QuestionQUESTION: after purchasing this suv for $17,200 in oct,2009, we had discovered that this suv was in front end accident and had frame damage that was fixed. we refuse to take it back to the dealer where we purchased it because of the lies they did not disclose that there was frame damage to this suv at the time of the purchase. threw the grape wine we found out the dealer wife was driving this suv and she had the accident with it. car fax came up clean of coarse because they didn't report the accident, try to take it to another dealer that deals with them, they refused to work on my vehicle, i guess this would be conflict of interest and or discrimination,talking with the gm chevy dealer they told us that any dealer could refuse you, which is fine and dandy but i would like to know why i was really rejected to go to this dealership which is 5 min from my house to get our repairs done. we also took this vehicle to find out a trade in value, it's worth $9,200. what good is a warranty on a pre-certified vehicle when you will have to pay for pre existing problem that stem from an accident that you had no clue on. if anyone has information that could be helpful please contact me thanks a bunch. from schuylkill county pa.
Car Guy
ANSWER: Sounds like you found a bad dealer and paid too much for the car. What should you do? You should take the car back to the originating dealer and tell him what you have discovered along with the fact that you believe without a doubt that they knew this car had been in an accident previously and failed to disclose it which as a matter of law in every state they are required to do. He will try to 'wrap you up" and 'put you together' somehow to try and keep you in that car and make you happy with it somehow DO NOT DO IT! People don't realize that once a vehicle has sustained frame damage it is then considered to be a 'framer' and framers in good condition with no issues at all are worth exactly 50% of the value you got from it's book value ...and that's it. Furthermore, if you were to go and try to trade it in most dealers are going to ask you to sign something swearing to the best of your knowledge the car has never been in an accident and if so how much damage etc. If you don't dislcose it to the dealer you trade it into and they discover it later they can and usually will sue you for the difference between what they can wholesale it for (50%) and what they gave you on trade. At this point you are the victim and all of the normal victim type of resolutions are avalable to you including unwinding the entire deal all the way back to it's origination and the refund of all payments you have maden and all of your legal fees should you have to go down that road to get a fair and legal resolution to this problem. threats to write and complain to the state Attorney General are great to use but make sure you also tell the dealer if he doesn't resolve things immediately you plan on also calling the bank they financed you through and telling them and also the state DMV. People don't realize that atty general complaints may or may not have an impact because all that heppens is they send a letter to the dealer asking him to explain his side of the story. If the AG sees a pattern with one particular dealer they will then investigate further and go after him ....that process takes alot of time and they are more interested in what they can get out of the dealer (fines) and stopping and shutting down the really bad ones than they are helping you to get your money back. It's the DMV and their investigators that keep dealers awake at night. They can pull the plug on the dealer almost instantly compared to the AG. If a dealer lies to the AG and they find out they get mad,...if he dares to lie to DMV he knows he will feel their wrath and they will pull the plug by pulling his license. They will also use that leverage alot of times to get him to make things right with you in return for a slap on the wrist and a hefty fine or two. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES SHOULD YOU KEEP THAT CAR ...IT'S LIKE THE OLD MAID CARD AND HARDER TO GET RID OF. If your car has already gone from $17,200 to $9,200 it will give you a chance to do a better job of buying yourself a different SUV that has a clean bill of health. I know no reason why the other shop would have refused to work on your vehicle...I don't think you mentioned what work you wanted done ... dealers are not like the police...we don't close ranks on victims to protect our own.. we want all of the bad dealers gone from the business as quickly as possible.
P.S. I just reread your question and in the heading you say the car was a certified preowned trailblazer. Did you buy it from a GM dealer? There are alot of dealers who put certified stickers on cars that are NOT certified by the factory. If you bought a factory certified pre-owned car from a GM dealer then you have even more leverage. Call GM and verify that the dealer actually did the certification paperwork on your car and they agree it's certifed (their opinion is the only one that counts) if it is certified with them then he has defrauded GM as well ..add that to your things to mention if he doesn't resolve the issue to your satisfaction (and the only resolution you should be satisfied with is a complete unwind) if he told the financing bank it was certified then he has defrauded the bank as well. Certified cars with GM go through a rigorous 117 pt check and a wrecked car with previous damage including frame damage would not be eligible for certification! If your car is 05 then also know that only some 05's are eligible for certification depending on it's in service date which you can get off of your carfax, you must have purchased the car with fewer than 75k miles on it too qualify as well. let me know if you have any additional questions
P.P.S. As you may or may not know we all live and die by our customer review ratings ...if there is any reason you aren't able to give me a perfect score in all of the categories then please let me know before you rate me so I can make sure you are completely satisfied.
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QUESTION: The suv had 21,700 mileage on it at the time of purchase we have 26,000 on it now,we call Gm with our complaint,they told us that we need to call chevy's to file a compliant,after about a week of back and forth phone calls a chevy's rep calls back and they spoke with the dealer where purchased this vehicle and they told this rep that we knew about the damage to the frame and if there was any problems we should come back and they would fix it, we didn't want to go back to that dealer in fear of that they would do quick fixes just enough to get the vehicle threw the warranty stage and we would be screwed big time that's why we decided to change to another dealer..Our warranty was over look and never put into the system until 1/18/2010, so when i took the vehicle to the dealership for oil change and small repair in Nov,2009 i call them after i found about when our warranty went into effect on 1/18/2010 and had asked why my vehicle repairs were not put on our warranty they told me that they were being done in house and not sure why they were not put threw our warrenty.more lies i believe to hide the fact that this vehicle was in an accident and that they couldn't put this repairs under the warranty because this might be stemming from the accident in which they are fault and the warranty would not cover it. after getting the 12 month or 12,000 mile with the suv we purchased an additional coverage for $400 they paid half and we paid half we just assume now that the $200.00 went into their pockets for spending money. The complaint with chevy meant nothing as you can see. what would be your advice on this could you see why we would not want to go back to them.
carguy
ANSWER: Hi Lisa,
a couple of quick thoughts:
1) there is no way the car could have been certified as if it had been in an accident especially one that caused frame damage to the vehicle it's just not a possibility without somebody lying to somebody.
2) I understand why you wouldn't want to come back to the originating dealer but he is the person who ripped you off and that makes him the only person who can make you whole again. He says he disclosed to you that the vehicle had framed image from an accident that had been repaired, when we sell a car that has been in an accident we are legally required to disclose that to the customer in a very formal way so that there's no misunderstandings ever which means we disclose it and then we make them sign that they have been told and understand. A salesperson claiming he told you that it had been hit isn't enough. Secondly, as the car financed? The term frame damage has a very specific meaning in the car world. It means that the car was an accident in the frame was bent just enough to take it out of factory specs. Once a car has had framed image to it there is no fixing it, and most importantly its banks will not finance cars with frame damage. They won't do it. Which bank did you finance this vehicle through? If you tell me the name I can tell you the level of angry they will be when they discover that the dealer lied to them as well.
3) since you're comfortable going back in for another round of lying which I understand, save yourself and a lot of headaches and heart ache and brain damage and go see an attorney who can interact with the dealer so you don't have to. The one thing you absolutely cannot do is keep that car and do nothing. It's too much money to lose you don't have to and it's too hard to get rid of once you are ready to move on to a different car whenever that might be.
4) What is the name of the dealer and in what city is the located? I was the Chevy dealer for many years also to have a copy of the Carfax I would love to see that and would probably be able to see things on it that you can't... like whether or not the car was put into demo service for the owner's wife. There are a lot of car dealers and deep financial trouble right now even so not paying for somebody's extended service contract is theft and fraud and they put dealers in jail for things like that because I promise you if he did it to you he's done it to other people and there's probably a whole stack of warranties he hasn't ever purchased for the customers who paid for.
5) what you should do right now which would require no face-to-face contact, is write a letter to the dealer send it certified mail with return receipt requested. In that letter layout your your gripe, layout your threats, i.e. the attorney general complaint, the DMV complaint, threatened to go to Chevy again and complain, and winning the right to DMV by the way and the Atty. Gen. make sure you mention the warranty not being purchased for so long and tell them how coincidental it was that your extended warranty was paid for only after you were starting to make some noise. Ask the dealer to supply you with a copy of the certification repair order and checklist that they completed and they did the certification of the vehicle it's a separate form they have to fill out and keep it in the car file. If you want I can help you write those letters so you say things correctly in car lingo.
My e-mail address right me hopefully with those attachments is roadloans@Gmail.com... don't forget to give me the name of bank
Roger
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QUESTION: The loan we have with M&T bank, and we decided that contacting our lawyer was a good idea because we don't want to interact this dealer at all, other concern i have is that i have full coverage on this vehicle, so i guest i might be committing fraud with them also. Does insurance company insure vehicle full coverage with frame damage? what a mess i'm very discussed it and trying to keep a good sense of humor and hope for a happy ending. dealership is located in Shenandoah, pa were we purchased the suv and the dealership that refused our service is located in schuylkill haven, pa.
AnswerI am glad to hear you got an attorney involved please let me know how this winds up for you… you made the right decision to not let this guy get away with it and you are actions will no doubt save other people from being similarly defrauded
to worry be just fineRoger
