The Replacement Problem, or Absence and Disappointment, Final Chapter

Now, where was I? Right, continuing from here.

Friday, May 25th, 2018, 6:05 pm.

It had been 11 days since I collected my freshly fixed Dodge Dart from the dealer/repair shop and in that time I also traded an old job in the country for a new one in the city (same company, just different work locations). My wife's Honda HRV had served me well and I think she was rather glad to get it back, life felt like it was returning to normal. However, Fate, Karma or whatever supernatural force at work had different plans for me.

On this particular Friday, I started my car like I normally do, drove to the site, shut it down and mingled with any remaining workers that were finishing up their day. The weather had become unseasonably warmer and less than five minutes after my arrival, I was already sweating. So, after my greetings and updates from the progress that was made during the day from the workers, I returned to the Dart and tried to start it, blast myself with some air conditioning.

The Dodge performed it's usual "bells and whistles" as I turned the fob, but the gauges went...funny and nothing else happened. A few more attempts produced the same results. My first two thoughts was the battery was dead (which I couldn't see how, since the car had been starting just fine up no less than half an hour before) or an electrical connection had come loose, somehow. I stepped out of the car and gave my wife a call, asking her to locate and bring me the "booster pack" she had got for me the previous Christmas.

Despite only having a 75% charge, the car started and I let it run for a while, then I shut it down. A quick turn of the fob recreated to same useless results as before. No big deal, I thought to myself, I will just take it to the dealer tomorrow and they will have a look. Yeah....no.

The next day, before noon, I boosted the car and drove down to the dealer, pulled up to the service department and talked to the first guy behind the counter I saw. I explained the issue and showed them a video I made (see the image at the top of this page). "We can take a look at it...." he said, flipping through what looked like an appointment book, "on Thursday?" I was stunned, "So, for the next six days I have to embarrass myself at work by boosting my car, or possibly cause more damage to it, since I don't know what is wrong?" The look I got back could have been an exact match for this....

After a minute of silence, I broke it by saying, "Fine then." His reply was, "Does 10:30 in the morning work for you?"

Perhaps my customer service expectations were too high, crazy thoughts of immediate attention given to my problem, or even the offer of a loaner vehicle and leaving mine behind, but I was past the point of being livid. I walked off the lot, away from my car and across the street to the pre-owned/used section.

Already the seeds of ridding myself of the Dart had been planted when I run into, of all people, the salesman who sold me the car a year before. I took a chance and explained my problem and showed him the video too. He directed me towards vehicles that were considerably more expensive than what I was paying out on my crippled Dodge now. I just left him talking to the air as I returned to the Dart, boosted it and drove off home.

For the next six days, this was my "going to work" routine.

Every time I popped the hood, connected the booster to the battery, got into the car, started it, got back out, disconnected the claps, closed the hood, re-entered the car and drove off, just added to my pile of negative emotions. I was determined to have the car repaired and by done while the whole deal.

I did entertain the thought of talking to the General Manager about my situation, but after a search on the internet for the dealership on the Better Business Bureau and reading the exchanges between him and other customers, I decided that would have been a waste of time and breath.

Finally, the booked day had come and I drove back down to the dealership and made my presence known. I handed the fob off and was told it shouldn't take more than an hour or two the diagnose and repair. For a moment, I was starting to reconsider "dumping" the Dart. I gave my phone number, so they could call me when the job was done and they arranged a courtesy driver to take me home. Okay, I was rather impressed with how this was all going (bare in mind, there was different people behind the service counter than from six days before).

The ride home was a quiet affair, since I worked the night before and was operating on very little sleep. After being dropped off, I wasted no time at setting an alarm for a two hour nap, since that was the bigger time frame they had given me for the "find and fix." However, my phone was right beside me and close to my ear, just in case.

For whatever reason, no alarm went off and I awoke on my own four hours later. A quick check showed I didn't miss a call from the dealer, so I called them. "Yeah, we finished with your car a few hours ago, do you need our courtesy driver to come and pick you up?" I wasn't impressed and any thoughts I had about keeping the Dart quickly vanished when I arrived to collect it, after I had to payout $540.00 for diagnostics, a new battery and getting some electronic module flashed.

Right then and there, I was done with the dealer, their staff and any thoughts of purchasing future products manufactured by FiatChrysler.