Berkeley Toyota Refused To Sell Us A Car

[roiguy]

This saga began in January when I leased a new Prius. Soon after that, wife decided that her 1992 Camry was ready for a replacement. The car had served her well for 15 years and over 100,000 miles, but time had taken its toll on the interior and exterior.

After the dealer I leased my Prius from wasn’t able to find us the car she wanted, my wife called the dealer where she bought her Camry in 1993, Berkeley Toyota. She spoke to a salesman named Javier Rios, who said they had two gray cars in stock. She told him I would call him back to discuss it.

I called Javier, confirmed they had the car she wanted and told him that we were ready to buy if he could match the offer we had from Broadway Toyota in Oakland. He responded that his manager wouldn’t match the offer unless we came in in person, but that they had run a sale over the weekend for an even better price and that he was sure that we could get $2,000 off the sticker if we can in to make an offer. After discussing the matter with my wife, we made an appointment to come right in.

My wife and I arrive 15 minutes later to discover that Javier hasn’t returned from picking up the car. When he returned after another 10 or 15 minutes, I explain that I am a former car salesman and that I took off work to come make sure my wife gets the deal they advertised in the paper and that they don’t tack on any hidden charges. I reminded him that I mentioned on the phone that we are in a hurry because she needs to leave for class in two hours.

Javier stepped away for a few minutes and the returned tells us that they sold one gray car a few days ago and that the other one they have isn’t available because it just arrived and hasn’t been checked into inventory. He said that the car can’t be ready for another three days. I reminded him that I used to sell cars and that it could done faster than that if the car was sold, he responded that the service department was really busy.

He sat us down at his desk and asked my wife to fill out a credit application along with an offer sheet. He returns about five minutes later and he tells us that the car he assured us was available on the phone had actually been damaged and needed repairs before they would sell it to us.

Mr. Rios then says his manager noticed that we “were upset or in a bad mood,” and wanted to be sure we would be happy…that’s why he is admitting that the car was damaged and is in the body shop. We both had busy days ahead of us and they didn’t have the car she wanted, so we left.

After calling around some more, looking for the car in the color she wanted, my wife called Javier back and explained that at this point she was interested in ANY Prius with a Package #2 and a dark interior, and she was willing to come back in to buy the car tonight to get it over with. Javier said that he would look into it and call her back.

Imagine her shock when Javier phoned back a few minutes later, after discussing it with his manager, to say that he “feels uncomfortable selling us a car” because we were unhappy and that her husband made him “feel like dirt” on the phone.

We were outraged. They lied to us about having a car available. They lied about needing three days to prepare the car for delivery so they could fix the body damage. Then they said we weren’t happy enough to buy a car from them!

Toyota has gotten a lot of press about their customer satisfaction program, including a recent New York Times article, Toyota’s rise to world domination driven by customer satisfaction, we decided to write Toyota Headquarters.

We did hear back from Toyota, who said they would file a report with Toyota of Berkeley and that we would get a call back from them within 3 days. They did not offer any further resolution or provide anything we could feel positive about.

The next morning, we got a follow up call from Toyota of Berkeley. The customer satisfaction manager explained that he had heard about the situation and that the dealer was simply exercising their right to choose who to do business with. He agreed that Javier was not being honest when he said that the car would take 3 days to PDI. He further stated that Toyota would require them to tell us about the body damage if the repair exceeded $500. He didn’t state that the damage was beyond the $500 threshold, but we speculate that the salesman told us about the damage because it became apparent that he would have to disclose it if he sold us the car.

He also said that this situation occurred because the salesman was afraid that if he sold us a car, we would respond unfavorably in our customer satisfaction survey. He said that one bad experience reported by a customer could cost the salesman thousands of dollar over the course of a year. Javier dugg himself a whole and then claimed that we were in a bad mood and using profane language so we wouldn’t tell the truth about him in a customer survey.

Of course, that will never show up on Toyota’s J.D. Powers results, because he refused to sell us a car.

<a href="http://measurement.com/Online_Marketing/?p=10">Toyota Of Berkeley sucks</a>

[SFTundraMan]

There is plenty that went wrong with that transaction.

So did you ever get the car?

[BLOWN 86]

that sucks, nothing like ready to buy a car and then you get the run around

[roiguy]

Cory

Yes, we leased a car a few days later from Downtown Auto Center - (510) 899-7220, although we were so upset we almost got a Nissan Altima instead.

[SFTundraMan]

Originally Posted by roiguy

Cory

Yes, we leased a car a few days later from Downtown Auto Center - (510) 899-7220, although we were so upset we almost got a Nissan Altima instead.

fyi

Hint for the future, never deal with a salesman that isnt in a position to make any decisions. Always deal with the fleet or internet sales managers.

I am glad you got the car though. I am surprised about how you were treated. I have heard nothing but good things from them in the past. All it takes is one bad incident to tarnish a rep.

[42GAMI]

i feel for you, but why not just go to another dealer? its not like you live in hawaii where there is only one importer of toyota products that has exclusive rights. in other words, no competition.

[roiguy]

42 GAMI

We actually did go to another dealer. It's true we had about a dozen to choose from in the area. I am determined to make my story heard because I am offended by the idea of refusing to sell a car to keep your CSI scores high.


The idea of the surveys to keep dealers from lying to customers and treating them poorly. We were lied to and treated poorly BECAUSE of the survey.

Bitter Irony

[SFTundraMan]

Originally Posted by roiguy

42 GAMI

We actually did go to another dealer. It's true we had about a dozen to choose from in the area. I am determined to make my story heard because I am offended by the idea of refusing to sell a car to keep your CSI scores high.


The idea of the surveys to keep dealers from lying to customers and treating them poorly. We were lied to and treated poorly BECAUSE of the survey.

Bitter Irony

Interesting way of looking at it.

first of all, there is no excuse for how you were treated. End of story. 100% wrong

on the flip side, Toyota has put so much of a backlash against a dealer for a bad survey, you can easily see why a dealer would consider not selling you the car. NO amount of profit on any car is worth a bad survey.

The system sucks both ways.

Here is a crazy for one you from the other side of the coin. I got dinged on a survey because the customer said parking at our dealership sucked. Actually it does but that is not the point. The customer never even parked on our lot. I delivered the car to his house with the paperwork. He never even stepped foot in the dealership but my score went down because of parking.

so i think the system sucks as well

[MOREPOWER]

Originally Posted by SFTundraMan

Interesting way of looking at it.

first of all, there is no excuse for how you were treated. End of story. 100% wrong

on the flip side, Toyota has put so much of a backlash against a dealer for a bad survey, you can easily see why a dealer would consider not selling you the car. NO amount of profit on any car is worth a bad survey.

The system sucks both ways.

Here is a crazy for one you from the other side of the coin. I got dinged on a survey because the customer said parking at our dealership sucked. Actually it does but that is not the point. The customer never even parked on our lot. I delivered the car to his house with the paperwork. He never even stepped foot in the dealership but my score went down because of parking.

so i think the system sucks as well

So is this why dealers change their names? I'm curious because the dealer that sold me my 2002 Tundra has changed names twice, and my experience with the sales manager was less than bad, only reason I bought it was it had the right options package without the southeast fluff add ons and I had to literally run the guy down to force the sale, the last thing he told me was give him a good review on the survey, I was so mad even tho I got the right truck that I simply dint do the survey at all.
Recently I went to the renamed dealer, and the guy is still there I told the salesman that was helping me about it, I also told him that the experience would not be repeated.

[42GAMI]

Originally Posted by SFTundraMan

Interesting way of looking at it.

first of all, there is no excuse for how you were treated. End of story. 100% wrong

on the flip side, Toyota has put so much of a backlash against a dealer for a bad survey,

sorry to jack this tread for a moment: sftundraman, wanted to know if i could still fill a survey even although i purchased my truck in 2004? i have a bone to pick with my dealer and servco VPC (vehicle processing center). thanks.

[SFTundraMan]

Originally Posted by MOREPOWER

So is this why dealers change their names?

Not at all. Usually dealerships only change the name when ownership changes in some way. It cost way too much to change everything over to the new name.

[SFTundraMan]

Originally Posted by 42GAMI

sorry to jack this tread for a moment: sftundraman, wanted to know if i could still fill a survey even although i purchased my truck in 2004? i have a bone to pick with my dealer and servco VPC (vehicle processing center). thanks.

if you still have the original survey you can. But I dont think you can just ask for another one.

Scary part is when you get treated badly at one dealer and buy the car elsewhere. usually people still do the survey on their feelings towards the first dealer.

Again, I hate the survey system as it is right now.

Here is another example.

lets just say you wait for your tundra for 3 months and when you go to pick it up, on the bottom of the wheel well you see a hairline scratch. As of that moment, I cant give you the truck unless I have someone working at that time that can fix it on the spot. So on the weekends , it aint happening, because on the survey , question 6 states were their any concerns when you picked up the car. if you say yes. Even if the other 45 questions were all excellent, it counts as a zero for that dealership. Of course we try to find any imperfections before you get there but the dealer would rather make you come back and get dinged for wasting your time, then to give you an imperfect truck. That really should piss customers off but can you blame the dealer for not giving you the truck?


So you can see, we hate the system the way it is set up.

[TunTac]

I called Javier, confirmed they had the car she wanted and told him that we were ready to buy if he could match the offer we had from Broadway Toyota in Oakland. He responded that his manager wouldn’t match the offer unless we came in in person, but that they had run a sale over the weekend for an even better price and that he was sure that we could get $2,000 off the sticker if we can in to make an offer. After discussing the matter with my wife, we made an appointment to come right in.

My wife and I arrive 15 minutes later to discover that Javier hasn’t returned from picking up the car. When he returned after another 10 or 15 minutes, I explain that I am a former car salesman and that I took off work to come make sure my wife gets the deal they advertised in the paper and that they don’t tack on any hidden charges. I reminded him that I mentioned on the phone that we are in a hurry because she needs to leave for class in two hours.

I'm gonna' play Devil's advocate here, so bear with me and read my comments with an open mind. Not to be a jerk, but if you truly did work in the car biz, then you realize everything you stated in the above paragraph was spoken like a true novice.

First, to confirm the availability of the vehicle, you should have asked for the VIN and/or stock #. Okay, so you didn't, not a major mistake, but second ... a former car salesman (you) doesn't play the quoting game. Third, paper ad's are merely attention grabbers that advertise a dealer's "loss leader's." And lastly, an experienced negotiator and/or someone who claims to have worked in the car biz never negotitaes downwards from the MSRP.

Javier stepped away for a few minutes and the returned tells us that they sold one gray car a few days ago and that the other one they have isn’t available because it just arrived and hasn’t been checked into inventory. He said that the car can’t be ready for another three days. I reminded him that I used to sell cars and that it could done faster than that if the car was sold, he responded that the service department was really busy.

Typical dealer scam.

He sat us down at his desk and asked my wife to fill out a credit application along with an offer sheet. He returns about five minutes later and he tells us that the car he assured us was available on the phone had actually been damaged and needed repairs before they would sell it to us.

Stall tactic.

Mr. Rios then says his manager noticed that we “were upset or in a bad mood,” and wanted to be sure we would be happy…that’s why he is admitting that the car was damaged and is in the body shop. We both had busy days ahead of us and they didn’t have the car she wanted, so we left.

Never assume a dealer is being truthful with you.

After calling around some more, looking for the car in the color she wanted, my wife called Javier back and explained that at this point she was interested in ANY Prius with a Package #2 and a dark interior, and she was willing to come back in to buy the car tonight to get it over with. Javier said that he would look into it and call her back.

They won, you caved in and were willing to settle.

Imagine her shock when Javier phoned back a few minutes later, after discussing it with his manager, to say that he “feels uncomfortable selling us a car” because we were unhappy and that her husband made him “feel like dirt” on the phone.

Are you telling us the whole story? I'm certainly not defending the dealer, but a sale is a sale and they would have rolled that deal regardless of what they thought you would have given them on the survey. Besides, they would have done all they could to coerse you to mark "Excellent" in every category.

We were outraged. They lied to us about having a car available. They lied about needing three days to prepare the car for delivery so they could fix the body damage. Then they said we weren’t happy enough to buy a car from them!

So, you've trusted other dealers??

Toyota has gotten a lot of press about their customer satisfaction program, including a recent New York Times article, Toyota’s rise to world domination driven by customer satisfaction, we decided to write Toyota Headquarters.

Yeah, with their vehicles, not with their cattle call sales staff.

We did hear back from Toyota, who said they would file a report with Toyota of Berkeley and that we would get a call back from them within 3 days. They did not offer any further resolution or provide anything we could feel positive about.

The next morning, we got a follow up call from Toyota of Berkeley. The customer satisfaction manager explained that he had heard about the situation and that the dealer was simply exercising their right to choose who to do business with. He agreed that Javier was not being honest when he said that the car would take 3 days to PDI. He further stated that Toyota would require them to tell us about the body damage if the repair exceeded $500. He didn’t state that the damage was beyond the $500 threshold, but we speculate that the salesman told us about the damage because it became apparent that he would have to disclose it if he sold us the car.

He also said that this situation occurred because the salesman was afraid that if he sold us a car, we would respond unfavorably in our customer satisfaction survey. He said that one bad experience reported by a customer could cost the salesman thousands of dollar over the course of a year. Javier dugg himself a whole and then claimed that we were in a bad mood and using profane language so we wouldn’t tell the truth about him in a customer survey.

Of course, that will never show up on Toyota’s J.D. Powers results, because he refused to sell us a car.

<a href="http://measurement.com/Online_Marketing/?p=10">Toyota Of Berkeley sucks</a>

In all fairness, I understand your frustration and it feels good to vent, but your first mistake was simply not leaving the second you realized they were not honest with you. Also, from the first paragraph; that BS about you having to come into the dealership for the manager to honor the discount is pure BS.

I may sound a bit callous, but truly, you made some mistakes here. By default, the dealer is always to blame, therefore making it your responsibility to set the ground rules and make your own deal. You don't have to be mean or forceful, just firm.

I really do wish you the best in your vehicle pursuit. It's just frustrating when people complain about geting burned, when it could have been prevented.

Ever heard the phrase, "We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone." ? That's exactly what they did when they thought you were too difficult to deal with. It sucks, but not all dealers will kiss your *** for a sale.

C'mon dude, this sounds like a bruised ego story.

[TunTac]

Originally Posted by roiguy

42 GAMI

We actually did go to another dealer. It's true we had about a dozen to choose from in the area. I am determined to make my story heard because I am offended by the idea of refusing to sell a car to keep your CSI scores high.


The idea of the surveys to keep dealers from lying to customers and treating them poorly. We were lied to and treated poorly BECAUSE of the survey.

Bitter Irony

Again, this is nothing new. Car dealers have been at this crap forever. We all know that MOST (not all) salespeople are less than truthful at times.

Instead of wasting all your energy talking about your poor experience, focus on finding that new car you really want and enjoy it. I guarantee Javier and his GSM aren't losing any sleep over this, and neither should you!

Tough Love here baby ... that's all!!

[SFTundraMan]

Originally Posted by TunTac

but a sale is a sale and they would have rolled that deal regardless of what they thought you would have given them on the survey.

I have no problem believing that they wouldnt roll the deal. I have seen this done at a few dealers and on several occassions. Think about it, it if was a loss leader and I dont know that it was, but why would a dealer want to lose money on a deal when they know they are going to get torched on the survey. No car deal is worth that. Again back to the original vibe of the post. It is still messed up how he was treated and the customer should be pissed how he was treated to start with. I dont even see why they gave them a second chance to sell them the car. If you dont like how you are treated 100%, then get up and leave. Like he said, there is at least 12 dealers within 20 miles of berkeley including mine only ten miles away.