I am simply in disbelief. I had a very negative dealership experience today, but I will leave my personal story aside and will sddress later and post a copy of the letter I will write on this forum. What has me at a higher level of disgust is what I witnessed while in the service department oat Bingham Toyota in Clovis, Ca.

An elderly lady walked in to have her car serviced. She gave the service writer her keys and politley asked to use his phone to call for her ride. The service writer informed her that there was a pay phone outside and pointed. She again asked politley to use his phone and that it was a local call and it is very hot outside. He again refused and said she would have to use the pay phone and just smiled as he pointed to the door. The elderly lady then said "you know you would think for the amount of money I spend here you would let your customer use the phone". I looked up at her and said I agree and reached in my pocket and pulled out my Blackberry and handed it to her and said I would be happy to help her call for her ride. She lit up and was so gracious. She came over to me and stood next to me and looked at the service writer and said "you should have more people like this." After a few seconds showing her how to use the phone she called for her ride and left. The service writer thanked me and I just gave him a blank stare simply in disbelief of the lack of care and attention to their clients.

I am writing a letter to this dealership, our newspaper and to Toyota Corp. I am so disgusted by this that it is actually swaying me from buying a future Toyota for the simple fact that evn having to walk into that dealership for anything again will feel like I am supporting someplace I feel treats people poorly.

For those that will say well thats a one time thing and blah blah blah.......this isnt the first. It;s just the final straw.

 

wow that is horrible.. this world is lacking in the respect department..

 

Some people...

Really, what's the harm in letting someone use your phone? I can't think of a reason not to.

 

i agree completely with your motion to write a letter to toyota, and hopefully you got the techs name and the time he was working.

be professional and concise in your letter and dont go for blood (ie demanding he gets fired.) people are human and have bad days, although that is no reason for him to treat an elderly person the way he did. where i come from we have respect for our elders.

 

I'm glad that you were there to help her. I would have done the same. That service writer needs a swift kick in the pants. I have a quick story about a similar situation that I think is funny as hell:

About 16 years ago (before everyone had a cell phone) the wife of my boss at the time was shopping at a Bon-Ton department store. She was a "power shopper" and had just bought 3 large bags of stuff worth a few hundred dollars. After checking out and walking to her car, she realized that she had locked her keys in the car. She went back into the store and asked to use a phone so she could call her husband. When the store employee refused to let her, she calmly smiled and said, "That's fine...but while I'm standing here I would like to return all of this merchandise I just purchased." She said the look on the employee's face was priceless.

 

The dealership I use has a courtesy phone in the waiting area...

 

two things:

1. who doesn't have a cell phone these days (with the exception of those days between phones when somebody broke their phone)

2. who still has pay phones? i seriously can't remember the last place i've seen one...

and one last thing, what makes you think that any other dealership that sells different cars will be better? toyota works to build the best cars they can for consumers. dealerships with crappy service writers is alittle beyond their control. just because you have a crappy toyota dealership, doesn't make them all bad and you should boycott toyota products because of it. my toyota dealership is great. they have a really nice lounge with big screen tv's, computers with internet access. the one i used while living in orlando florida also had a nice lounge, and in the morning had dounuts and in the afternoon had a sandwich platter.

i took my dad's porsche in for service one, and the porsche/audi dealership just had a circle of chairs next to a 13 in tv next to a vending machine. you would think that a person servicing a 70 thousand dollar luxury vehicle would be able to wait in a lounge that is nicer than what i get servicing my 15 thousand economy car.

my point is hate the dealership or the service department, not toyota.

 

i ditched my cell phone cause i can't aford it even if its 20 dollars a month and i never use it and i mean never

 

Seriously. There is absolutely no excuse to NOT have a cell phone.

 

 

So whether or not the lady was old, dying or whatever... some places just have policies to not let customers use the phone. Local or not, it is irrelevant. Lame? Absolutely... but if that's what their policy is, that's what it is. I doubt letters to the world will necessarily change it (might help though, who knows).

There are some places that just suck when it comes to people and services they offer. Car dealers are included. I like to use the guilty until proven innocent approach with ANY dealer. Then they might surprise me.

As for boycotting Toyota... well, that's up to you of course... but I'm with Drax on this one. Some dealers are just awful and it's not always Toyota's fault.

 

PEOPLE REREAD MY BLOG. Not boycotting toyota directly......the toyota dealership. Oh forget it.

 

I'm confused.

 

What blog? I see no link.

 

i feel ya about rude @$$ service i almost did not but my xb because of it,, i went to capitol toyota here in nor cal and the guy was just a a @$$hole,i asked if he had any xb's pointed outside.. i then only seen 2 all they had at the time i then asked about getting the camo he said he did not know anything. i asked if he had anything that showed me all the colors out, he told me to go out on the lot and look myself, i then explained i want to see the camo he told me well go look at another toyota and see if ya see it on that car and walked away...also had another rude run with a guy at motorcycle shop.i had just sold my car and had 5,000 to put as a down payment on new bike was looking for a 600 at the time back in 2002-03 ish i walk in with my mom look around a bit ask for help get nothing,then a guy walks up while im looking at a bike and my mom ask if they got any for around 5,000 to 7,000 he say's to us no and walks away i then see a new bike sitting there for 5 i just walked out ,,,after no help and the lie i was done

 

+1!! i would do the same thing..

 

Ya, I ignored that part.

 

You say you are not boycotting but you say this simple event is going to sway you from buying another toyota. This happens all the time, like ack said some place just have stupid policies like that.

 

thank you, i was about to do that myself.

people seriously need to chill out. today i was getting food at burger king and this customer ahead of me was going crazy and yelling at the poor cashier over something so minor about his order. i almost consider not going there because while the people are great, i don't like being around crazy people who take their fast food so damn serious. it's a whopper, and while you can have it your way, it isn't like you just ordered a gourmet meal from a chef, or your mom who cuts the crusts off for her baby.

 

When I worked at the toyota dealership and had people come in, if I was around id let them do what they like.

I had a guy come in and ask to use the bathroom only, which is usually a no-no, and I walked him to the shtr. If you gota go, you gota go. I know the feeling.

Had a lady want to make a phone call, I walked her behind the front cashiers desk to let her make a call. She even sat down.


I dont understand how people can take such a shty job so serious. Those guys make like $11/hr, why are they fighting customers over a $free local call, even if it was to Japan, they aren't paying for it.


Like I always say, people flat suck. Period. I love to watch people fight with the kids at BK or MCd's about their order, then I see them take the order back to fix it. I've had probably 10 friends who told me stories about when they worked at fastfood places.

Lets just say it is pretty well known that they ALWAYS get the last say/laugh. They could give me a kidsmeal 5peice nugget when I ordered a fuggin baconator, and i'll enjoy my 5peice as I drive away, believe me.