On the evening of January 16th, 2015 my wife and I went into Lantern Motors to gather information and possibly purchase a vehicle. Due to my wife's loss of job and having to change careers we had lost our Family vehicle. My wife and children are full time students and she works part time at the hospital, we were in dire need of a reliable vehicle as the only vehicle we had was my work issued patrol car but nothing for our Family's transportation. We expressed our concerns about purchasing a vehicle from a buy here pay here establishment and expressed our fears regarding the need for a reliable vehicle and asked what would happen if there was an issue with the vehicle after purchase.
Chip the salesman and Vinnie the GM both advised that the businesses reputation was the most important thing and that they have been in business so long by providing people with reliable vehicles, that if something was wrong with the vehicle after it was purchased within 90 days that they would fix it at no cost or change the vehicle out for another one if it was jot repairable. This certainly put our fears to rest. We then went ahead and purchased a 2005 Jeep Grand Cherokee that evening. However, within a week and a half of having the vehicle it began to act as if it wanted to stall when idling at a traffic light or stop sign my wife called and spoke to Chip who advised rudely to just bring it in and leave it, she advised that due to our large family of 5 children and hectic work and school schedules that we would have to have a set date and time so we could arrange for alternate travel and child care, Chip stated the mechanic is not there every day and he would make contact with him to schedule a time that we could bring the vehicle in. The call back never happened.
I then kept calling and speaking with Vinnie the GM who (now that we had bought the vehicle was rude and acted as if we were hassling them) he did nothing but chastise me as If we had done something wrong to the vehicle. Our calls were ignored and not returned. On February 21st, 2015 our vehicle was not operative at all. We called Lanter Motors again to no avail. On Monday February 23rd, 2015 I was finally able to get in contact with Vinnie the GM and again he was nothing but rude and abrasive as he stated we were the reason we were in this position and the vehicle would need to be towed to their facility which I did. On February 24th, I received a call and advised I needed to come and sign a work order before the mechanic could even look at the vehicle which I did, It stated on the order it was a starter(nothing about the vehicle stalling) only that the vehicle would not start.
On February 25, 2015 I received a call that I needed to come and pay for the repairs to be done which I advised I was not in agreement with nor was this part of their promises to use regarding the purchasing a RELIABLE vehicle. My wife then called and asked for Chip and Vinnie and was told they were both unavailable, she left a message with the gentleman who answered advising that we would not be paying for the repairs and that If they would not honor their promises and fix the vehicle or exchange for a different one that we would be contacting the Investigative News Media, the conversation then went bad ended in a yelling match and my wife being hung up on. Today is March 7th, 2015 and we have had no contact with Lantern Motors, we have no answers or hopes to retrieve our $2700.00 that has already been paid on the 7000.00 UNRELIABLE OR WORKING vehicle.