the email:

Mr Mossy,

I am going to try and keep this as short as I possibly can, but there is a lot of information. I will probably give way too much, but I'd rather make this thorough, then not give you what you need.

I bought my Scion FRS from your Toyota dealership in Pacific Beach on February 9th. I brought it in the following week to have an alarm installed. After getting back in the car, I noticed that the steering wheel panel was loose and that it was FILTHY! Finger prints everywhere. Okay, whatever. When I got home I wiped down the dash, and tightened the two screws. I shut my garage and look back at my new car. My eyes came across a fist size dent in the upper window molding above the driver's side window! I called the dealership the next day.

When I got to the dealership, they were friendly as usual. I brought their eyes to the attention of the dent. One of the FIRST THINGS out of their mouth was, "Well, how do we know that you didn't do it or someone walking down the street didn't do it?" EXCUSE ME!? The car is garaged every night and why are the fingers IMMEDIATELY pointed at me? I was pretty heated at that point. Why were they attacking me right after voicing a concern?

After getting some other people involved, the dent was pulled the next day. This did involve the dent repair guy having to drill a hold under that panel to get to it, so, now I have one flaw in the car, which I was willing to let go. It was fixed and the hole is covered by the window molding. There were no other options.

I drove the car around for the next month and loving every minute of it. I kept hearing a "clunk" sound coming from the rear driver's side strut. I took it into the service department and unfortunately the rear strut was blown. So on April 11th of this year at 8:31 am with 2,408 miles on the car, the strut was replaced. All was good and the clunk was gone.

Now, fast forward to yesterday, June 3rd. Being a car enthusiast and having worked on cars for 15 years, I decided to put performance springs on the car. I knew this would void the warranty on my suspension, but for the most part that is completely fine. The car was advertised to be an autox car, and that's why I bought it. I am fully planning on leaving every other part of the car 100% stock, even the paper filter. So, I pull the carpet panels out of the trunk and start inspecting the project in front of me. That is when I noticed that the allen head insert on top of the strut is stripped and rounded out. This just so happened to be the SAME STRUT that the service department had replaced a month and a half ago. Well, the job was over. There are other ways of doing this job without this allen hole, but somehow it had been stripped and ACCORDING TO ITS MANUFACTURER, it should be removed with hand tools (allen wrench and open ended socket.)

Page 10, step 10 is an example of the procedure in the link below
http://www.newmarketskills.com/asset...it09/a4_u9.pdf

I called up Sean Moore and told him what was going on and he told me to come on down. After looking it over, the tech informed me that they didn't use this hole while replacing the strut. Once again, I got "How do we know you didn't strip it when trying to remove it" and then he explained to me how it worked! Why am I constantly being accused of creating the problem??? I know how they work, in fact I told them EXACTLY how I planned to do it, which is listed in the link above. The bolt is torqued down on the strut to 41 ft/lbs, which isn't tight. In fact, I could physically hold the shaft with my hand and be able to turn the nut off. So, the chances of stripping that hole completely out with a hand tool are slim. Chances of doing it with an impact gun however are MUCH higher (which is why I don't use them). The point here is that the part can no longer be pulled off like McPherson designed it to be pulled apart and I would like the part replaced.

I personally am not willing to point fingers at the tech and say that he/she did it. For all I know, it came to you guys like that and was simply missed upon install. At the same time, I am tired of constantly being accused when the work comes back. I no longer want to visit this service department! I don't want to have to constantly check up on the techs work and make sure nothing is messed up! If I would have brought it in the next day, there would be no questions and no accusations. The part is covered by the trunk liner and I thought I could trust the part/job to be correct, so I never looked until a month or so later!

There were a couple choices I had to make when I discovered the stripped hole. Finish the job, and like so many people do, put the stock parts back on it when the strut blows and have it replaced under warranty, or come clean and admit what I was about to do and insist that the part be corrected before I void the warranty.

I have been in the customer service industry for 13 years now and this is simply ridiculous. There is no evidence here to support the idea that I did this to the strut, however, I DO have documentation showing that the service department at Mossy Toyota in Pacific Beach did replace the strut on April 11th at 8:31 in the morning when the car had 2,408 miles. It's a bad situation is so many ways, but sometimes things need to be taken at face value and fixed. That is what good customer service entails!

All of this to say that I hope that you and I can reach a common ground on this situation. The customer service I received while in the service department was appalling and fell short of my expectations from my dealer. The accusations thrown my way instantly, the unwillingness to see another viable explanation to the damaged part and concluding "well it's stripped, but it works" by every person who contacts me is unacceptable.

I have attached pictures of both the dent in the roof as well as the driver's side stripped allen hole. I have also provided the passenger side allen head for reference as to what the hole is supposed to look like.

Thank you in advance for your prompt attention to this matter,

Brian

I was shocked that I actually got a response back within just a couple minutes.

Mr. Moreno,
I apologize for falling short and not meeting your expectation. We certainly value you as a client and want you to be satisfied with your service from us. Please let me know what we can do to correct the situation and make you happy.

Sincerely,
Jason Mossy

And this is how I followed up

Thank you for your quick response. I honestly just want it replaced so that I can do things according to the manufacturers instructions. I'm a stickler for doing things right. I don't care how its done. You can give me the strut and I can do it myself and bring you back the old strut (I will leave credit card information so you can have insurance that this will be done) or your service department can do the work if you wish. I am open to options.

Brian

Then silence. I went and took care of washing the car and when I got home I had an email from the service manager letting me know my strut has been ordered and they will be contacting me when it gets in. He was apologetic and amazing!

I really didn't know what the outcome was going to be because I was shut down at every door, but I appreciate Jason Mossy standing up and making things right! I am beyond stoked, but I was also ready to swallow my pride and be great with him if he told me no and just get the springs in.

Glad it didn't come down to that!