supwiddiss

iTrader: (1)

Short and sweet. RC Hill Mitsubishi lost me as a customer. Poor paint warranty quality on my 06 Evo MR. Pretty poor.

Back in July the clear coat on the hood started to frost and fail. At around 56k I took it in to RC Hill to see if it could be warrantied. The asst. service manager took photos and told me that I would be notified when Mitsu made a decision. It was November when it finally got scheduled to be fixed.

A note. When I first got the car off of the lot I noticed a few a flaws on the hood, roof, and trunk lid. Scuffs and scratches. I drove it home and took it back a day later. I didn't drive it for almost 2 weeks while the repairs were done. They ended up respraying the hood and trunk lid and buffed the roof. I was given a loaner for the whole time. The repairs were immaculate and the paint guy, Scott was to commended.

So, PPG warrantied the paint and Mits warrantied the work. I took it in Nov 1. I had to rent a car and mine had just over 60 k on it by that time. I got it back about 8 days later.

At the time I also paid for the bumper and right fender to be painted and the roof to be buffed to take out some water spots that typically show up. Trusting someone familiar with paint to know how to, as I said, "Make her pretty again".

So I got my Evo back and inspected it. It was in the bright sun and looked sweet. I felt some rough edges around the perimeter of the hood and had the body shop guy sand and polish them out. It was slick with wax and really looked great. I signed the paperwork and drove off.

A few days later I washed it. All of the "shinola" came off and that's where my heart sunk. The hood and roof without the heavy coat of whatever they put on it that went down the drain had cross hatched scratches on every square inch of them. The hood, which was factory perfect before, was wavy and orange peel had been attempted to to be sanded down. So in the dark under artifical lighting it looked terrible. The roof has a burn mark through the clear coat that I did not see when it had all of the dealer applied wax on it.

Now, I have to say that RC Hill always did a nice job in the service dept. Up until recently when I did take it in for things I couldn't do like change ACD lube and such, the work was great. Then I started seeing things like scratched Brembos, scratched wheels around the lug nuts, and falling asleep on the impact wrench.

I've always performed my own service. Rotation, oil changes, pad swap, etc. Hand torque the wheels with a coated impact lug socket.

Anyway I called up Wayne and Christian. Took the car back. RC came out too. They "couldnt see anything wrong" under the canopy of the service entrance. I told them things looked terrible under parking lot lights at night and said that it was unacceptable. So I rented a car and it was a few day before I got a call expecting Wayne to say it had been all fixed. NOT! I was told that they could not find a thing wrong. How do you think I felt?

I composed myself and went right into the sales floor and in a minute was in RC's office to tell him my disbelief. In a straight face he told me that nobody could see anything wrong. I let everyone in the sales dept. know how they lost a customer that day, calmly, and why.

I called Mitsu's customer relations dept and the lady on the other end told me it was her job to take down the facts and relay them to the man in charge. A day later I got this from, I think it was, Maurice.

Mitsubishi can honor a warranty claim but they cannot insure the quality of work performed. He explained that it was up to the dealer to assure quality and that Mitsu had no influence on dealer performance and that he was sorry for my experience. He did say that he would contact RC Hill and express my displeasure but could not insure any positive response and that it would be up to RC Hill to offer to make me a satisfied customer. I never heard from anyone at RC Hill since.

I've spent over 6 hours block sanding my hood and roof with 2000 and 3000 grit wet or dry and buffing them out. I totally avoided the burn through on my roof. It looks a bit better now but I still have some finishing touches. The scratches are less noticable but still there. RC Hill told me that it would cost ME $400 to have the roof resprayed and that they thought I did the burn through in the clear coat. And that they were "done with the hood". I never even had my Evo close to a machine buffer and as a matter of fact it never needed one. It's my baby!

Advice: Always, Always take time to spec out any work on your car. Take a few minutes and detail what YOU want done and what YOU expect the outcome to be on a piece of paper. Make the service manager (not an assistant) initial and agree that he understands your wants. Have you ever read a service ticket? Sometimes they are a bit vague. "Customer wants hood to be painted, to be covered under warranty"

Far fetched, but they could use a paint brush and call it a day. That's how I feel.

RC Hill, Jr. You lost me and my business. You used to be a top notch dealer and had top notch techs. Too bad your blindness to my concerns and decision to not fix my EVO right cost you the next EVO that I'll purchase. I bought my car from you in 45 minutes.