Complaint Review: Oil Can Henrys

On July 3rd, I allowed my 17 year old cousin to take my vehicle into Oil Can Henrys for an oil change. She called me at work when she left and told me that the bill was a little over $63.00. Immediately, she was asked how this was. She told me that they convinced her into buying a new air filter, fuel and oil supplement. I asked her for the number and contacted Oil Can Henrys to inquire as to the services that were rendered as I was unsure if my cousin had been taken advantage of. After, speaking with the owner, John, he assured me that he was standing next to the mechanic at the time and my cousin had not been ripped off and that if I came in, he would give us a $10.00 coupon. I assured John that I was not mad or angry in any way just attempting to find out what had taken place.

At the end of my phone call with the owner, I was content to go back to doing business with them. However, the next day, we left for a 5 hour drive across the state.

When we were about 2 hours into our trip, I told my fiance that I thought the truck was picking up speed. He told me that everything was fine and it was just me. At our last stop, I told our friends that we were following that we would have to stop at the rest area on top of Ryegrass Hill in Eastern Washington so that my fiance's daughter and our dog could go to the bathroom. They said fine and they would see us there.

When we left North Bend, Washington, I again told my fiance that I felt as if the truck were picking up speed. He said the truck was fine. My fiance then went to sleep, along with his daughter, my cousin, and our dog.

When we got to the rest area. We pulled off the freeway and I immediately began having trouble braking and slowing down. The speed limit on the freeway had been 70 and we had been traveling around 75 - 77 mph. Our friend's pulled off the freeway and we pulled in beside them. I was unable to slow down and ran into a cement block to get us stopped. My fiance woke up at this point and asked me what I was doing as the stopped has jarred everyone in the truck severely. I told my fiance that I could not get the truck to stop and the brakes felt like they were out. My fiance told me to put the truck in park and I told him I could not. At that time, we both heard this loud revving noise coming from underneath the engine. My fiance told me to turn the truck off, I did. At this time, I was able to put the truck in park. When we got out of the vehicle, our friends were laughing saying they thought that we must have really had to use the bathroom and we told them that something was wrong with our truck. We told them we thought that we had lost the transmission. My fiance and our friend began to look underneath the hood. At several minutes, we all agreed that we had better get a tow truck. When we stopped we were nearly 3 hours out from our destination in the middle of nowhere in the scorching heat.

Our friend and my fiance looked under the hood a little bit longer and noticed that our air filter cover was not on correctly. They took the cover off and noticed that our O - ring had fallen down into the butterfly valve. They straightened that mess up and we started the truck and had no further problems. The tow truck was cancelled and our friends that we were going to visit were told to head back home, as they had started on their way to pick up the kids and the dog, and we would be there in a few hours.

What we have found out, is that our throttle on our truck was stuck wide open causing us to pick up speed, like crazy. On the other side of the rest area that we stopped at, was nothing but a down hill freeway, with a bridge and a hairpin turn at the bottom.

If we had not of stopped where we did, we most likely would have been in a serious wreck, injured severely or even killed. Most likely, we would have hit our friends that were traveling in front of us with their small child and they too, would have been severely injured or killed. We would have had no way of stopping but wrecking our vehicle. If one person would have put on their brakes in front of us, we would not have been able to stop.

When we came home, my fiance went to Oil Can Henrys and was given the $10 off coupon that we were already promised. The individual that worked on the vehicle was taken out to our truck and shown what he did wrong.
When I phoned the business and informed them that I would like my money back for the services rendered, I was informed by the manager that he would not be able to do that without the owner's consent. At that time, I asked for the owner to phone me and was told that he was in a meeting and the manager, Joshua, did not know if he would call back. Joshua asked if I had any other demands of them. I informed him that there would not be demands only requests. I then went on to tell Joshua that not only would we like our money back, we would like the individual terminated which we knew would not happen so we would like him to receive a letter of reprimand in his file, we would like people that are employed to be aware of this problem so that they can be properly trained, and we wanted a formal letter of apology. Joshua told me that he did not know if anything could be done. I asked Joshua to put himself in our shoes and asked what if it was his family in the car and his best friends in front of him and he couldnt stop. He never responded to the question. I asked for the number to the corporate office at this point.

A short time later, after I phoned the corporate office, I received a call from the owner, John. I phoned John back and told him what we would like to come of this. John stated that we had made some serious threats and that their employee would not be terminated as he was a good employee. John told me that his employee never said he would not call us back. I reiterated to John that we knew the employee would not be terminated so we would like him to receive a reprimand. John told me that would not happen and he owned the same truck which had the same issue with the air filter but not as severely as what had taken place with ours. I asked John what the resolution to the situation would be and he said our money back and that was all they were willing to do. Also, John stated that he would write us a letter if that would make us happy and reiterated the fact that his employee was a good employee. John told us to feel free to contact a lawyer as he had already contacted his and made him aware of the situation.

The entire time through my conversation with John, I never became hostile or threatening. At no point did I become hostile or threatening with anyone from Oil Can Henry's. In fact, each conversation with Oil Can Henry's involved a witness and documentation.

However, we have been made to feel as if we have done something wrong and our lives are not worth anything to Oil Can Henry's. I can honestly say that Oil Can Henry's will never receive our business or anyone else that we can persuade to stay away business either.

Creedence
Lacey, Washington
U.S.A.