- Report: #1153875
Complaint Review: Brown Motor Works - columbia South Carolina
-
Author Not Confirmed
Why?
Brown Motor Works
520 clemson road columbia, 29229 South Carolina, USA
Phone:
803.788.7028
Web:
http://www.brownmotorworks.com/
Categories:
Business Rating:
(0)
Tell us has your experience with this business or person been good?
Brown Motor Works Tried to Scam me into paying $400 for a diagnostic columbia South Carolina
I took my BMW into brown motor works after experiencing shaking at idle and the check engine light pop up. I have an obd2 scan tool so I hooked it up to the car and it came back as an o2 sensor. I replaced the o2 sensor myself since it was an easy repair but the code did not go away. I had taken it to BMW and my private mechanic prior to brown and they could not figure out the problem either. Neither one of them charged me a fee for looking at it. I finally decided to open up the phonebook and try people who specialize in BMW's. I spoke with a man called Bart who was at the clemson road branch of brown. I explained to him that I already replaced the O2 sensor but the light was still on and BMW dealership as well as my private mechanic could not figure out the problem. I asked if he could take a look at it and he assured me his techs would figure out the problem.
I also had an aftermarket extended warranty that I had purchased with my car in case of any major repairs. Bart did also give me a station wagon to drive around while they looked at my car with 3/4 tank of gas filled.
After dropping it off, I went home and got a phone call the next day saying that they ran a diagnostic and they need to take apart the whole engine to figure out what the cause of the problem was. I went back to brown to understand exactly what he meant. Bart went on to explain to me that they could not figure out why it was vibrating and that there was problem with the cam shaft or heads and that they needed to open the whole engine which would be 4 hours of labor and over $400 just to diagnose. I told them I could not afford that and it wasnt worth it so I'll just get rid of the car instead of trying to fix it at this point. Thats when he said I owed him $120. I asked him for what? He said they were charging me $120 as a diagnostic fee just to tell me that my oxygen sensor light was on. I told him that I already knew it was on because i had a machine that I hooked up and it told me that already. I had told him this before I even gave him my vehicle, so he wasn't telling me anything new. He said he tried to file a claim with my warranty company for the diagnostic fee and they denied him the claim because he could show a 4 hour diagnostic was needed. He said I had to pay the diag fee for them hooking up their scan tool and running the code on my car. Again- I had already done this, and autozone, advance auto all do this for free. Even the BMW dealership did not charge me for running the code. I asked him why he would charge me and the actual BMW didn't and he stated to me that "my technicians are high quality technicians and you have to pay a premium for a better tech." I told him "A better tech just ran the code that I had already told you when I dropped the car off, so what is the high quality that I'm paying for here?" He continued to say that brown is a premier auto repair center and people at the bmw dealership are stupid.
I was upset but I paid him and gave him his loaner station wagon back. He then tried to accuse me of stealing gas. He had given me the loaner with 3/4 tank full and I had filled it back to that point before going back and he claimed it was "a little over 3/4 full". He had already charged me $120 for nothing and now was trying to get an extra few bucks off me for gas that I didn't even use.
Fast forward a few weeks and I did a routine transmission oil flush myself. Upon changing the fluid I recognized a leak in the filter. The oil was leaking and slowly covered the whole oxygen sensor connector up in oil. I used a can of electrical parts cleaner on the connection and replaced the filter. My codes were gone and the vibration was gone as well. All fixed with a $5 can of electrical parts cleaner.
Bart and his "high quality" technicians tried to charge me $400 plus dollars to rip apart my engine when all I needed was to clean the oxygen sensor connector for $5. So much for "paying for high quality techs".
