Honda of Seattle

Reviews 3

A

Anonymous User

Feb 07, 2012 Monday morning, 6 Feb. 2012. I make an appointment using the Internet for a 0945 Oil and Filter change at the downtown Seattle Honda Dealership, where I bought my 2008 Honda Civic Hybrid in May of 2008.. At 0945 hrs. Im at the Dealership waiting in the lounge. I also wanted to know if they could run a computer check and tell me why I am only getting 29 MPG. Its a 2008 Hybrid with 15,200 miles on it and I should be seeing more like 41mpg for city driving. After nearly a 2 hour wait, the assistant manager, Rod Ridley came to tell me that he thinks changing a filter which he showed me, which was a little dirty, would improve my mileage but other than that nothing else appears out of order. The filter and labor will cost $55. I say sure, change the filter. Another half hour passes and Rod comes again and tells me he will have to jump start the car...he suspects a dead cell in the battery! This the battery that came new with the Honda and its only been in service for 45 months. I tell Rod, "No way that battery could be defective, it worked normal getting the car here and started just fine for the technician who drove the car to a bay to work on it. He services it and now my battery is dead? Its unfathomable that such a coincidence as my battery going bad...while I sat in the lounge and they worked on it." Rod says hell see what he can do and leaves. Ten minutes later Rod returns and says Im ready to go. I pay my bill...$126 for my service...a bit steep but then its the Honda Dealership where you pay more for the Honda expertise, right? I jump into the cockpit and it starts fine...but when I try to close the electric window all Hell breaks loose with the dash instrumentation…flashing lights everywhere in the cluster and then…the engine stops and the starter will no longer work! I take the key to Rod and tell him, "your people have somehow "broken" my car." "Rod" quickly comes up with a plan to try charging the battery....and I go home by bus to have lunch with my wife. I ride the Metro bus for home and arrive just after 1200 hrs. We start eating lunch and the phone rings...its "Rod" to give me this song and dance about the fact that my battery is dead and wont take a charge...what do I want to do? Im a retired Navy Captain and admit I have a slight "Anger Management" problem when I encounter this kind of inept Customer Service and verbally unload on "Rod" complaining that the incredible coincidence between my car being in excellent shape when I drive into the Dealership and now he is implying he expects me to say, "Well...I guess Ill have to buy a new battery". I further tell him what I expect is to have my car running like it was when I drove into the Honda Dealership, and by the way, have the Service Manager call me ASAP. We finish our lunch and I mull over the possibility of taking the Honda Dealership to Small Claims Court over this incident. At 1230 hrs. the phone rings...and its Rod again, not the Service Manager...with a "were so sorry...well replace your battery at no charge". I reply, "Fine....just tell me when I can pick-up my car!" One half hour later Rod telephones and says the new battery is installed and my car is ready to pick-up. My wife joins me for the bus ride downtown. The poor Customer Service story was not over. When we arrived at the Honda Dealership to retrieve the Civic Hybrid with a new battery installed, the car started just fine...only, now, because they changed the battery and did not reprogram the radios "code" I had to, once again, ask "Rod" to correct this oversight and kindly get the code and FIX the radio! After getting the serial number and looking up the "code" Rod entered it...and as a extra…he set the clock. Honda Customer Service nightmare over...for now.

KA

Kathy Sun

Honda of Seattle is an abusive place to do business. The actual process of looking at cars was acceptable -- we drove all the cars I was interested in and they did a great job at explaining the differences to me. Unfortunately, the process of trying to buy a car made me feel like they were trying to trick me at every moment. Im younger and female and I felt like the car dealership tried to take advantage of me with every dirty trick in the book. The short story: Honda of Seattle lied to me at least 3 times during the process and refused to honor prices and rates agreed upon, going as for as to just changing the the numbers when presenting the paperwork to me. The next day, I bought the exact same car at Bellevue Honda for about $2000 less during my lunch break at work. We had agree upon a price over the phone and I even called my dealer (Kelli) back to ask her if it was all inclusive. When I got there, I was presented with a price that was about $8,000 more than agree upon. I probably should have left right there but this is what followed was a nightmare. I had originally decided on a civic coupe and changed to a sedan instead. The saleswoman said, "well the doors are really expensive" and quoted me an additional $2500. The MSRP difference between the two cars is $200. Then, she told me that most customers just pay MSRP and she had cut me a very special deal on the exact car we had discussed earlier. Then, there was upgrades on the civic that she didnt know about that cost me $500. And, conveniently, this is a Honda dealership that only owns 2 Civics so that upgraded car was effectively my only option.Then, she implied that the extended $2000 warranty was mandatory and when I point blank asked if I had to buy it, she refused to answer and told me, Id have to discuss that with the finance department. At one point I really needed to duck out to run a 25 minute errand because this was taking longer than I expected and she REFUSED to let me leave because she needed me for the paperwork she had spent the last 45 minutes preparing without me. I try to be a polite a customer but in what world does a customer at a car dealership need permission to leave for 30 minutes?! Eventually, Im so fed up I pull out Kbb and start showing them the average price paid for the Honda Civic in Seattle. She tells me, "No dealership in the State will give you prices like that". Eventually they agree to give me the kbb price listed. When I asked why she had give such absurd numbers and lie to me throughout the process, she said, "itd be like giving free money away to customers". As I get ready to complete the paperwork, I note that that the APR on my car loan was 8.99% instead of the 0.9% we had agree upon earlier. Time to flee. The next day, I went to Honda of Bellevue. They picked me up for work, offered a starting price that was the same as this places "absolute lowest price", gave me a price that was about 2k lower than this place, and threw in some upgrades for free. Whole process was done during my lunch break.

AS

Ashley Vanbrunt

Went here after reading great reviews to buy my first car for Christmas. Had a wonderful time with the sales associate Issac, I felt like everything I have heard about how scary buying a car could be was not the case here. I left with my Honda Fit, carfax, and vehicle inspection certificate 100% trusting that I was getting a quality car from a dealership that was filled with genuine and trusted people. It had only been 2 months and I got a flat tire on the road (this happens) and I go to fix the tire and realize that there is no tire key included in the spare tire parts. Called Honda to try and make an appointment to bring the car in, they tell me they are booked all day and I cant so I am left with trying to find an open auto shop to help change the tire. The auto shop lets us know that they couldnt find the key and the tire bolt would have to be broken to change the tire. They ALSO let us know that the tires are far past the legal limit to be driving, and are almost worn down to the bare bones and we shouldnt have been driving on them at all. So we call up the Honda dealership to ask about the key and how after only 2 months the tires could be so bad. The gentleman at the customer service desk informs us that "state law only requires that they sell a car that meets the minimum requirements" and that they "are only obligated to give me 1 set of keys". Not understanding I ask "so youre telling me that you can sell me a car that has bad tires as long as they meet the BARE minimum" he said "Yes". So, taken aback I asked about the tire key, "so if you guys knew I needed this key to change my tire, and that is the ONLY way to change it, why wouldnt you let me know that its missing so I could get a new one, or another option?" And he said "That falls on the sales person". The auto mechanic let us know that there was NO WAY that we could have worn down the tires that low (we had not even driven 3,000 miles since we got it), and that they were damaged far before we got the car. So my question is, why would they let me buy a car that could potentially be dangerous, tell me everything checked out, and drive off the lot? If the tires were bad, just let me know and I would have gladly taken care of it. If they didnt disclose that before I purchased the car, what else have they not disclosed or checked "ok" on the vehicle inspection. And instead of hearing me out and acting the least bit concerned about the issue the customer service rep made it seem like they dont care what kind of car they are selling as long as it makes $$$. I trusted this dealership with the 1,000s of dollars I had been saving to buy my first car and they just took advantage of that. Now we are out 100s of dollars for a problem that could have been fixed if it would have been disclosed in the first place. The whole thing is super shady.

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