Poor build quality, poor management, and poor customer relations…read more
Let me preface this review by saying this is my second new vehicle from Elgin Chrysler; it is a 2022 Ram 1500 Classic purchased in early April.
After driving my new truck for the last month, and reaching exactly 2,000 km on it, this past weekend, I had a catastrophic power steering failure. Quite literally out of nowhere, the "Service Power Steering" light lit up on my dash and my steering wheel completely seized up mid-turn at a stoplight. Through some serious manhandling, I was just able to keep it turned enough to keep it from crashing into a parked car on the street, and, even more miraculously, I was able to barely avoid hopping the curb as I tried to pull it over safely. After putting it in park and turning it off and on, I tried to turn the wheel again, only to find it had 100% locked up and the wheels would simply jiggle in response to a full-effort wheel turn.
I got it towed to the dealership and had the keys dropped off, and the next day I got a phone call from the service department saying that the entire steering rack would need to be replaced. The repair was, obviously, under warranty, and would take a few days at least to order the part and do the work.
This is where the problems started.
I am writing this review as I await my truck to be repaired, and I've recently been told that it will actually take up to a week and a half since the part needs to be ordered. Upon learning this, I texted my sales rep to discuss what could be done to help restore confidence in the truck, since a serious failure of this kind showed a clear defect in the truck's construction.
I suggested that the normal 60k/3-year, bumper-to-bumper warranty be extended to the 100k/5-year upgrade, which is usually sold as an extra add-on. To me, this was a fair way to help restore confidence in the truck, since, if repaired correctly, the dealership wouldn't need to worry about me exercising the warranty that late into the truck's life.
The response I received from the manager, Curtis, was that they "couldn't" do that, but would be happy to SELL me the upgraded warranty, instead.
While I have no reason to suspect that the repairs they will do on my truck will be poor, I do have concerns that they don't put the necessary checks in place to identify potential issues with vehicles they sell. After all, replacing an entire steering rack isn't a minor fix -- it is a structurally integral part of the vehicle's basic function. While I'm aware that official safety inspections aren't done on new vehicles, I would caution any buyers to do a check themselves to ensure no defects go unnoticed.
Do I hold Elgin Chrysler accountable for the issue itself? No. Clearly a mistake was made in the factory when the vehicle was being built.
Do I hold Elgin Chrysler accountable for failing to identify the issue pre-sale? Yes. When you purchase a new vehicle, it should come with it some kind of assurance that key functions of the vehicle are certified to perform properly -- anything short of that is pure negligence.
Do I hold Elgin Chrysler accountable for the subsequent handling of the situation? Absolutely. Curtis, in particular, has taken no steps to allay my concerns with the safety of the truck in the future. A warranty extension is, in my mind, the bare minimum he could do to help restore confidence and faith in the vehicle as a whole, and it's the avoidance of committing to that warranty that makes me think they would rather just avoid the liability down the road.
You'll see a lot of positive reviews for Elgin Chrysler, many of which are deserved. But the vast majority of those are from people who had positive experiences purchasing a new vehicle. The real test of whether a dealership is worthy of your business is how they handle the BAD situations and the guarantees they put in place to protect, you, the customer, from having issues with your vehicle.
Now I know to take my future business elsewhere, and I hope my experience will serve as a warning to you, too.
