Reason for Visit: Service
I recommend this dealer: No
My Review of Honda Redwood City:
Beware of Honda Redwood City. Absolute crooks. They have very low quality technicians in their service center now who are messing with your cars and after you figure out that your car has issues they don't even honor their 1-year service warranty on all parts and labor jobs they perform on your car. Don't take my word for it guys. If you have been going to Honda Redwood City to service your Honda for the last year or so, have your car's health checked immediately by some other service center. Trust me I have been a customer since the last 8 years. I have been servicing both my Honda cars in this service center and since the last year both my cars are having problems. This is especially true if you have done timing belt change. So absolutely NO NO - DO NOT CHANGE TIMING BELT WITH THESE GUYS.
If you want more details as to what happened with my cars read the exact complaint text I filed with BAR attached below. If I would be rating these guys a year back I would be giving them all 5s. But how they have treated me and my cars over the last year is why I am giving them low rating. My situation is so bad that I have filed complaints with American Honda, BBB (http://www.bbb.org/) and BAR (Bureau of Automotive Repair) a division of DCA - the California Department of Consumer Affairs (http://www.dca.ca.gov). Trust me I am going to fight it till the end till I get justice, even if I spend more that what would have cost me to get a new engine (note, I have already spent $800+ dollars on rental car and counting). If any of you guys are in the same boat and want to be with me in a joint fight against these guys please email me at gourksaha@gmail.com. BAR representatives are looking for more people in the same boat so that they can prepare a solid case against these guys. Trust me I also had so many small issues over the last year but I never had the time to do all these complaints. It is true that now since I have to incur such a high cost that I am taking these steps. I understand there are so many of you out there who are in the small issues area, but trust me ignoring and letting go does not help. We need to fight and protect our consumer rights.
This is the exact text that I had provided to BAR in my complaint on Sep 28, 2009:
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On September 16, 2009 morning I dropped off my Honda Civic to Redwood City Honda for an air condition problem. They diagnosed the problem and found some leaks. After talking to me and getting my confirmation they went ahead and fixed the problem. Later that day they delivered my car and then I headed back home. Within 15 miles of driving from that point I saw the check engine light come on and thick fumes coming out of the hood of my car. I pulled over and stopped the car. I waited for hours to let the engine cool down but could not re-start it again. Next day morning I called Redwood City Honda and (without much ado) they immediately towed it to their service center. They diagnosed the problem and found that my engine is completely gone bad and that I need to replace it with a new ($9000) or old ($3000) one. The sole cause of the problem - the radiator cap spring became loose because of which all the coolant leaked and the engine became over-heated. The piston springs inside the engine bent because it was too hot and now cannot be fixed. The only solution is to replace it with a new or old engine. They told me they had nothing to do with this radiator cap problem in this servicing and were not responsible for the engine failure. I was shocked.
I always serviced my Civic from Redwood City Honda since I bought it. No one else ever opened the hood of my Civic. I have all the records. I told them that 5000 miles back you guys did a timing belt change and intermediate servicing on this car (on the same day). They also have a 1 year warranty on any job they perform on any car. It has been only 3-4 months and 5000 miles since that job. On that day they did radiator coolant top off and checking of its cap and other related parts. According to them my Civic was in excellent health as they had told me on Sep 16 also. I told them that it is less than a year that Redwood City Honda performed these jobs on my car and that they were responsible for the above incident. They behaved rudely with me in the beginning. Later I complained to BBB and American Honda and their service manager (Neff Castro) called me back saying they are ready to give some discounts on the new engine. I told them my car was as good as new specially after the timing belt change all cars get another 90,000 miles of easy life. I am absolutely not accepting that my Civic is a junk now. I asked them that they have to replace the engine of my Civic at their cost (specially that it is under the warrantly of their timing belt change and all other service jobs). Since then they stopped communicating with me. It has been 11 days that my car is lying in their service center.
Please read further if more details are required:
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Their has been a major issue with the quality of service at Redwood City Honda over the last year or so (with my 2 Honda cars - the Civic mentioned above and another Accord).
Now when I recall the history of last 5-6 visits I realize that the quality of service of Honda Redwood City has actually fallen to a very low level. Following are the series of incidents that has been occurring with my 2 Honda cars over the last 6-7 visits to Honda Redwood City.
1. The air condition problem stated above started within a week after doing a timing belt change and intermediate service (3-4 months back) on the same car Civic.
2. I dropped my Civic for a minor service (4 months back) and during delivery found a windshield crack. They denied that they had caused it and that it was already cracked when I dropped the car. I replaced the windshield through my insurance.
3. I dropped my Civic for a regular intermediate service (7 months back) and found external body damage caused to my car. This time they had actually accepted their fault and told me that they will fix it. It was a pretty big unnoticeable scratch and I was expecting that they would report it proactively.
4. I did a timing belt change on my Accord (8-9 months ago) and the fuel economy immediately after dropped by 20%. They told me it was normal and fuel economy would come back within a few weeks of driving. Several months passed and I reported that I still see no change. On their request I also did a whole bunch of stuffs like fuel injection, filter cleanup, throttle body cleanup and what not (for ~$600 after discount) thinking that I will eventually save on fuel if it gets fixed. Till date I have seen no change and am paying the price every mile I drive. Also after 3 months of timing belt change my car suddenly dropped dead on the freeway.
5. 2-3 months later after the timing belt change on my Accord (point 4 above) while doing a minor service Redwood City Honda detected a leak in the water pump system. On asking if it was anything to do with the timing belt change they immediately said that in that case it will be covered under warranty of the timing belt change. They fixed it without cost. Again no pro-activeness of finding the root cause and poor quality of service (specially timing belt changes).
6. About a year back I was noticing that they were not rotating my tires during major or intermediate servicing when they were supposed to do so. Once I marked my tires with 1,2,3,4 in a hidden place and on delivery saw the same configuration. I asked them multiple times if they rotated the tires and they said "oh absolutely". This time I caught them red handed and showed them the photographs I had taken before the drop off with the position of the numbers being the same as they are now. They said that sometimes they forget to rotate tires and immediately did the rotation for me.
I am a long time (almost 8 years) customer of Honda Redwood City and have never faced such problems until this last year. In fact I never saw the points from 1 to 6 as a series of low quality servicing until after the last event occurred with my Civic (now a scrap of $0 value). All the while I thought that it was either co-incidence that I see issues with my cars within days/weeks after servicing or that it was probably caused by me (the windshield incident).
However my car breaking down within few minutes and 15 miles of driving after getting it delivered from their service center is absolutely unacceptable. Note, I always ask them to do a health check during any servicing and repeatedly ask them if the health of my cars look good. I can't believe that on Sep 16 before taking the delivery of my car I had asked them this question 10 times and they said "your car had a recent timing belt change so be rest assured that your car is in super health and will easily last another 90,000 miles".
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