Congrats man! I'm glad that you got it worked through... let us know the final results!

 

Congrats to you and also to Pep Boys for doing the right thing.Hopefully what they finally do to remedy the situation will result in you having a good-running car in your driveway.

 

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I have to second that one..... Pep Boys has earned some respect by me, I would at this point allow them to work on my car for most things, I still won't allow anyone but myself, a dealership (a good one), or a specialized honda/acura shop do critical work but as for oil changes etc. I'll do business with them because they did the right thing....

 

First off I am glad that finally your car gets fixed and this issue will be put behind ..
As for PEP BOYS earning some of you guys respect,, i respect your opinions ,,but In my personal opinion ,what they did SUCKS big time,, A true professional would not have LIED but told the customer immediately that they screwed up and fixed the car, no if, and ,or buts,, It was not untill Honda help went to all other alternatives that they decided to finally admit their wrong doing and fix it..
So , what is my opinion of PEP BOYS ??? [sm=boosign.gif]..

 

That's a very valid point that I had never considered....

 

Desert, I agree with you about what SHOULD have happened, but that's like saying that politicians should never lie.

In my entire life I really trusted only ONE establishment to at least bebrutally honest with me about a vehicle,but that was many years ago. The rest, including Honda dealerships,would do exactly as Pep Boys has done, except most would never have admitted error. That's why I have to applaudPep Boysfor at least accepting responsibility for what happened.

Telling the truth may be the right thing to do, but maybe the person who made the mistake feared getting fired, and he could notrisk losing his job. To me that would be quite understandable - particularly if the person's family would be adversely affected.

To a great extent, employers have to assume that their employees are telling themthe truth about what they've done on a job, butemployers also put pressure on their employees to work fast and make no mistakes while they're doing it. That's a very difficult combination to maintain day after day, so someone inevitablymakes an mistake and the fingers start getting pointed all over the place -evenat the innocentcustomer.

But through some type ofgood, though slow, investigativeprocess, Pep Boys has now figured out logically (just as we did here) that whoever did the work must have made a mistake, and now they're willing to pay for their mistake.

Who knows, maybe they'll evengo the extra mile and the customer will end up paying nothing. If I were the customer, that would be the best outcome of all and would erase all of the "should haves".

(Hopefully the person who messed up learned a couple of good lessons from itwithout losinghis livelihood.)

 

Tony I totally agree with you about the tech perhaps worrying about losing his job and that would affect his family..I would not want that happen to any person

But I want my techs to tell me right away if something happened and if we are at fault .. by a tech lying it will cause worse issues for him and the facility once the truth comes out ,,
This could have been as simple as calling the customer up and saying ( I am sorry we made a mistake we will take care of it and get you the car ASAP ) had the tech told the truth .. But if a tech lies and the shop stands behind the tech and believes what they say ,, it will be much worse in the long run .. ( b.b.b., law suites, bad reputation , losing a customer etc etc..)
We are all human ( techs) and in today flat trate system the shops do put a lot of pressure on techs and mistakes do happen , but STILL that is not an excuse to LIE and make matters worse .

I am a shop owner ,I pay my techs weekly, I tell them that i CARE and WANT quality ..take your time and do the job right the first time, I want my customers to be happy with our work and tell 10-20-50 of their friends how good a job we did and how well they were treated ,, but even so , mistakes can happen .. But i mostly STRESS the issue that if something gets damaged ,I want to know ASAP and not for them to cover it up .. because like many managers i believe in my techs and if they tell me that something was broke i would stand behing them But if i were to find out that they lied to me and made matters worse I would have to thing long and hard wether to keep that tech or let him go ..

My reason ,, if you lied about this ,what else have you lied about ? what are you going to lie to me in the future ??How can I fully trust him ??
I give you a small example,,. working an a car,( Infiniti ) one of my techs dropped a small bolt inside the intake manifold,it ended up in the cylinder, he told me right away,, i called the customer and told her that we made a mistake, need to remove the head . put her in a rental , removed the head and got the bolt at very minimal cost ,
Now if he had not said anything, because he was worried of being fired .. started the car , think of the damage that it would have caused,, ( hole in the piston ? bent valve ? )
To me , the truth has and will always be the best policy no matter what ....Lying will always make matters worse ..if not at the moment but it will catch up with you..

 

First, I agree 100%with everything you say about truth and honesty being the best policy. If everyone operated that way, the world would be a much better place.

Second, how'd you like to move your establishment to Edmonton, Alberta? There's one hell of an oil boom going on here rightnow, and there's a ton of money to be made in the automotive repair business. If you did, I might very well give up my DIY ways!

I've been given a few second chances in my life and at the timeI was very happy to get them, so I'm a great believer in giving someone a second chance (even a dealership, restaurant, or ....gulp .....politician).

No third chances available, however. Screw up the second time and I'm (you're) gone forever. I think that's fair.

Pep Boys is one helluva big outfit, so the folks that actually started it probably followed your policy to the letter. But now that it is what it is, it is the attitude and behaviorofthe local franchise owner that will not only determine the fate of his small pieceof Pep Boys, but also affect the reputation of the entire Pep Boys organization.The owner or managerstarts off his frnachise with the Pep Boys reputation and it isvital thatPep Boysmakes sure that he operates it in keeping with that reputaion. (The same type of thing must happenin theMacDonalds organization -whereI think customer complaints are ultimatelytaken very seriously.)

In this case, the manager of the local franchise was incapable of doing the right thing, so a Pep Boyshigher-up picked up the ball and ran with it, and to methat is commedable.

Hopefully the behavior of that local manager will nowremain under closer scrutiny for some time. Ultimately,vigilance on the part of the entire Pep Boys organizationis the only way thatthey will survive in a very competitive market place.