Complaint Review: Cottman Transmission Center - Paoli Pennsylvania

In response to John's comment of "say no run" is some one wants you to remove the transmission and open it up... Anyone here can say anything. I would suggest visiting the Houston BBB website and read the article "is your transmission sending distress signals" brochure. They expressly recommend that the ONLY way to get an estimate is after internal inspection, and that any other front end price is probably misleading...the exact opposite of what John suggests. As previously stated, not doing so will generally end in overpayment, or most likely, the dreaded "follow up" call to the low ball phone quote. Chad

In the case of a transmisson rebuild, there are only two ethical options: rebuild your existing transmission or replace the transmission with another rebuilt unit. The Cottman franchise only offers two warranty options: Platinum or Premium service. If you go to a shop that promises to "patch" the transmission or install a "used" (a.k.a. "Junkyard transmission) as a cheaper option...run! You will definitely get what you pay for and it will lead to lots of wasted money, time and misery. I would be interested to hear what "less expensive option" was proposed. It may take 15 hours to remove and install your transmission but there is also time to price it out, order parts, clean the components and do the rebuild. This typically takes about 5 working days and assumed that the parts are readily available, arrive in time and are the correct parts that were ordered, which, alas, is not always the case due to lack of standard nomenclature in the automotive industry. (For instance, I have heard motor or transmission mounts referred to by different suppliers and manufacturers as: mounts, shock abosrbers, insulators, struts, braces etc. etc.) If you communicate with the shop that did the work and truly listen to what they have to say, you might be surprised...or talk to a mediator such as the Cottman Customer Service department for a clarficiation. It may just be your hostility towards the manager that caused a communication problem.

The Individual Responds rebuttal proved all the original points without intending to: a load of canned corporate rubbish. Some expensive lessons: When somebody wants to charge you $300+ just to open the transmission, he's not trying to help you. Say no and run. When a mechanic or manager uses your name every five seconds and otherwise talks like a telemarketer, say no and run. (Most people are bad liars - when they're lying or otherwise trying to do something they know is wrong they give themselves away. The same reason a lot of people are bad at poker. This could be Brian's 'tell'.) When the guy trying to sell you something gives you three options, a $2,000 transmission rebuild, a $2,000 transmission rebuild and a $2,000 transmission rebuild, you have another choice: say no and run. When a mechanic or sales hack pretends to help you and offers to do extra work on your car, say no and run. If the sign outside the shop says Cottman or Aamco, say no and run. Go somewhere else. Local non-chain mechanics treat you much better and do better work for a lot less money. Unlike Cottman and Aamco they're not in the business of selling overhauls you don't need.

The Individual Responds rebuttal proved all the original points without intending to: a load of canned corporate rubbish. Some expensive lessons: When somebody wants to charge you $300+ just to open the transmission, he's not trying to help you. Say no and run. When a mechanic or manager uses your name every five seconds and otherwise talks like a telemarketer, say no and run. (Most people are bad liars - when they're lying or otherwise trying to do something they know is wrong they give themselves away. The same reason a lot of people are bad at poker. This could be Brian's 'tell'.) When the guy trying to sell you something gives you three options, a $2,000 transmission rebuild, a $2,000 transmission rebuild and a $2,000 transmission rebuild, you have another choice: say no and run. When a mechanic or sales hack pretends to help you and offers to do extra work on your car, say no and run. If the sign outside the shop says Cottman or Aamco, say no and run. Go somewhere else. Local non-chain mechanics treat you much better and do better work for a lot less money. Unlike Cottman and Aamco they're not in the business of selling overhauls you don't need.

Our policy at Cottman is to provide the very best service to our customers to ensure the ideal function of their vehicles. While we believe our services to be the best value and we attempt to provide solutions that consider multiple price ranges, we do not present options based on the least expensive. However, from time to time and at the customers request, we will attempt to find non-standard alternatives to meet a customers need. In this case, the customer was not satisfied with the options originally presented and wanted to find a cheaper alternative to what we believed to be the ideal option for the vehicle. In order to keep the customer happy, we did attempt to find other alternatives. Unfortunately, that does take a bit of time and we were unable to provide other options in the timeframe expected by this consumer. Our goal is to ensure that we provide 100% of our customers with excellent customer service and value. We understand that it is not always possible to please some customers and it is apparent that this customer did not appreciate the personal style of our team. To measure our efforts in customer satisfaction, each customer is asked to complete a CSI (customer satisfaction index) which rates our team in areas of wokmanship, cleanliness and customer service among others. A testament to our commitment is the fact that we have received only one negative customer response. It was from this customer. So, while we are disappointed that we were not able to make this customer happy, we are confident that our policies and practices make us a leader in our field. Brian (Manager) Cottman Transmission Paoli, Pennsylvania

Our policy at Cottman is to provide the very best service to our customers to ensure the ideal function of their vehicles. While we believe our services to be the best value and we attempt to provide solutions that consider multiple price ranges, we do not present options based on the least expensive. However, from time to time and at the customers request, we will attempt to find non-standard alternatives to meet a customers need. In this case, the customer was not satisfied with the options originally presented and wanted to find a cheaper alternative to what we believed to be the ideal option for the vehicle. In order to keep the customer happy, we did attempt to find other alternatives. Unfortunately, that does take a bit of time and we were unable to provide other options in the timeframe expected by this consumer. Our goal is to ensure that we provide 100% of our customers with excellent customer service and value. We understand that it is not always possible to please some customers and it is apparent that this customer did not appreciate the personal style of our team. To measure our efforts in customer satisfaction, each customer is asked to complete a CSI (customer satisfaction index) which rates our team in areas of wokmanship, cleanliness and customer service among others. A testament to our commitment is the fact that we have received only one negative customer response. It was from this customer. So, while we are disappointed that we were not able to make this customer happy, we are confident that our policies and practices make us a leader in our field. Brian (Manager) Cottman Transmission Paoli, Pennsylvania

Our policy at Cottman is to provide the very best service to our customers to ensure the ideal function of their vehicles. While we believe our services to be the best value and we attempt to provide solutions that consider multiple price ranges, we do not present options based on the least expensive. However, from time to time and at the customers request, we will attempt to find non-standard alternatives to meet a customers need. In this case, the customer was not satisfied with the options originally presented and wanted to find a cheaper alternative to what we believed to be the ideal option for the vehicle. In order to keep the customer happy, we did attempt to find other alternatives. Unfortunately, that does take a bit of time and we were unable to provide other options in the timeframe expected by this consumer. Our goal is to ensure that we provide 100% of our customers with excellent customer service and value. We understand that it is not always possible to please some customers and it is apparent that this customer did not appreciate the personal style of our team. To measure our efforts in customer satisfaction, each customer is asked to complete a CSI (customer satisfaction index) which rates our team in areas of wokmanship, cleanliness and customer service among others. A testament to our commitment is the fact that we have received only one negative customer response. It was from this customer. So, while we are disappointed that we were not able to make this customer happy, we are confident that our policies and practices make us a leader in our field. Brian (Manager) Cottman Transmission Paoli, Pennsylvania

Our policy at Cottman is to provide the very best service to our customers to ensure the ideal function of their vehicles. While we believe our services to be the best value and we attempt to provide solutions that consider multiple price ranges, we do not present options based on the least expensive. However, from time to time and at the customers request, we will attempt to find non-standard alternatives to meet a customers need. In this case, the customer was not satisfied with the options originally presented and wanted to find a cheaper alternative to what we believed to be the ideal option for the vehicle. In order to keep the customer happy, we did attempt to find other alternatives. Unfortunately, that does take a bit of time and we were unable to provide other options in the timeframe expected by this consumer. Our goal is to ensure that we provide 100% of our customers with excellent customer service and value. We understand that it is not always possible to please some customers and it is apparent that this customer did not appreciate the personal style of our team. To measure our efforts in customer satisfaction, each customer is asked to complete a CSI (customer satisfaction index) which rates our team in areas of wokmanship, cleanliness and customer service among others. A testament to our commitment is the fact that we have received only one negative customer response. It was from this customer. So, while we are disappointed that we were not able to make this customer happy, we are confident that our policies and practices make us a leader in our field. Brian (Manager) Cottman Transmission Paoli, Pennsylvania

To the gentleman in Florida: I understand all that and know the corporate types love it. It's cheesy, phoney and sounds untrustworthy. After about the tenth time I did tell rude Brian to stop using my first name but that didn't matter. He'll be just as patronising only now he'll carefully say 'Mr ______' every five seconds instead... while trying to sell you the most expensive things possible.

While you obviously do not want to be called by your 1st name, there is a reason some places do it.

Marketing geniuses have found that it promotes a more customer friendly atmosphere. It's much nicer to go somewhere that the people all know you on a "personal level". First name recognition does that. Every focus group tested shows this out.

ALL of my customers know me by my 1st name only. Not one knows me by any other name at all. I call everyone Mr/Mrs/Miss(fill in last name here). I also say Sir/Ma'am. Maybe it's my Southern upbringing. The few I consider to be more friend than customer, I call by their 1st name.

You should have informed Brian you were not comfortable with his calling you by your 1st name. It's like when I was growing up. The children never called adults by their 1st names. Now they all do. I still call my parent's friends Mr/Mrs(fill in last name here). My kids do this "old" version of respect too.

While you obviously do not want to be called by your 1st name, there is a reason some places do it.

Marketing geniuses have found that it promotes a more customer friendly atmosphere. It's much nicer to go somewhere that the people all know you on a "personal level". First name recognition does that. Every focus group tested shows this out.

ALL of my customers know me by my 1st name only. Not one knows me by any other name at all. I call everyone Mr/Mrs/Miss(fill in last name here). I also say Sir/Ma'am. Maybe it's my Southern upbringing. The few I consider to be more friend than customer, I call by their 1st name.

You should have informed Brian you were not comfortable with his calling you by your 1st name. It's like when I was growing up. The children never called adults by their 1st names. Now they all do. I still call my parent's friends Mr/Mrs(fill in last name here). My kids do this "old" version of respect too.