Wed. Oct 30th, 2024


BREAKING NEWS UPDATE: Kia Dealership Controversy Reaches Its End: Final Update to Historic Post

Initial Post Publish Date: 2 days ago
Follow-up Post Publish Date: 22nd February 2023, 18:00 GMT

In our effort to provide the most recent information available, we are issuing this follow-up post to our initial update published two days ago regarding a customer’s experience with a Kia dealership regarding a warranty issue. The information you are about to read is still significant, and we urge you to be thoroughly informed about the situation.

To jog your memory, our initial report delved into the story of John Wilson, a satisfied Kia vehicle customer who had been experiencing issues with the door locking mechanism of his 2018 Kia Sorento EX. Despite having brought this issue to the attention of a certified Kia dealership, the problem went unchecked, and the dealership refused to provide support under the warranty.

Development & Resolution

After our original expose, Kia’s customer service division came forward to address this distressing situation. In response, the company issued a formal statement on January 25th, 2023. Specifically, they acknowledged the customer’s troubles, expressed regret for the situation’s severity, and assured them a resolution would be reached soonest.

Following this pledge of action, Kia’s customer services extended an invitation to John for further clarification and a thorough examination of the complaint. After a series of correspondence sessions, the dealership agreed to accommodate John’s request for complimentary fixes, thus rectifying the problematic parts of his vehicle.

Full Analysis & Conclusion

In conclusion, after relentless efforts from both our customer and Kia’s customer service team, it becomes clear that the dealership not honor[ing] the war[riant]y was isolated circumstance. Kia’s commitment to customer satisfaction proved commendable, as they took measures to find a solution for the affected owner in a timely manner.

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Greetings all, I live on an island and I don't have the option to use other dealerships. I have a 2017 Kia Sorento. The engine failed, classic Theta 2 recall stuff. I brought it into my Kia dealership that I bought it from, I have done all the recalls in a timely manner. I provided all my oil change maintenance records. However they decided to use the Carfax oil change records instead which show a lapse of about 30k miles no oil change. Using this information they denied my warranty and suggested I call Kia Consumer Affairs. I did and Kia Consumer Affairs has been trying to contact my local Kia dealership for weeks and they refuse to speak with them and have blocked their number as well as mines. According to KIA Consumer Affairs this repair should absolutely be covered by the warranty.

I went through the better Business Bureau as well and the KIA dealership continues to refuse my mechanics maintenance records. In the BBB exchange they flat out lie about how they have approached the situation. Now they posted through the BBB that they will send my vehicle to salvage and charge me to storage + disposal fees. It's been almost 5 months so in sure they could charge me quite a bit in fees if they wanted to do that.

Please help, what else could I do to have them honor the warenty?

So far the last couple days I have:
1) Drafted a letter for my attorney to send to the dealership outlining the situation
2) Contacted the State Attorney General
3) Reached out to several news and journalist outlets
4) Attempted to call Kia but goes straight to voicemail.

I have screen shots of conversations that I have had with their employees outlining the above including them refusing to explain exactly what oil changes I missed and also them explaining that they will refuse to speak with Kia Consumer Affairs.

Mahalo for any help dealing with these local kine problems.

Update!
After a month Kia Consumer Affairs finally got through to someone at the dealership. The Service Department spoke with them and now they said they have always planned to replace the engine. (They just didn't think to let me know or reply to me but instead chose to threaten me with the destruction of the vehicle and fees for storage). The Service Manager (different from my original service manager) didn't give me a hard time, but he still wants to see evidence of my claims. I am going to print EVERYTHING out today for him and make copies for every person shopping there today. I'm just debating whether I should leave names on the print outs for their customers to see. The main person that was threatening me is conveniently off island.
The service manager also wants to go over more charges as they want me to pay for repairs involved not related to the actual engine. I am going to have them go over everything and then review it with my mechanic and Kia Consumer Affairs.

I feel like a weight has been lifted and I also feel that I'll be able to finally grieve all of this with the dealership tomorrow.

Final Update:
We worked it out! Kia Consumer Affairs got in touch with them. They moved facilities which I knew about, but their phone lines are having issues. Probably why myself and the Consumer Affairs couldn't get in touch with the service department and voicemails went unanswered. Not sure why the emails didn't get answered. To add the service staff I spoke with in person were VERY helpful and kind. This service manager that is now helping me is awesome. They understood what transpired after we spoke and I provided them with all the information and screenshots/emails. They are going to fulfil the warranty and replace the engine. Now for the issues:

  1. I sent 2 emails with maintenance records. One from me and one from my wife that I forwarded from my email. They are going to check, but seems like one didn't get opened and attached. So maybe that's why they were missing records.
  2. I asked for clarification about the missing oil changes but they only responded with "call Kia Consumer Affairs"
  3. The images provided are from the service director/manager. He refused to tell me what was missing and also blocked all communication with me. Only conversing in the Better Business Bureau. In which he told me that he went ABOVE AND BEYOND to help me and that there is nothing more he can do. He said that he is always willing to talk to Kia Consumer Affairs but in text messaging was very clear that he refuses to speak to them which is unbelievable.
  4. I would say the strangest thing happened as well. The Service Director offered to BUY the vehicle from me unfixed directly for himself and not for the KIA Dealership at the very beginning of this whole process.
  5. Despite shutting down all communication with himself and the service center after July 26. The Service Director threatened to destroy the vehicle and charge me for salvage and storage fees. It was there for 5 months. This was communicated through the BBB and not directly. Imagine the service director telling you he is going to destroy your vehicle AND refuse to communicate directly to you so you cannot do anything about it.
  6. Lasty they apparently approved the repair August 16 but did not send me any notification of this, instead the BBB ended the conversation and I was only made aware of the approval for repairs from Kia Corporate when the KIA Consumer Affairs Case Manager emailed my wife August 20th.

I'll be setting up another meeting to give the dealership all my documents and the rest of the screenshots, and messages from the BBB regarding this service manager. It appears this one employee wanted to make my life hell, mission accomplished bro.

Thanks for all your help with my previous post. I can't tell you how relieved I am to have this resolved. There are more communications and screenshots but I don't feel the need to share everything. I'm satisfied with this here.



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