6mtV6

I went to a dealer in LI today to get my inspection because I bought my TL in NJ. When I got my car back I saw that my rear bumper was scratched. It seems like whoever parked my car backed up into something. It's not that big but it's just wrong. I'm very paranoid about my car. I check my car two times a day, once in the morning and another right before I go to sleep. I never parallel parked my car anywhere. When I go to Flushing I park in a private lot where I park myself and pay $3/hr. When I go to Manhattan I park in a garage that I also park myself and pay $10 for 2hrs or more.

I spoke to one of the service advisors and he offered to repaint the whole bumper for me. I told him that it's a brand new car and I don't want any repainting. So he offered to swap my rear bumper with another TL's rear bumper.
This could've been avoided if they can just be more careful. Now I have to go back in 2weeks.
This is why I'm so afraid to go to NY dealers for service. I'm so f*ckin p*ssed.
And also they put the dealer license plate frame on my front and rear.
I'm not going to say the name of the dealer yet. I want to see if they make it right.

Also what would you have done? Repaint or swap?
If they swap the bumper will they misaligned it? How hard is it to take the bumper off and put it back on?

rets

Did they tell you automatically that worker hit the bumper, didn't they? Or they promised to fix it after you found it and repoted back?

Swap. Hope they know how to remove the bumper correctly.

Sucks, man.

aw1

I would have them swap bumpers. If they dont do it right the first time, keep going back until they do.

Slava

I once had a dealer bump my old Prelude into a pole. The right door got dented pretty seriously. It took them 10 days to fix the dent, repaint and repolish the door. At least a I had a half way decent free loaner (pontiac grand prix) for all that time.

You REALLY have to be carefull with dealers. They drive around parking lots full of cars, their shops often have sharp objects pertruding all over. Accidents like this happen all the time. You just have to hold the dealer accountable and make sure they give you a GOOD loaner for your troubles.

6mtV6

They didn't tell me automatically. I saw it and I reported back and they say they will fix it.

nick04tl

how do you know that it was who parked your car. what is another customer hit your car? did you actually see the tech or wash guy back into another car?

6mtV6

I didn't see anything. I'm sure that it wasn't there before. It wasn't another customer because when I went there they drove my car to the back.

KawBoy

The same has happened to me. I took my car to the dealer in order to get an annoying loose piece (screw) off the dashboard and to have the famous vibration checked for the second time. When I went to pick up my car, I noticed my car had been hit on the rear bumper. There was no way to just repainted, it would have to be replaced. Replacing the bumper is a pretty straight forward task, nothing to worry about. As they didn’t have the bumper, I left the car there over the weekend. This Monday I went there again to check on my car, and the right quarter panel was also hit! They wanted to paint the panel. I told them I didn’t want to have a repainted car because of something someone else had done. After all, the car is little over a month old and had only 1400 miles. Well, to make a long, very long story short, I am using a loaner ('04 TL), they kept my car ('04 SSM/AT/NAVI) and I am waiting for a '05 SSM/AT/NAVI to be delivered by second week of November. So, answering your question, no, no repainting. And you should not worry about alignment, as there is only one position to bolt the bumper into the body.

6mtV6

I haven't even made my first payment yet. I just made 1K miles.

jackabyte

Sounds like Valley Stream guys to me. They are the most pleasant the most incompetent bunch of a**holes. If anybody is interested I'll go into details, otherwise I'll just let it be.

IL_TL

Hmm, swaping the bumper might not be a good idea. I believe that ALL of the body parts (fenders, hood, trunk lid, bumpers) have a sticker with the VIN number on them. This is how you can tell if a car has been wrecked. If the two front fenders, hood, and front bumper cover do not have the factory VIN sticker on them, you can be pretty confident that a front end collision has happened.

If the dealer swaps your rear bumper when you sell the car a savvy buyer may notice this and assume that the car was rear ended. If they can repaint, and leave the VIN sticker untouched, it may be better in the long run.

I had an 01' s2000, and hit a board on the highway one month after I got the car. This lightly damaged the front bumper cover, and I wanted a new one put on. Well the new bumper cover has a tab that sticks out where the VIN sticker goes, but was obviously missing as it was a replacement part. I kept the bumper cover in my basement for 3 years, until I got rid of the car. The dealer wanted the damaged bumper with the VIN sticker to prove that the car was not in a serious accident. And since I turned this in to my insurance company, the vehicle came up on CarFax as wrecked.

Also my factory bumper had VERY thin paint from the factory (Silverstone), and was already chipped in several places after one month. The repainted (PPG) bumper cover remained unchipped for 3 years. I think on the plastic parts, if you find a good shop, the paint may very well be better than the factory paint.

Just my

KawBoy

IL,
You may be right on this. However, when dealer told me they were going to swap my rear bumper, I asked them about the sticker. They told me the new one would have the sticker, just the same. Don't know if they have the ability to print a new one (for cases like this, scratches, minor damage) or what.

6mtV6

IL TL, I was thinking about the same thing. When I opened my trunk yesterday I saw the VIN sticker. Would they have to remove the rear bumper to repaint it? Can they just paint that part?
I will post pics later on.

The service advisor, I think he's the manager, told me that they never had a customer file a complaint before. I guess this means they will make things right?

IL_TL

It would be nice if they can print new VIN stickers, however I would think that this could only be done at the factory. I bet each car gets a sheet of the VIN stickers and they are put on as the car after paint during final assembly. Those stickers would be like gold, as you could replace parts after an accident and the car would appear to have never been damaged. I thought briefly about trying to remove the sticker from the old bumper and put it on the new one. It seemed like the sticker would be destroyed in the process.

I am sure the swapped bumper would have a sticker, but would it be the VIN of the car it came off of, or would it match your VIN?

narnia

Obviously other people who drive your car are never going to be as careful with it as you are. The manager could have just said your bumper was scratched when you brought it in, so I think they're doing the right thing by offering to rectify the situation.

Stuff like this can happen in any service dept., a good one or a bad one. The difference is how they compensate you for what happened, and to me sounds like they're making a good effort. Hope it works out for you.

te3point5

This is the way I see it, if its not a big scratch, or a big dent, Why would you fix it? You drive your car every day, and in Newy York, you're bound to get scratches every so often. So everytime you get a small scratch, you're gonna go fix it? If they change out the stock bumper, it might not line up as well. I say live with it, because it will happen again no matter if you park your car yourself or not.

It's a bumper, its suposed to be "bumped", well, not suposed to, but you get the idea.

Tedanddenise

leeherman

jackabyte, I'm interested.

I bought my car at AVS and had a decent buying experience.

I had purchased body side moldings and had to bring the car back on a Saturday to have them put on. I was watching one of the mechanics driving cars around like he was at Watkins Glen, and I was glad he wasn't handling mine. The owner of one of the cars was watching and said something to the mechanic, but I'm sure he'll continue to be a dumbass.

Relay your experiences, please.

Thanks!

6mtV6

It doesn't matter if it's a big sratch or a small one. I didn't do it. Why should I have to suffer for something I didn't do?
I do drive my car everyday and I park far away and I only park at garages where I can park myself. I don't parallel park my car in NYC. I see what other drivers do. If they can't fit in the spot they will try to squeeze in and push your bumper if they have to.
No, i'm not going to fix it everytime I get a scratch. The service department has no right to damage a customer's car. Why should I have to live with something that I didnt' do?

A bumper is there to absorb the impact in a collision, to protect the drivers and passengers. It's not there so the tech can play bumper cars.

Seems like you don't care for your cars. So your saying that if you bring your brand new car, that just reached 1K miles, that you didn't even make the first payment on to a dealer to get it serviced, inspection or any other thing and they scratch your brand new car, doesn't matter big or small, it's ok?
It doesn't matter if the car was two years old and has some scratches on it already. They have no right to damage a customer's car.

te3point5

Its not that I don't care about my cars. But I realize I'm not driving a Bentley, The thing I was saying, is if you make them change the bumper, it might not line up perfectly, which could 1)create gaps, and 2) Create wind noise from air passing over those gaps. What I was saying is that you could make your scratch into an even bigger problem.


And I know what you're saying, its not your fault, But making them try to fix it could make it worse.

And I know people are gonna say, keep bringing it back till they get it right. But is it worth your time? Maybe you have a busy schedule, maybe its a pain in the ass to drive to the dealer repeatedly. I'm just saying, think of the long run, when they car has 30k miles, will you even care anymore? Was it worth risinking the possibility of panels not lining up anymore just to save the paint? Paint will scratch, but panels fitted on a car from the factory are never the same when replaced, because no 2 cars are exactly identical.

jackabyte

Like I was saying before it seems to me like they are a bunch of nice guys, but the basic logic eludes them. I had ordered the A-Spec package to be installed. The car was suppose to be ready on the last day of the month. When I get there to pick it up what do I find in the back seat of the car, you got it all the take off parts. Rims, tires, suspension parts and whatever else they decided to stuff in the back seat. This was after I asked them to put aside all the parts so I can come back and pick it up the next day. If I did not have my wife there calming me down I was ready to take somebody's head off. Needless to say the rims left bad indentations in the leather, grease and dirt all over the car. The front body skirt was so badly attached there were two inch gaps at the corners and deck lid spoiler was so crooked you could spot it 10 feet away. They never bothered to do the alignment, even when they did do it twice a week later it still was not right, I had to take it to another place to get it corrected. In the end they made everything right and were very apologetic about it, but the whole experience left a bad taste in my mouth. At this point I would not take my car over there for an oil change. The good thing about the service dept. is that they will do whatever it takes to get all the problems corrected but for me it's a day late and a dollar short.