Simple warranty, made difficult by the dealer/Chrysler

[dcmdon]

This is BAD service through and through. Another example of common sense strangled by bureaucracy. I have only had one good dealership experience in my entire lifetime, and that was from Ford, which replaced a rear diff even though it was out of warranty. Jeep has been a nightmare, and I've owned three.

Don't give them credit they don't deserve. Its not bureaucracy. A service oriented dealer can work within the needs of the manufacturer and still give good service.

This is simply a total lack of any desire to take care of the customer.

I worked for a small dealer in a small town. It seemed like half the town drove the cars that we sold and serviced. (Saabs and Subarus) Our entire business model depended on repeat, happy customers.

I suspect that the Jeep model depends on 2 kinds of customers.
1) One shot buyers who will see that there's a lot that sucks and won' t buy again.
2) People who are jeep fans who will make excuses and keep buying Jeeps.

Either way, their business doesn't depend on providing great service.

The Wrangler and Gladiator are unique products. Mine has been great so far and I really enjoy what it does.

But there is no way in hell I'd buy a commodity family hauler like a Grand Cherokee from Jeep or Chrysler. Not when there are so many similar alternatives made by manufacturers take care of their customers and that support/incent/require their dealers to provide good service.

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[Bonanza]

Don't give them credit they don't deserve. Its not bureaucracy. A service oriented dealer can work within the needs of the manufacturer and still give good service.

This is simply a total lack of any desire to take care of the customer.

I worked for a small dealer in a small town. It seemed like half the town drove the cars that we sold and serviced. (Saabs and Subarus) Our entire business model depended on repeat, happy customers.

I suspect that the Jeep model depends on 2 kinds of customers.
1) One shot buyers who will see that there's a lot that sucks and won' t buy again.
2) People who are jeep fans who will make excuses and keep buying Jeeps.

The Wrangler and Gladiator are unique products. Mine has been great so far and I really enjoy what it does.

But there is no way in hell I'd buy a commodity family hauler like a Grand Cherokee from Jeep or Chrysler. Not when there are so many similar alternatives made by manufacturers that support/incent/require their dealers to provide good service.

I agree completely. My wife has a Cherokee, and I will not be blindly brand loyal in the general family hauler. This dealership has no interest in making in the slightest accommodation for me, so for our next vehicle purchase we'll be going elsewhere.

 

[Jefe1018]

I'm a little conflicted on this one. I've read through the thread and it went off in a few different directions as per the usual. Here's my take no one will care about:

1) 99% of people are not gear heads and by no means qualifed to perform ANY work on their own cars - that includes many times the service writer who doesn't understand what a multimeter is

2) Because of point 1, a service department cannot take your word for it, even if customer service oriented - they still need to diagnose and take action

2b) dealers are in the business of getting warranty reimbursed from the factory - the factory is all for denying as many claims as possible - letting a customer and not a certified technician diagnose things is probably a good way to do that.

3) Yep, they are usually backed up, not much we can say or do about that one. This was a simple light swap and just puts you in a bad spot.

4) Personally, I've gotten to the point in life that if it doesn't take more than an hour or two and less than a day's wages in parts - sometimes I'll just eat it and move on with my life.

5) Be careful self-diagnosing things... or at least telling the dealer about it. I tell service departments as little as possible. You've disassembled the harness? Well maybe that's how it was damaged... or at least the scummy ones can take that stance and often times will.

Anyways, glad you got it fixed, sorry it happened, hope you get to wheeling soon and live a long healthy life along your JT.

 

[Bonanza]

I'm a little conflicted on this one. I've read through the thread and it went off in a few different directions as per the usual. Here's my take no one will care about:

1) 99% of people are not gear heads and by no means qualifed to perform ANY work on their own cars - that includes many times the service writer who doesn't understand what a multimeter is

2) Because of point 1, a service department cannot take your word for it, even if customer service oriented - they still need to diagnose and take action

2b) dealers are in the business of getting warranty reimbursed from the factory - the factory is all for denying as many claims as possible - letting a customer and not a certified technician diagnose things is probably a good way to do that.

3) Yep, they are usually backed up. not much we can say or do about that one. This was a simple light swap and just puts you in a bad spot.

4) Personally, I've gotten to the point in life that if it doesn't take more than an hour or two and less than a day's wages in parts - sometimes I'll just eat it and move on with my life.

5) Be careful self-diagnosing things. I tell service departments as little as possible. You've disassembled the harness? Well maybe that's how it was damaged... or at leas the scummy ones can take that stance and often times will.

Anyways, glad you got it fixed, sorry it happened, hope you get to wheeling soon and live a long healthy life along your JT.

Disassembled the harness? No, I unplugged the lamp from the connector. This is a very common issue in gladiators. It wasn't damaged, it just stopped working.

https://www.jeepgladiatorforum.com/forum/threads/issue-with-3rd-brake-light.45679/

 

[Jefe1018]

Disassembled the harness? No, I unplugged the lamp from the connector. This is a very common issue in gladiators. It wasn't damaged, it just stopped working.

https://www.jeepgladiatorforum.com/forum/threads/issue-with-3rd-brake-light.45679/

Oh, I understand that.... but emphasis on the scummy ones.

 

[Bonanza]

In one last kick in the teeth, the parts department at the dealer gave me their "best price" of $116, not shipped. Knowing they would disappoint me, I already went somewhere else and had the same part shipped for $66.93 from AZMopar. Do you price match?, I asked... "No", they said.

At every possible stage of interaction, this has been a miserable experience. @JeepCares , what is the best way of documenting this? Usually I'm immediately spammed with survey requests once any contact with the dealer is made, and I'd like to put my dissatisfaction in writing so it might be read by someone who can implement changes.

 

[dcmdon]

My responses in all caps. (I'm not yelling. )


I'm a little conflicted on this one. I've read through the thread and it went off in a few different directions as per the usual. Here's my take no one will care about:

1) 99% of people are not gear heads and by no means qualifed to perform ANY work on their own cars - that includes many times the service writer who doesn't understand what a multimeter is

IRRELEVANT. iF A CUSTOMER CAN USE A MULTIMETER, THEN GOOD FOR THEM. ACCOMODATE THEM. mOST SERVICE MANAGERS HAVE TECHNICIAN EXPERIENCE.

2) Because of point 1, a service department cannot take your word for it, even if customer service oriented - they still need to diagnose and take action

nOBODY EVER SUGGESTED THEY DO SO. iF YOU DRIVE UP WITH YOUR LIGHT ALREADY REMOVED, IT WILL TAKE SOMEONE LESS THAN A MINUTE TO CONFIRM 12 V THROUGH THE HARNESS

2b) dealers are in the business of getting warranty reimbursed from the factory - the factory is all for denying as many claims as possible - letting a customer and not a certified technician diagnose things is probably a good way to do that.

sEE ABOVE. DEALER COMPLETES DIAGNOSIS, STARTS A REPAIR ORDER AND USES THAT TO ORDER PART FOR WARRANTY REPAIR

3) Yep, they are usually backed up, not much we can say or do about that one. This was a simple light swap and just puts you in a bad spot.

4) Personally, I've gotten to the point in life that if it doesn't take more than an hour or two and less than a day's wages in parts - sometimes I'll just eat it and move on with my life.

tHAT MAKES SENSE. iTS WHY i PUT MY OWN SNOW TIRES ON AND OFF. i CAN DO IT IN 20 MIN PLUS 15 MIN TO SET UP THE WORK SPACE. SO IF i DO BOTH CARS i CAN KNOCK IT OFF IN AN HOUR. mUCH LESS THAN BRINGING THE CARS IN FOR THE "FREE" CHANGE OVER.

aND i KNOW THE LUGS WON'T BE RUN ON WITH AN IMPACT DRIVER AND WILL BE PROPERLY TORQUED.

5) Be careful self-diagnosing things... or at least telling the dealer about it. I tell service departments as little as possible. You've disassembled the harness? Well maybe that's how it was damaged... or at least the scummy ones can take that stance and often times will.

ACTUALLY THAT'S A GREAT POINT.

Anyways, glad you got it fixed, sorry it happened, hope you get to wheeling soon and live a long healthy life along your JT.

 

[Jefe1018]

My responses in all caps. (I'm not yelling. )


I'm a little conflicted on this one. I've read through the thread and it went off in a few different directions as per the usual. Here's my take no one will care about:

1) 99% of people are not gear heads and by no means qualifed to perform ANY work on their own cars - that includes many times the service writer who doesn't understand what a multimeter is

IRRELEVANT. iF A CUSTOMER CAN USE A MULTIMETER, THEN GOOD FOR THEM. ACCOMODATE THEM. mOST SERVICE MANAGERS HAVE TECHNICIAN EXPERIENCE.

2) Because of point 1, a service department cannot take your word for it, even if customer service oriented - they still need to diagnose and take action

nOBODY EVER SUGGESTED THEY DO SO. iF YOU DRIVE UP WITH YOUR LIGHT ALREADY REMOVED, IT WILL TAKE SOMEONE LESS THAN A MINUTE TO CONFIRM 12 V THROUGH THE HARNESS

2b) dealers are in the business of getting warranty reimbursed from the factory - the factory is all for denying as many claims as possible - letting a customer and not a certified technician diagnose things is probably a good way to do that.

sEE ABOVE. DEALER COMPLETES DIAGNOSIS, STARTS A REPAIR ORDER AND USES THAT TO ORDER PART FOR WARRANTY REPAIR

3) Yep, they are usually backed up, not much we can say or do about that one. This was a simple light swap and just puts you in a bad spot.

4) Personally, I've gotten to the point in life that if it doesn't take more than an hour or two and less than a day's wages in parts - sometimes I'll just eat it and move on with my life.

tHAT MAKES SENSE. iTS WHY i PUT MY OWN SNOW TIRES ON AND OFF. i CAN DO IT IN 20 MIN PLUS 15 MIN TO SET UP THE WORK SPACE. SO IF i DO BOTH CARS i CAN KNOCK IT OFF IN AN HOUR. mUCH LESS THAN BRINGING THE CARS IN FOR THE "FREE" CHANGE OVER.

aND i KNOW THE LUGS WON'T BE RUN ON WITH AN IMPACT DRIVER AND WILL BE PROPERLY TORQUED.

5) Be careful self-diagnosing things... or at least telling the dealer about it. I tell service departments as little as possible. You've disassembled the harness? Well maybe that's how it was damaged... or at least the scummy ones can take that stance and often times will.

ACTUALLY THAT'S A GREAT POINT.

Anyways, glad you got it fixed, sorry it happened, hope you get to wheeling soon and live a long healthy life along your JT.

Why are you yelling at me? Hahah jk

 

[sharpsicle]

I can sympathize with your frustration, but let's be real here, you made a choice to do the work yourself. I think it's fair to own that choice through to completion. If you wanted to have the dealership cover it, you needed to give them the ability to do their work as required. Handing them anything that's already disassembled is taking away their ability to do that work they need to do and document. There are steps that they need to follow for verification and unfortunately they can't just take your word for it.

Again, you had a choice at that point to pop the light back in and allow them to do their diagnostic as requested, or not. You chose not to do that, which I completely understand. But at that point, you need to realize you've taken on the responsibility of the repair. This is not a "bad service" thing, it's actually the way service works. Misdiagnosis or damage can easily happen when certain steps are skipped or performed by the owner, so no matter how right you were, you must afford the dealership the ability to do their own verification of the problem and record their results and actions along the way. Unfortunately there is no "skip intro" button to this, and from the sounds of things the dealership explained exactly that to you as well.

I'm also not trying to go against you. I agree with how you handled it. I would've done the same and bought my own replacement for this issue rather than wait. But I wouldn't be complaining about the results of the actions I chose to take, I'd be owning that choice. Nobody forced you to complete the repair, you had options, and frankly you chose a reasonable one. I don't see how your choice is a problem that Jeep's warranty service needs to be brought into. It's not like they denied doing warranty work, they in fact offered to schedule it! What I'm seeing here is that you didn't give the dealership a chance to do what was required, start to finish, and are now upset they didn't do anything because you chose to do it yourself.

 

[Hootbro]

I can sympathize with your frustration, but let's be real here, you made a choice to do the work yourself. I think it's fair to own that choice through to completion. If you wanted to have the dealership cover it, you needed to give them the ability to do their work as required. Handing them anything that's already disassembled is taking away their ability to do that work they need to do and document. There are steps that they need to follow for verification and unfortunately they can't just take your word for it.

Again, you had a choice at that point to pop the light back in and allow them to do their diagnostic as requested, or not. You chose not to do that, which I completely understand. But at that point, you need to realize you've taken on the responsibility of the repair. This is not a "bad service" thing, it's actually the way service works. Misdiagnosis or damage can easily happen when certain steps are skipped or performed by the owner, so no matter how right you were, you must afford the dealership the ability to do their own verification of the problem and record their results and actions along the way. Unfortunately there is no "skip intro" button to this, and from the sounds of things the dealership explained exactly that to you as well.

I'm also not trying to go against you. I agree with how you handled it. I would've done the same and bought my own replacement for this issue rather than wait. But I wouldn't be complaining about the results of the actions I chose to take, I'd be owning that choice. Nobody forced you to complete the repair, you had options, and frankly you chose a reasonable one. I don't see how your choice is a problem that Jeep's warranty service needs to be brought into. It's not like they denied doing warranty work, they in fact offered to schedule it! What I'm seeing here is that you didn't give the dealership a chance to do what was required, start to finish, and are now upset they didn't do anything because you chose to do it yourself.

Very well said.

 

[Bonanza]

I can sympathize with your frustration, but let's be real here, you made a choice to do the work yourself. I think it's fair to own that choice through to completion. If you wanted to have the dealership cover it, you needed to give them the ability to do their work as required. Handing them anything that's already disassembled is taking away their ability to do that work they need to do and document. There are steps that they need to follow for verification and unfortunately they can't just take your word for it.

Again, you had a choice at that point to pop the light back in and allow them to do their diagnostic as requested, or not. You chose not to do that, which I completely understand. But at that point, you need to realize you've taken on the responsibility of the repair. This is not a "bad service" thing, it's actually the way service works. Misdiagnosis or damage can easily happen when certain steps are skipped or performed by the owner, so no matter how right you were, you must afford the dealership the ability to do their own verification of the problem and record their results and actions along the way. Unfortunately there is no "skip intro" button to this, and from the sounds of things the dealership explained exactly that to you as well.

I'm also not trying to go against you. I agree with how you handled it. I would've done the same and bought my own replacement for this issue rather than wait. But I wouldn't be complaining about the results of the actions I chose to take, I'd be owning that choice. Nobody forced you to complete the repair, you had options, and frankly you chose a reasonable one. I don't see how your choice is a problem that Jeep's warranty service needs to be brought into. It's not like they denied doing warranty work, they in fact offered to schedule it! What I'm seeing here is that you didn't give the dealership a chance to do what was required, start to finish, and are now upset they didn't do anything because you chose to do it yourself.

My problem is that the warranty work, for a very basic item, became more trouble than it's worth. It's very easy for the time spent dropping a vehicle off, waiting for it to be done, and then picking it up, to eclipse the worth of the warranty. I'm upset because there are alternatives which don't take as long, there are customer service opportunities not explored, and ultimately, I'm left with choosing the lesser of two evils. This isn't rocket science. It's a tail lamp. if the engine is knocking, sure-- have it as long as you need.

Edit-- I'll say also I need to give credit where credit is due. When I brought in my Jeep for the TSB for the steering box, they did that with lightning speed. I forgot about that, and I have to applaud that. They didn't even question my reporting of wandering-- they just ordered a part and put it in, no questions asked.

Here... much different experience. And to be clear, I didn't bring it in disassembled; I offered to do that to save them time. It's as easy as plugging in a new light and tightening a few bolts. But it wasn't meant to be.

Long story short, as the title states, this should have been much simpler and faster than it turned out to be.

 

[Hootbro]

My problem is that the warranty work, for a very basic item, became more trouble than it's worth. It's very easy for the time spent dropping a vehicle off, waiting for it to be done, and then picking it up, to eclipse the worth of the warranty. I'm upset because there are alternatives which don't take as long, there are customer service opportunities not explored, and ultimately, I'm left with choosing the lesser of two evils. This isn't rocket science. It's a tail lamp. if the engine is knocking, sure-- have it as long as you need.

Edit-- I'll say also I need to give credit where credit is due. When I brought in my Jeep for the TSB for the steering box, they did that with lightning speed. I forgot about that, and I have to applaud that. They didn't even question my reporting of wandering-- they just ordered a part and put it in, no questions asked.

Here... much different experience. And to be clear, I didn't bring it in disassembled; I offered to do that to save them time. It's as easy as plugging in a new light and tightening a few bolts. But it wasn't meant to be.

Long story short, as the title states, this should have been much simpler and faster than it turned out to be.

I agree with everything you say but the process is the process and has been that way probably for decades and is not unique to Jeep. I guarantee it has been brought up before at a corporate level that their warranty process does not accommodate small and simple item warranty issues well like you have mentioned.

I can tell you from experience working for a Fortune 50 company that is a major manufacturing concern, we are processed to death also and I run into the same thing of trying to get a low cost part replacement for let's say under $10, but our process will expend multiple hundreds if not thousands of dollars across many other disciplines in the process in labor cost the same as if I was trying to get a $5K dollar replacement part. Companies are aware of it but there is also a cost with having another separate process to manage that many companies would just rather levelize out the cost to them and keep the same process for all.

You either get comfortable with it or let if fester.

 

[Bonanza]

I agree with everything you say but the process is the process and has been that way probably for decades and is not unique to Jeep. I guarantee it has been brought up before at a corporate level that their warranty process does not accommodate small and simple item warranty issues well like you have mentioned.

I can tell you from experience working for a Fortune 50 company that is a major manufacturing concern, we are processed to death also and I run into the same thing of trying to get a low cost part replacement for let's say under $10, but our process will expend multiple hundreds if not thousands of dollars across many other disciplines in the process in labor cost the same as if I was trying to get a $5K dollar replacement part. Companies are aware of it but there is also a cost with having another separate process that many companies would just rather levelize out the cost to them and keep the same process for all.

You either get comfortable with it or let if fester.

I understand the complex logistics, I do. It's not lost on me. Where that ceases to be acceptable is not offering a discount on the part I should have had for free. Ok, ok-- thinking critically, maybe that's because the dealer is separate from the manufacturer and their own pricing, shipping, and warehousing costs come into play. Right? Well....

Independent shops routinely gets parts at usually 20% discount from dealerships under mechanic's accounts, the savings of which become profits when installed on customer's vehicles. "I'm not entitled to a discount, if you wanted it for free you should've gone through the process". Got it. I'm also not entitled to crappy coffee or a chair to sit in while I wait. But it's a bare-bones effort at customer service. The basic, bottom-level iota of evidence to suggest customers are worth appreciating.

None of that was displayed. It's a take it or leave it, sucks-to-be-you approach that doesn't sit well with me. But, like it's been said, F me, I'm just a customer! I'll absorb the hit, and look elsewhere for my next vehicle.

 

[Jefe1018]

Dude, it's a $75 part from what you've said, you are going to give yourself a heart attack or maybe just destroy your keyboard. The process sucks, we all agree, but stop and smell the flowers.

 

[Bonanza]

Dude, it's a $75 part from what you've said, you are going to give yourself a heart attack or maybe just destroy your keyboard. The process sucks, we all agree, but stop and smell the flowers.

I demand satisfaction! Also I type a lot at my job. And I'm at my job browsing forums. It's a mixed bag.

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