Complaint Review: Don McGill Toyota of Katy

On Friday, August 18th, 2011, the air conditioning in my certified pre-owned 2007 Toyota Camry stopped working. I purchased this Camry at Don McGill Toyota in Katy, TX in 2010 along with an extended warranty therefore I broughtO the car to the dealership immediately. At that time, the dealership kept the car and took my husband and I back to work/home via their shuttle. Later that day, Glen (a service employee) called and informed us that our compressor needed to be replaced. My husband, who is very knowledgeable about cars, also told him that if it is the compressor he also knew the dryer would need to be replaced.

Glen told us he needed to order the part and that it he would not be able to get the part until Monday morning so we knew we would go into the weekend without air conditioning in 100+ degree heat in Texas. On Monday, August 22nd, 2011 we waited for the Service Department to call us and we did not receive a call. Glen finally called us that afternoon and said he has the part however being that the part did not get to him in the morning, he would not have enough time to install the part, so to drop the car off with him on Tuesday morning and he would get the install taken care of.

On Tuesday, August 23rd, 2011, my husband dropped the car off to him and was given an assurance that he would be able to complete the work by that afternoon. The day passed and my husband received a call that afternoon around 2:00 pm from Glen stating that once they got the car taken apart and started the work, it was discovered that he forgot to order the dryer. He went on to tell us that that the car would not be ready for pick as promised at the end of the day. We told Glen that we would need a loaner car and he informed us that Don McGill does not provide loaners, but that my warranty would cover $30 per day of a rental car. Unfortunately Toyota rental cars are more than $30 per day which means we would need to pay out of pocket for a rental when initially we were told we would have our car by the end of the Tuesday. We agreed being that we had no other choice being that this car is the only car in household and we needed to have transportation since we have two children and jobs that require transportation. At that time (around 4:00 pm), I let Glen know that I needed to have the service shuttle pick me up at work so that I could get the rental car and pick my daughter from daycare before 6:30. When I did not get a call from the shuttle driver by 5:00 pm, I called Don McGill Toyota and asked where the shuttle driver was and they nonchalantly said he is very busy and will get to you shortly. I expressed my concern with being able to pick my daughter from daycare before it closed at 6:30 pm and they said that they would have the driver call me. The shuttle driver called me around 5:45 pm and offered to take me to my daughters daycare to pick her up since he was running late and I agreed. The shuttle driver finally picked me up at 6:05 pm and contrary to what he said to me over the phone he simply dropped me off at the dealership and said I hope you get to your daughter on time. At this time it was 6:25 pm and needless to say, by the time I got the rental car and got to my daughter, the daycare was closed and I was charged a fee for being late. What upset me more than the fee was the fact that my 9 year old daughter was sitting at the front of the daycare wondering why her parents werent there to pick her up before the daycare closed as usual. It is unacceptable to put a child through anything like that!

The next day, Wednesday,  August 24th, 2011, Glen called us in the afternoon to tell us that the car was ready and the compressor/dryer had been installed. My husband and I went to the dealership that afternoon to pick up the car. Again, being that my husband knows quite a bit about cars, he opened the hood of the car to look at the work that was done. He immediately noticed that the radiator was shaking a great deal and asked Glen and the service tech to come and take a look at what he was seeing. Once my husband pointed out the extreme shaking of the radiator, Glen proceeded to tell us that a bracket on the radiator was broken and that is why it was shaking, however my husband told him that it was not like that when we brought it to Don McGill Toyota so why was it like that now? Furthermore, they had to take the radiator off to get to the compressor. Even more, why would a service department see something broken on a customers car and not tell them about it at all? Why did the customer have to bring something like that to their attention before they even said anything? Unacceptable!

While my husband stayed with the car, the service tech and manager were trying to get to the bottom of the broken radiator bracket. Minutes later, there is a loud explosion underneath the hood of my car, right in the driveway area of the dealership. Freon and radiator fluids exploded everywhere and starting leaking and luckily my husband was not looking directly into the engine area or he might have suffered injury. My husband immediately went into the dealership and told me not to complete the transaction. Several of the employees also witnessed the explosion and commented that it was very loud. We brought the service manager, Glen back out to the car and showed him what happened, not to mention the air conditioning was not working AGAIN! Glen put us in a rental car and said he would find out what went wrong. So now we are back in a Toyota Corolla rental when we were fully expecting to be back in our Toyota Camry. We also are starting to see a level of incompetence in the service area of this dealership that could potentially have a serious impact on our safety, but what could we do? Our hands were tied being that the car just exploded under the hood and we need to have transportation.

The next day, on Thursday, August 25th, 2011, Glen called and said that he was going to replace the radiator because they recognized that the broken bracket was their fault, as well as fix the brackets and that it was some type of air conditioning line that exploded underneath the car that would also be fixed. He assured us that he would take care of everything. At this point, my husband and I are very nervous about the work being done at this dealership and now we are even more concerned about the integrity of our vehicle. Finally, Glen calls us and tells us we can pick up our car. We arrive at the dealership and go inside to pick up our car thinking that Glen took care of everything considering the work they performed cause more problems than it fixed, however upon returning the rental car and requesting the keys, we were asked to pay $100.14! My husband expressed his disappointment in the service and his concern with the work that was done on our car; however management did not seem to care much. At that time, he informed the dealership that we wanted an incident report or some type of documentation that described the explosion underneath our hood in the event further problems occur due to the inadequate work done on our car. No one at the dealership wanted to give us any documentation of this incident or of any of the issues with the work done on our car (broken radiator bracket, broken air conditioning line, etc.). When we saw their reluctance to document what happened with our vehicle, we informed them that we would be submitting this information to our insurance company for documentation purposes and we would be consulting an attorney.
Friday, August 25th, 2011, my husband stopped by the dealership to speak with another manager about getting documentation of this sequence of events. Again, he was told that there was no documentation and that they would not be willing to document anything for us regarding this incident.

The following Monday, August 29th, 2011, my husband received a call from the dealership informing us that they would be reversing the charges made to pay for the work that was done on our car, however, after everything that has occurred, that is not enough. Our car does not ride the same after all of this work. The area under the hood still shakes more than it did before we dropped it off. The inside of the car smells like automotive fluid (from the explosion I am sure). Underneath the hood, there is fluid residue that was never cleaned off the car and all over the engine area there are fluid stains. What is even more disturbing than the condition of our car after having it serviced at Don McGill Toyota is the damage to our peace of mind that our car was NOT returned to us in the same or better condition than what is was in when placed in their care. I have never been through such an experience with a so-called reputable brand name dealer in my life. I truly do not feel safe driving in this car with my family anymore and I truly believe that Don McGill Toyota owes us; you cannot take safety in a motor vehicle more serious, especially when Toyota is supposedly the safest car in the industry.

I brought my car to Don McGill Toyota with the confidence that they would repair my vehicle, but what they did was damage my vehicle and opt to send me away without telling me that they damaged my vehicle.