Complaint Review: Tropical Auto & Air

Filed on : June 17 2016

Filed by : 
SUNRISE AUTOMOTIVE INC.
PO BOX 251143 
Daytona Beach FL 32125

***.***.****

Filed against : 
Tropical Auto Air
*** * **** ** 
Daytona Beach FL 32114

***.***.****

Complaint Description:

       TROPICAL AUTO & AIR MISDIAGNOSED THE VEHICLE RESULTING IN $684.37 IN REPAIRS AND PARTS BEING PAID BEFORE TELLING US THAT THE ENGINE WAS BLOWN.

                 This situation arose from Sunrise Automotive Incorporated to which this writer is President, sent our customer with whom we are a lien holder on her vehicle to Tropical Auto & Air. In certain circumstances I have arrangements with our customers that I pay for their repairs. In this case I used a credit card because the shop could not release the car without payment. Normally I paid in the form of a company check but the shop was some distance from us and the customer needed their vehicle so they agreed to take the credit card as payment over the phone. The services provided were labor by Tropical Auto and Air and I purchased the parts from Advanced Auto Parts and Radiator Depot.

             The vehicle was taken to Tropical to be diagnosed. The customer had problems with the vehicle overheating. Tropical recommended from their diagnosis a water pump, timing belt and thermostat and gasket. These parts were purchased and delivered to Tropical and they put them on the vehicle. Next tropical recommended strut housings, tie rod ends and brake pads for the vehicle. These parts were purchased and delivered to Tropical and put on the vehicle. After this Tropical said that the vehicle needed a radiator. The radiator was purchased and delivered to Tropical and they put it on the vehicle. At this point in time we and our customer had provided Tropical with each part that they said needed to be on the vehicle for the vehicle to work properly. The customer came back and picked up the car, she drove it out and got less than a block. The vehicle was making a very loud scrubbing sound. She immediately turned around and took it back. They put it up on the lift looked at the tie rods and found out that one had been installed improperly.

           They straightened this out and they put her back out again. She got less than two miles and the vehicle started overheating again. She left the vehicle a few miles away in a merchant's parking lot to cool down. I called Tropical - they told us to bring it back in. She let it cool down and she returned it back to Tropical. Tropical had the vehicle, let it run, claims it never overheated. After it came back in overheating they recommended a hub and bearing assembly for the noise. The part was purchased, delivered to Tropical and they put it on. They called the customer and told the customer that it was ready to go, they could not get it to overheat. She took it and drove it out. Again she got less than three miles and the vehicle overheated. She took the vehicle back to Tropical. At that point in time Tropical told her that it had a blown head gasket and that it had the blown head gasket when the repairs were made. The vehicle had been driven less than six miles. She immediately stopped when it overheated so she could not have blown the head gasket unless it was already gone. There is a very simple test that every shop knows to do when they have a vehicle that overheats. It is commonly known as either a sniff test or a block test. It comes from a kit that you test to see if lubricants and the water have mixed. If they have you know that the integrity of the engine block has been compromised. If possibly Tropical said that they could not do this because it was not pumping adequate water with the water pump but the car was running when they brought it in and they could have done this test then. A blown head gasket on this particular car with the age and model makes this car not a car that you should repair. More than likely it needs a new engine, which is impracticable putting an engine in a 99 Plymouth breeze. However past the first repair the timing belt, water pump and thermostat, Tropical recommended all these other repairs that I mentioned above, and only after the lady had taken it out twice did Tropical tell the customer that it had a blown head gasket. 

Your Desired Resolution:
SUNRISE REQUESTS A REFUND FOR THE MISDIAGNOSED REPAIRS AND PARTS PAID ON A VEHICLE WITH A BLOWN ENGINE. WE REQUEST: $360.00 PAID FOR LABOR TO TROPICAL AUTO & AIR $324.37 PAID FOR UNNECESSARY PARTS PAID TO ADVANCED AUTO PARTS & RADIATOR DEPOT TOTAL REFUND REQUESTED: $684.37

               Total labor paid on these unnecessary repairs were $360.00. We spent $399.00 on parts that were bought for this vehicle of which for the repair they recommended the thermostat, timing best and water pump those parts were $50.00. If they had used proper judgment after they did the initial repair on the job and then tested the engines integrity properly it wouldn't have been so bad. But they did not use good judgment in making this repair. No one told them to put a water pump, timing belt and thermostat on there. They said it needed to be done. I concurred. But at that point in time they should have known by using the proper testing methods that the car's engine head gaskets were blown. So Sunrise is out the money for the parts. They have been put on a car that is not worth putting a new engine in. If in fact they had done their job properly - at most we would have put the timing belt, water pump and thermostat on there. But they used such poor judgment and such poor skills that they overlooked the problem with the car and never tested it to see if they had repaired it and went from there and recommended much more repairs that they originally diagnosed that never fixed the car. So we do not want to pay the labor because I am out all this money on parts. We will probably have to take them to small claims court to recover the parts purchase and labor paid. We plan on selling the car for salvage and helping the customer get another vehicle. We do not think that in no shape or form that Tropical is due this labor cost. They did not perform or use proper judgment in repairing this vehicle but carelessly recommended other repairs that were a total waste of money on a vehicle with a bad engine. Only after all this work and parts were purchased did they say that it had a bad engine. We took the vehicle to another garage and had it diagnosed and the heads were bad.

           We feel that Sunrise should be awarded this contested charge since they did not diagnose the problem correctly that resulted in us paying a fairly large sum of money in parts and labor that were wasted.