Tuffy Auto Services Center
| Address: | 4110 Stadium Dr, Kalamazoo, MI 49008, USA |
| Phone: | +1 269-375-4877 |
| Site: | tuffykalamazoo.com |
| Rating: | 3.8 |
| Working: | 7:30AM–6PM 7:30AM–6PM 7:30AM–6PM 7:30AM–6PM 7:30AM–6PM 7:30AM–4PM Closed |
Location
Photos 1
Reviews 5
CA
Cassie Ann
While the employees at Tuffy are kind, likeable, and seem to have the best intentions -there seems to be a serious lack of competency when it comes to auto repair. I took my car in to have my two rear tires replaced- nothing else. After 4 hours I received a call from Tuffy saying that my serpentine belt (which had just been replaced no more than 2 weeks previously) had popped off and that I wouldnt be able to drive my car off the lot if I didnt have a new tensioner pulley put on. I agreed to the repair (and to pay the additional $240 on top of my bill of $206 for the tires) and picked my car up the next day. After driving for about 15 minutes, there was a loud metal scraping sound and the car seized up on the expressway. When I popped the hood, I found the entire engine and all other components around it covered in aluminum shavings as well as a medium sized, circle shaped patch of metal worn away on the top inside of the hood. After having it towed back to Tuffy, we found out that the mechanic had put the tensioner pulley on upside down and backwards. The manager was apologetic for the inconvenience and had the repair redone, correctly this time, for free. He also replaced the alternator for free as it had been damaged due to the first fumbled tensioner pulley installment. I took my car home, thankful for the help Tuffy had provided me at no cost. While driving the car on a basic errand less than 5 miles away later that day, the car completely stalled and turned off while I was going 45 mph. I had to have it jumped 4 separate times in order to return home. At this point I had a reliable mechanic from the Detroit area come out to Kalamazoo to check out what could be wrong. Turns out, the mechanics at Tuffy had failed to plug in the new alternator making it impossible for my battery to charge and had also disconnected the wires to the heat and ac fan/defroster. A simple mistake that prevented my car from running properly could have been avoided if the mechanics at Tuffy paid more attention. I do not recommend taking a vehicle in for service at this location at this time.
JE
Jesse
Horrible. My vehicle had to be towed here due to an electrical problem that wouldnt allow my vehicle to run. First, the employees at Tuffy couldnt figure out how to move my vehicle into their shop stall when the vehicle was dead, which eventually took them an entire day to do. Then they couldnt figure out what was wrong with my vehicle and tried to tell me that it was a bad battery, which it wasnt. Then they tried telling me the problem was due to a loose battery cable connection, which it wasnt. Then they tried telling me that the battery cable fittings were stripped in the battery, which it wasnt. Then they found a blown in-line fuse, which they replaced. They ended up putting a new battery in my blazer anyway with a new fuse and charged me close to $400 for it. The battery didnt need to be replaced for it was a new battery and they charged me way beyond the reasonable labor time and costs associated with changing a friggin 25 cent fuse. I do not like giving bad reviews and understand that everyone has off days, but these gentleman were totally incompetent. If I had my own garage and lived nearby I would have done the repairs myself. I feel like I was taken advantage of considering the circumstances that I was in, which was from out of town, broken down vehicle, towed to Tuffy, and needed it to be repaired quickly. They new all of this and unfortunately I got stuck with the short stick in my opinion. You may be better off going to a local, family owned mechanic shop or a car dealership, which have gotten tremendously better these days with their labor costs.
KO
Kodie Heading
They recently did some work on my car. They tried to overcharge me by quite a bit but I was otherwise fairly happy. Today my tire came off while I was on the highway. It was clearly their fault and they should have taken responsibility. Instead they denied that they made a mistake and after I threatened to sue them they finally told me they would look at it. Once my car got to the shop they told me they would look at it on Monday (today is Saturday and my car got to them well before they closed so to me it seemed like they were just trying to give me a hard time, especially because all the mechanics went over and looked at my car when it got to the shop). On top of the poor work they did that could have potentially caused a lot of harm to people (including myself), they also lied to me and appeared to intentionally give me a hard time. If they would have taken responsibility for their actions and been polite I would have no problem giving them a good review, but they couldnt even manage to be polite. TL;DR: They put myself and others in danger, lied, were rude and unhelpful, and seemed to be intentionally giving me a hard time. I STRONGLY RECOMMEND DOING BUSINESS AT A DIFFERENT LOCATION. *If they change their tune on Monday and decide to act like decent human beings I will probably come back and give them more stars, but until then this is what they get (it would be 0 stars if I could).
JO
John M. Mueller
Tuffy was recommended to me by a colleague at work when I moved to Kalamaozo two years ago. Since then, I have taken our Volvos to Tuffy and have been satisfied with the service provided by both the Kalamazoo and the Portage location (owned by the same person). A recent example of their good customer service was when they looked at a leak we were having in one of our cars. It had been 6-8 months since they had replaced the rack-and-pinion on the car (a big expense for any vehicle, but we liked the vehicle and wanted to keep it), and they looked at the car to see where was the leak. They spent time diagnosing where the fluids could be coming from. Even though the leak looked like it was coming from the transmission (they had us also have a transmission shop look at it confirm that the transmission was in good order), it was finally determined that there was a lose fitting on a tube from the rack. Even though it had been some time since they installed the new rack, they made sure the leak was fixed and did so without any charge. I appreciated the extra time and attention they provided to ensure the leak was fixed (they looked at the vehicle serval times a week latter just to make sure the leak was solved). Thanks.
JE
Jessica Bradley
tl;dr: These people are slow, and they will probably lie to you. I called when they opened at 7:30, explained that I needed my radiator hoses replaced. I asked if they have the parts and he said "Yes I should have them in our warehouse down the street." He scheduled me in right away. After discussing what I needed he said it would take 45 minutes. Apparently he meant 45 minutes to look at a cracked radiator pipe, because 45 minutes later he said it will take 3 hours to replace. I was shocked that such a simple procedure would take that long, but he offered me a loaner car to use until my car was done. 3.5 hours later and I heard nothing from them so I gave them a call. He said that he just got the part and had not even started working on my car. Remember how he said he had the parts in a warehouse around the corner? WRONG! He said he had to go across town to get the part, which I suspect is also a lie. We were in Kalamazoo not New York, it would take 45 minutes MAX to go across town. An hour and a half after that last phone call I finally got my car back. The half hour job took them 6.5 hours.