Warranty issue

[johnsm]

I have found out that my 2000 Isuzu Rodeo (73 000 kms) is under a drivetrain warranty. The dealer that I am having problems with does not want to warranty the transmission. I was recommended to go to another dealer and they phoned the original dealer which said I was in violation of the warranty. I don't want to get to much into that. But the second dealer said that the first had put a block on my warranty and I should contact GM customer service. Well I did and GM said they were not aware of any block on the warranty, so they created a case file to investigate. It usually takes 48 hrs to investigate these matters (GM's time estimation) and now it has taken 6 working days with the car sitting at the second dealerships parking lot. I also had the egr replaced, they said that is not covered by the warranty. Does anybody know different? They had a brake fluid campaign that I did not have to pay for but they won't honour warranty.
So heres the question. Does anybody know who I can talk to above the GM customer service reps in Canada. Or is there any organizations that I can contact that could help me. I have good documentation that the first dealership was trying to shaft me and is mad about it that i didn't fall for it. Any good ideas would be much appreciated.

John

[2eyefishclaw]

a dealer cannot block your warranty but they can and will or will not repair the vehicle depending on maintenance history (HAVE YOU EVER HAD THE TRANSMISSION SERVICED?) if not warranty will not pay for a transmission due to lack of care (if you dont care why should they) they are well within there legeal rights to decline a warranty repair if there are no maintenance records

[2eyefishclaw]

oh and the egr valve is not part of your drivetrain
and most likely should never have been replaced I bet it only needed to be cleaned

the ABS recall has nothing to do with fluid it is replacment of the ABS module

[Davejb]

Without knowing why they think your warranty is void we can only speculate. And 2eye is likely right on the EGR valve, some rigorous cleaning usually brings it back to life, it did with my wife's 2000 Rodeo.

[johnsm]

Thanks on the egr. The maintance is fine. I'll tell you about it latter. I finally got ahold of my case reviewer. We are playing tennis now. They told me why the the 1st dealer is blocking my transmission warranty (yes it has been now blocked due to my inquiry, no big deal). I now have faxed invoices countering the dealers claim. I'm pretty jaded about things, I got alot of ammo but I expect them to change the rules in mid stream.


John

[rodeo02]

John- As far as I know, Isuzu of Canada is no longer in business. This is likely part of the problem. Check wildlife's post under the trooper thread.
G/luck
Joel

[Shrumph]

What was the ABS recall about? I just bought a 2oo0 v-6 and I don't know if my this would apply to my Isuzu.

[amigo-2k]

Nope there were no recalls on the 2000 Rodeo abs

[johnsm]

Originally Posted by amigo-2k

Nope there were no recalls on the 2000 Rodeo abs

There calling it a brake fluid campaign. They said they changed my brake fluid free of charge. I'll ask them for the specifics when I talk to them on Monday. Something must be up, nobody does anything cheap nevermind free at the saturn/saab/isuzu dealerships here.

[Dober89]

Hey, I was just wondering what two dealerships you have been dealing with?? I just bought my rodeo from downtown mazda(who i think are horrid), but anyways, my rodeo had some warranty work done on it by the isuzu dealership near there and although I didnt deal with them directly, it seemed to be like they would be a nice place to deal with.

Im kind of out of luck though because the closest dealership to me is about an hour away so its not really a good option when I need work done.

[johnsm]

Originally Posted by Dober89

Hey, I was just wondering what two dealerships you have been dealing with?? I just bought my rodeo from downtown mazda(who i think are horrid), but anyways, my rodeo had some warranty work done on it by the isuzu dealership near there and although I didnt deal with them directly, it seemed to be like they would be a nice place to deal with.

Im kind of out of luck though because the closest dealership to me is about an hour away so its not really a good option when I need work done.

I'm not going to talk too much about the specifics of my problem or the dealerships until I get final verdict on my warranty. But if your near Downtown Mazda there should be a Saturn/isuzu dealer I think on warden and eglinton and another farther east. Check gmcanada.ca and then look up Isuzu for dealership locations nearest you

My personal thoughts on Isuzu is that they are very functional vehicles. The four wheel drive already saved me from a serious head on collision. On coming driver spun out infront of me. Good control on snowy road and a surprisingly cool head on my part may have saved my life. I'm a general contractor and the back window opening allows me to load up trim longer than 12ft. Folding seats allows me to load up my tool boxes. I spent a long time choosing vehicles. My first choice would have been the Jeep Cherokee, but the back window option is only on the grand cherokee and gas milelage was terrible . I assume that a 3.2 litre would get better gas milelage but I was wrong. My 3.3 Caravan was better on gas. Also they keep the spare in the back compartment.
All cars have their mechanical problems, but the Isuzu Rodeo has two problems in Canada. 1- Phenonmenally expensive parts $600 alternator, 369 egr valve, 5000 transmission , 8500 engine.
2- Very few independant garages that know anything about Isuzu's. You can get the 4L30E transmission serviced at any transmission specialist, its a GM tranny. But anything complex or under warranty should go to the dealership.
2b- I can buy diamonds cheaper by going to South Africa than getting a new egr valve installed buy the dealer.

I went through 3 transmissions on my 92 caravan total cost for rebuilds $3200. One rebuild was free under warranty. So manfacture design flaws don't scare me. What scares me is dishonesty and dealer greed.

If everything goes wrong with this vehicle and becomes too expensive to repair I'm just going to dump it and get a cargo van. No power windows, no power anything, no digital dash. Just a pull nob on the head lights and a good heater. The Isuzu service people have killed all my romantic notions of the automobile. My next vehicle will have one horse, its called a Clydesdale. Give it shots, feed it oats, hook a wagon to it and Yehaaaaaa. Oh yeah it has all wheel drive.

John

[johnsm]

Wednesday is D-day. GM customer service has put the decision in the hands of dealerships regional manager. I have successfully refuted all claims against my actions in violating the manufacturer's warranty. Now they are going to try to make a decision against me on the basis that the previous owner serviced the vehicle at independant garages at a more than acceptable frequency. See they don't know how much the previous owner serviced the vehicle, and they cannot claim that the previous owner did not service the vehicle due to the fact that it was GMAC leased, and the previous owner's identity is protected under law. Neither I nor gm can access the the owner's identity without a court order. The way they are coming to their conclusion is checking the Isuzu dealership databases for service history and have found out that the previous owner did not come in for all their service appointments.

I am now searching to see if they are breaking the law. You are allowed to go to independant garages and use aftermarket parts. The dealer has to prove that aftermarket parts caused problem.

Anybody got some good suggestions let me know

John

[johnsm]

The verdict came against me. They did everything to make sure my warranty would not be valid. I still can't go into specifics because I am now going to court. But what happen in general is that the first dealership I was dealing with tried to gouge me by saying I had a leaky transmission pan gasket. What I did have is a slow leak out of the tranny drain plug gasket. There are service bulletins that describe the drain plug gaskets as a "design flaw". I would not let them fix it. I took it down the road and had the local independant lube shop replace it and flush the tranny. Leak fixed at a third of the cost.

A month later the check tranny P01870 (transmission slippage) code comes up, I take into the dealer to look at they say the transmission shift points need to be reset. They checked the fluid level and printed on the invoice "fluid level OK". I drive it again and the P01870 code comes up again. I take it back they do a line pressure test.Pressure OK. They claim they found the oil low and burnt. They say the idependant lube shop that did my flush did it wrong. They flush it again and a week later P01870 comes up again (car feels fine, damn light keeps coming up)

So I know have had I with this dealership. I call the guy up that sold me the car and I let him know my problem. He tells me that I should be under warranty and he has been in this problem before with a blown Isuzu engine and the 2nd dealer covered it under warranty. I take my rodeo across town to the 2nd dealer and they see that I live right across town right beside the first dealer. So they get curious and phone the 1st dealer and ask whats happening. The first dealer tells them that I had a fluid problem and will not honour the warranty. So since the first dealer won't touch it, the 2nd will only work on it if GM customer service approves.

So I call GM customer service, they usually come to a decision within 48 hrs. They tried to sweat me out and didn't even look at my case for 6 working days. See my vehicle was sitting in the 2nd dealers lot for all that time without approval to drop the tranny. I told them that if it was not under warranty they could not do the work. I know of independants that can do the work for cheaper and Isuzu farms out their tranny work anyway.

Finally, my case worker phones me and says my warranty was void because the independant lube shop incorrectly flushed my tranny. I counter, not true. I have Isuzu documentation stating that the fluid level was inspected as OK 2 weeks before line pressure test and month after the independant flush. So the flush by the independant is not a factor. My case worker takes this info back to the first dealer and the district dealership manager who is manager for both dealerships and they come back with a new story. They said that I had an after market pan gasket on my tranny and that voids my warranty. Isuzu canada uses neoprene gaskets only supposedly and my gasket is cork. Well a line pressure test was done on the vehicle and no leaking was found by the dealer who originally said that my pan gasket was leaking. The pan gasket was never changed and the test was done 2 months after the 1st dealer insinuated the leak was due to aftermarket gasket. So pan gasket never leaked.

Now they start adding to the story saying when I originally came in the underbody was covered in tranny fluid. A lie. I just had the underbody oil sprayed and I have the invoice for it. They also insinuated that I had tranny work (at an indepenant garage) done on the vehicle between first visit and last. There proof for this was that the last time I came in the underbody was clean of oil. Wrong, it still had the same cork gasket on the vehicle. the pan was never dropped and secondly the last invoice they gave me specified in writing that the underside was washed clean by them.

So I explain this to my case worker, who is trying like hell to void my warranty. She still says my warranty is void even though the invoices written by the 1st dealership contradict their own explanations.

Now comes the kick in the nuts. She makes this offer.

Her words:

"We can reinstate your warranty if you would like. To do this we would have to inspect the transmission, and to do that we have to take it down. As we would determine the cause of problem the 2nd dealership would fix it also, since they have it disassembled of course. Now if it is not determined to be a fluid problem the warranty will be reinstated and you would not have to pay for the rebuild ($3500.00). But if it is determined that it is a fluid related problem you will have to pay for the cost of the repair yourself."

My reply

You have done everything possible to deny me warranty. I have no confidence that you will be fair in you decision to award or deny warranty after inspection. I will not give you another dime. I can get the tranny rebuilt by independants who have good experience with the 4L30E GM tranny and the P01870 code (or as they refer to it "the mystery code" ) I have estimates that are $1000.00 to $2000.00 cheaper than your dealers are offering. So no thanks".

So now I am looking into Canadian law that concerns voiding car warranties and aftermarket parts. I know what the moss/magnusson law in the States basically stipulates: Dealer must prove that aftermarket parts were cause of failure. I saw something like that in Canadian law, got to hunt it down again.

By the way car runs fine. Damn light keeps flashing.

John

[2eyefishclaw]

do some homwork find service bulllitens this is not new

for the 1870 first TSB says replace tranny fluid flush cooler return to cust. if it returns with 1870 replace torque convertor

revised TSB says rebuild the tranny I am assuming there are new and better parts for the tranny good luck