Complaint Review: Hyunday Corporation Not Living Up To Its Name. - Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey

This is to inform about my experience with my 2003 Hyundai Elantra and how Hyundai Corporation handled my case (#3252441).This Elantra had the engine to seize up at exactly 61787 miles on the odometer.

It started when after coming back from Ocala Florida visiting my brother the engine refused to crank. The car was driving then it stopped and would not crank again.

I am a Master ASE mechanic with 29 year experience and I own a mobile shop here in Miami. I provide service and repairs to my customers at their place. I think I should know how to maintain my own car, in fact I did an oil and filter change using Pennzoil 10 w 30 only about 1000 miles ago. Also I replaced the air filter and spark plugs about 3000 miles ago. The car was going to undergo a timing belt job considering the car was at the time recommended by the factory. Then this happened.

The car never overheated, never lost any oil or coolant, it ran perfectly up until this problem. The first thing I checked was the oil level which was clean and at the right level. The coolant color and level, they were ok.

I tried to move the crank shat with a socket and saw that it was seized. So then I started gathering info about the 100K mile guarantee Hyundai offers its customers, as it turns out they only give second owners (me) until 60K or 3 years. That was not nice to know. So anyway I proceeded to ask Hyundai if they will make an exception considering my car has been well taken care of by me. They told me (after asking me some questions that included where I have taken the car for maintenance to which I responded me. (I did the entire maintenance on this car) They instructed me to take the car to the nearest dealer for an inspection to see what was happening. I asked Britney if I had a chance of them taking care of the repair under guarantee, she said she didn't know for sure, I asked if they had done some exception like this before, she said yes. But I needed to take the car to the dealer. I said I will take it.

There I spoke to Mr. Jorge and he told me he will charge me $104.00 for the inspection. I left the car and waited. 4 days after I got a call from Hyundai Corporation saying they won't be able to pay for the repairs because I didn't take the car to the dealer for maintenance. That was kind of dumb, they could have checked this them selves (records at the dealer) just by contacting the dealer and avoid my expense and time to tow the car there and pay $104.00 for an inspection. I already knew the engine was seized, why we don't know. The dealer doesn't know, they will have to open the engine and check.

Well my point is this. This car has only 61K miles. It was maintained properly. If I was Hyundai Corporation I will be very interested on opening this engine and inspecting it to see why one of my engines failed under these circumstances. I will get my team of forensic engineers to inspect every part of this engine and find the cause of the failure. This will help in making better engines that will be at the same level as Toyota and Honda. But of course that is me.

Ok my brother Gustavo recommended me to try again and see if the dealer could be persuaded to pay for the repairs. I did that and called again. Nothing, they didn't want to let me speak to the people who made the decision with out even contacting me for any more details. I called Jorge at the dealer in Cutler Ridge where my car was being held. He told me that the district manager will have to review the case to see if they can persuade the Corporation to pay for the repair, he comes sometimes to check things out. After 2 weeks I received a call from Jorge telling me that they won't be able to help me, Period. Come get my car, pay the $104.00 for the inspection and be on my way.

It was a waste of time and money trying to get Hyundai Corporation to help me with this problem, on top of the aggravation of having a car with only 60K mile on the odometer fail in this way.

I have never owned a Hyundai vehicle before but have never really liked them much (same with Kias). I told my mom to buy a Honda Civic; she didn't listen to me as always.

Ok. I know they were not obligated to help me. But morally they could. I still have to make payments on this car for about 2 years more. I will fix the car but one thing is for sure, I will tell every one I know about this. No one in my family will buy a Hyundai if I can help it. Hyundai won't be on my recommended list. Many many people ask me what car I recommend.

By the way, you want to buy the best car? Buy a Honda. You will be happy. Don't waste your time with imitations and not cheap imitations, now days they are expensive imitations.

I will make it my job to inform people about this. Stay away from Hyundai vehicles. The 100 K mile guarantee is not true. It only covers original owners. So stay away from used Hyundai even more. This has caused me a real economical problem. This is something that shouldnt happen. This is something big corporation should have in mind. It seems car makers aren't really interested on their customers well being.

If you have any questions about this or you have a similar case please contact me. I want to know about it. I personally don't consider Hyundai's bad cars, but neither are they the best cars. They are priced very close to much better cars. So why do people buy these cars?

I think the reason people but this low quality cars is because they usually offer easier financing for people with bad credit. That's what happened with this car, my mom bought this car and then when she couldn't pay it anymore I had to assume payments so my credit won't be damaged. (I was the cosigner).

I say to you, save some money, put a better down payment and get a Honda. Always hire a mobile car inspector to do a check up to make sure the car is in good condition. (We do that kind of work).

My name is Pedro Talavera. I own Certified Mobile Tech of Miami Fl.

www.1mobilerepair.com.

786 344-9571. Feel free to contact me for anything.

Pedro xxxxxxxx

Miami, Florida

U.S.A.

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