When Carmakers Lie To Their Customers - The Podcast

"SteveLehto" (stevelehto) 01/19/2017 at 09:00 • Filed to: None

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About once a week someone calls me to ask if they have a lemon law case. They are not sure because the car manufacturer told them they didn’t. Let’s get this straight. They build the cars. That doesn’t make them attorneys. They are lying to you and they know it.

Luckily, most people suspect that the car company has a vested interest in you not pursuing your legal rights. At least, when that would mean them having to buy your car back from you. So, they have call centers where the call takers are trained to listen to you, say pleasant things to you, and to - if you ask - tell you that you do not have a lemon law case.

I’ve heard some crazy explanations. A caller last week was told by a customer care representative (or whatever they call that role) that repair attempts “don’t count” unless they replaced parts on the car during the visit.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Yes, we laugh now. But they tell consumers that because, apparently, some will fall for it and assume they have no case. It is such a common tactic that I felt I had to address it. This week’s audio.

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And video.

The top pic is a non sequitur . It is the side of a 5-ton gun truck, which reminded me of my M-35. Ah, good times.

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This website may supply general information about the law but it is for informational purposes only. This does not create an attorney-client relationship and is not meant to constitute legal advice, so the good news is we’re not billing you by the hour for reading this. The bad news is that you shouldn’t act upon any of the information without consulting a qualified professional attorney who will, probably, bill you by the hour.

Urambo Tauro > SteveLehto 01/19/2017 at 09:48

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It’s very eye-opening to hear that these call centers are actually for the automaker’s benefit. I wonder how many other types of “customer service” are designed with a similar purpose in mind.

jimz > Urambo Tauro 01/19/2017 at 09:55

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it’s pretty well known that “tech support” call centers are there to get you to go away.

SteveLehto > jimz 01/19/2017 at 09:59

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I think the amount of usefulness varies from industry to industry. Obviously, a call center can’t fix your car but one might be able to help you configure your router (“Have you tried unplugging it and plugging it back in?”)

jimz > SteveLehto 01/19/2017 at 10:01

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little extra reverb today?

and the “complaint number” you cooked up reminded me of one of Brian Regan’s (comedian) bits.

“Ok, here’s your confirmation code, you’re going to need this. Ready? It’s ‘11I1o00ooI1oo01Il.’”

ateamfan42 > SteveLehto 01/19/2017 at 10:19

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Steve, thank you once again for an informative article. I know your messages are helpful to a lot of folks to better understand their rights and options.

One of the topics I often bring up in conversation about corporations is to look at any publicly traded (and some private) company’s mission statement. They don’t start out with things like “to please customers” or “to make great products” or “to save the world” or even “to give our employees good jobs”. Every one starts with “ To maximize shareholder value ..... ”. And that should tell you everything you need to know about a company’s priorities.

jimz > ateamfan42 01/19/2017 at 10:40

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the sad thing is that Jack Welch- who is something of a god amongst the C-level types- has since called it the “dumbest idea in the world.” Yet the attitude persists amongst his disciples.

“Minimum Bob” Nardelli being one of them.

SteveLehto > jimz 01/19/2017 at 11:41

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I have an issue about every 10th or 20th cast where my audio fails. In that case I have to take the sound off of the camera (and every now and again I have the camera sound fail and then I have to sync the other audio with the quiet video). I’m a perfectionist but I didn’t feel like redoing the whole podcast to fix it the hard way.

SteveLehto > ateamfan42 01/19/2017 at 11:44

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Even more important is that corporations are required by their fiduciary duty to do everything they can do to maximize profits. They are technically NOT allowed to do things that reduce profits if they can avoid it. That is why publicly-traded corporations so often do shortsighted things. If they can make a dollar today, they must do that over making no dollar today but making more down the road (unless they can PROVE that the future dollar, amortized, is worth more than the present dollar).

PMS Witch > SteveLehto 01/20/2017 at 10:23

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My dealer asks customers to “Rate How We Did” when I take my car in for service. Since I’ve been happy with how things went, I rated them a favorably.

Can this work against me if I have a problem with them serious enough to justify suing them?

SteveLehto > PMS Witch 01/20/2017 at 11:51

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I have heard of them pulling those out to say you must not have had a real problem. I throw those reviews away unless I had a bad experience. Then, I go nuts.