Complaint Review: Southern's Mega Center - Glen Burnie Maryland

On 4/15/05, the salesperson at the dealership told me that I was approved for the loan at $470 per month for 66 months with $1000 down. He showed me one minivan, but later came back and said that he wanted me to look at another minivan.

When I asked why I was looking at a different van, he told me that the minivan costed less. One of the owner's of the dealership further told me that I was approved under the VIP program in which if I paid my payment on time for the first eight months, that either I could get refinanced at a lower rate or I could trade the vehicle in on another vehicle and the loan would be paid off no matter what I owed. He also told me that Wells Fargo was providing the financing and that he would shop around on Monday for a lower rate, but he went with Wells Fargo because he knew that they would finance the vehicle.

The owner looked up the retail price of the vehicle on the kelly blue book site. However, I noticed that the print out of the kelly blue book value referred to California. When I asked about this, the owner told me that this is where Kelly Blue Book was located. The retail value was a little over $18,000.

I later agreed to the deal, provided the down payment, and signed all the paperwork. I noticed on the paperwork that there was nothing in writing about the VIP program and the financing bank listed on the paperwork was not Wells Fargo, but Americredit Financial. I asked the salesperson about these discrepancies and was told that they do not put the VIP program in writing because they depend on "Word of Mouth" advertising to sell vehicles. I also asked the salesperson how Americredit Financial would finance this purchase since I had a charged off loan from them showing on my credit report. He told me that the owner will be shopping around for a lower rate so I may be called back in to sign some new paperwork and that they specialize in helping people with bad credit.

On 4/17/05, I noticed that there was a bent part under the carriage of the vehicle and scratches on the molding as well. I contacted the salesperson on 4/18/05 to inform him of this. He had me come into the dealership on three separate occasions to speak to an owner about the defects, but the owner was never there.

On the second occassion, one of the other salespersons accused me of causing the defects on the vehicle. On the third occasion, the salesperson told me that he would contact me next week to set up a time to have the vehicle picked up to have the defects repaired.

The salesperson contacted me on 4/24/05 and told me that the owner wanted me to come into the dealership after work to discuss the defects on the vehicle. When I asked why I need to come into the dealership for this discussion, the salesperson told me that the owner wanted to make sure I was satisfied with the vehicle and that he obtained a lower interest rate for me. The salesperson informed me that he would not be present, but to ask for one of the owners. I arrived at the dealership and waited almost two hours with my three small children for the one of the owners.

Finally, a salesperson called me back to the office to tell me that the bank that was going to provide the financing would not purchase the loan and that I needed a cosigner. He further told me that I could not keep the vehicle without a co-signer. He asked how far away I lived and asked another employee to drive me and my children home in my former vehicle. I requested an immediate refund of my down payment and the owner refused.

When I arrived home, I told my husband what happened and he called to the dealership informing them that we would be coming up there to pick up a check for my down payment, the salesperson on the phone told my husband that the check would be ready when we got there. We had to load our children into our old van to go back to the dealership. About half way to the dealership, my husband decided to call since it was close the closing time for the dealership to inform them that he was almost there and to have the check ready. He spoke to another salesperson that had no idea what he was talking about.

When we arrived at the dealership, my husband spoke to the owner who still refused to provide an immediate refund of my down payment and when my husband told him that he was calling the police, the owner demanded that my husband leave his dealership at once. We called the police and when they arrived, we were told that this was a civil and not a criminal manner. The police officer agreed to speak to the owner, but told us that he could not force him to produce a check for my down payment.

Nicole

Annapolis, Maryland
U.S.A.