Complaint Review: Westgate Chrysler Jeep Dodge - Raleigh North Carolina

I'll make this simple. I purchased a brand new Dodge SRT4 from a Dodge dealership in Idaho while I was living there, in 2005. I was upsold by the dealer and purchased an upgrade to the turbo (stage 2). I first wanted the Stage 3 but it isn't street legal and voids your warranty. I was informed by Dodge that the Stage 2 is street legal and does NOT void the warranty.

No problems for 2 years. I had all of my services completed within the 5,000 mile schedules, (however I had the synthetic $80 oil changes which are suppose to last 6,000 miles, but I still kept it under 5,000). In June of 2007 the car started losing power, and the engine would hestitate when accelerating under normal driving conditions.

Keep in mind this is a sporty vehicle, and was capable of being a competition vehicle, but the car was NEVER EVER raced or used in competition. I'm not stupid, I have freinds who have blown their engines, tranny's, etc. I purchased the car, (1) because I like how tuners look, and (2) because I was getting v8 power at 4cyl economy. You can't really beat that. Back to the story, In June I took the car into the nearest dealership Westgate Dodge, for the problems I was having and they told me it needed a tune up. (It requires a tune up at 30,000 miles, and the car had around 32,000 miles). I didn't have $300 for the tune-up at the time so I told them I would bring the car back in a couple weeks.

One week after getting the car back while driving the car engine started knocking loudly, and died in a parking lot. I had the vehicle towed to Westgate under the warranty, but this time they called me and told me the Stage 2 voids the warranty. I called Chrysler and they couldn't confirm this, but tryed telling me that ANY modification voids your warranty. I called Ron Sayer and they said the Stage 2 doesn't void your warranty, especially since the DEALER installed it and its a MOPAR part. (If you're not aware MOPAR, Dodge, plymouth, and Chrysler Financial are all subsidaries of CHRYSLER. Big corporation set up these little Limited Liability Corporations as subsidies to their main company as a way to shrug of liability and accountability of their actions.)

I spoke with a man at Westgate dodge named Mr. Anderson, the Service Manager, who I argued with for about 30 minutes about the issue. He changed his story several times, claiming the Stage 2 automatically voids your warranty, then he claimed it would void my warranty under certain conditions, which he couldn't even verify if the conditions existed because they REFUSED to thuroughly inspect the engine to determine the actual problem, unless I forked out $580 just to inspect it.

So, my car sat there for a few weeks, and they didn't do anything, except assume what was wrong with the engine, blame it on the Stage 2 (they first tried to blame it on my oil changes, until I faxed them copies of the reciept records), then cost me a few hundred dollars in tow fees.

I towed my car to a trustworthy mechanic who is in the church, and am waiting for a diagnosis. I checked out bloggs and posting about Chrysler warranty problems, and to no surprise, this is commonplace with any Chrysler vehicle. They are a scandalous company filled with fraud and deceit, to the point that Daimler dumped them, and Cerebrus, (A private holdings firm that specializes in the acquisition of near-bankrupt companies) bought them out. I can only forsee a more dire outcome for the Chrysler group, but that's just karma for screwing over so many people.

Scott

Hillsborough, North Carolina

U.S.A.