Acura of Tempe

I made a deal with their Internet manager, Doug Booth, on what was portrayed to be an immaculate low mileage (26000 original miles) 2003 Audi A4 station wagon. We are from Canada and would be flying in to Ph what was portrayed to be an immaculate low mileage (26000 original miles) 2003 Audi A4 station wagon. We are from Canada and would be flying in to Phoenix to pick up the vehicle and drive it home to Canada. The agreed price was higher than what I felt the car was truly worth, but I agreed to pay their price if they made certain that the car was fully up to date on maintenance and ready for a trouble free trip home. This was on a Tuesday. He promised the vehicle would be ready on "Thursday" as it was in their reconditioning shop. We booked a flight and headed to Phoenix on the Wednesday. While we were in the air Doug left a phone message saying there would be a delay in getting the car ready for Thursday as they had decided to order some interior panels that they felt needed to be replaced. I spoke to him on arrival at the airport and said I'd come over to the dealership on the Thursday morning to talk to them and to see the vehicle. On Thursday when we arrived at the dealership we sat down with Doug and talked, and he assured us that the shop would bring the car out to the front of the dealership for us to view momentarily. It took about an hour for them to actually show up with the vehicle. It was not the immaculate vehicle that we had been promised!! It had numerous small dents and dings, small tears in the interior, had not been properly detailed yet and was therefore quite dirty. Most disturbing though, was the fact that the cargo area had been converted for use as a service vehicle and had a plywood floor with some rather unusual electrical connections and devices protruding from the plywood. The glove box was also full of some type of aftermarket electronic devices that were built in and connected to the vehicle. Doug explained that the vehicle had been used by a ski lodge in northern Arizona to boost vehicles when needed at the ski resort, and that these interior parts that were on order were the replacement parts to replace the missing items in that cargo area as well as some other interior items. We felt we had been purposely mislead by Doug who had intentionally not mentioned the fact that this vehicle was previously a service vehicle of some sort. However, we had already invested considerable time, money, and effort to get this far, so we agreed to test drive the unit. The engine response was sluggish and the air conditioning was not working properly. We talked with Doug and his sales manager, a fellow named Joel West, told them the vehicle was not what it had been portrayed as, and offered them less money than what had been originally agreed to. During the meeting with Joel they truth about the vehicle history emerged. It had been an Audi service vehicle, rigged up by Audi to respond to customers whose Audi's broke down out on the road. It had then been sold to a fellow in a ski resort who had kept it for a fairly short time period before trading it in at this Acura dealership. The scars on the paint on the roof were from the "emergency light bars" that had been installed by Audi and later removed. The extra electronics were for the Audi service technicians to be able to diagnose on the road what was wrong with the broken down vehicles. They refused to take my new lower offer, and I then suggested that I would still give them their asking price if they were to get the vehicle fixed up ready to go as quickly as possible and to get me a copy of a service order from Audi showing that the Audi technicians had checked the vehicle and that it was actually OK. Two days later, on the Saturday morning, we went over to check the car again and to finalize the deal. The vehicle drove well on this second drive, the air conditioning now worked well, it had been cleaned up significantly, all of the add-on electrical components had been removed, and I said I was happy and that we could write up the deal. They then advised me that the price of the vehicle had now gone up as it had cost them more than anticipated to get the vehicle fixed up over at the Audi dealership, and that they were passing that cost on to me. I pointed out that the vehicle had been portrayed as being in good condition, and that obviously that was not the case, and that if they had made a bad deal on the car it was not my fault and should not be any additional cost to me. They refused to sell me the vehicle at the agreed price. My guess is that they felt that I was so far into this deal with time and costs and that I was now running behind schedule for my return trip to Canada, and that I couldn't do anything except pay them the new higher price that they now demanded. I believe it to be a scam and that they were simply trying to pry extra money our of my pocket to make additional profit for themselves. In my opinion these guys are sleazy used car salesmen, and if you are thinking of dealing with them, think again!! My suggestion is to head the opposite direction as quickly as possible. Jack Horan Edmonton, Alberta, Canada More

I initially negotiated with their Internet Sale rep. and we both know and agree the invoice price WITH DESTINATION for my interested 2007 Acura TL is $31817.93 (yes down to the penny). We talked (email and we both know and agree the invoice price WITH DESTINATION for my interested 2007 Acura TL is $31817.93 (yes down to the penny). We talked (email and phone) and I agreed to come in to purchase it around invoice price. Good Deal right? Well big mistake! I talked to a sale guy and said I am willing to buy the car around the invoice price + fees. Surprisingly they agree to sell the car exactly at $31817.93. I know it's September and '08 models are here in their lot already. I was still surprised but thought maybe they are willing to sell 07 inventory at invoice price now. But when they bring back the numbers with the sale price and fees, they included the DESTINATION CHARGE ($670) AGAIN, mixed in with Title and registration, Tax, Documentation fee ($369), etc.. I was there for like 4 hours and it was after 10pm, I didn't remember that the $31817.93 included the destination charge. So I agreed and purchased the car. The next morning when I looked at their number again and realized they charged me twice for the Destination fee, I am not happy with this tactic. See, if they told me that they need to make a profit for $670 on top of the invoice price, and if I agreed on it, then I CAN live with that. I made that choice, right?! But this is not. This is on one side they said to sell you the car for invoice price, on the other side they pull out this trick to embed the same Destination charge again among the fees to make up the profit. That is just wrong and dishonest, completely disrespectful to buyers. If I am fooled, I am sure there are plenty buyers out there that suffered the same thing, except they probably don't know it! What make this situation worse is, I went back to the dealer ship to talk to the sale manager, Andy. He basically said that's the price I signed to purchase and there is nothing he can do. After a couple rounds of fruitless discussion, I talked to the branch manager, Joe Leavitt. Wow, what an experience! He basically said the same thing but with a more arrogant, 'you-are-a-sucker' style. He tried to imtimidate me by asking how old I am, then said to the effect of 'Hey, you are over 18. You made the decision and now deal with it!' If the man in charge has that kind of integrity (or lack of), imagine how that influence the rest of the sales managers and sales associates. In this dealership, it doesn't matter whether a business practice is right or wrong, clean or dirty. As long as they can make a profit out of a buyer, they will find a way to get you signed the paper. This is what I learned from them, stright from the leadership. Yes I mean you, Mr. Leavitt. Thought I want to share this with you the $670 lesson I learned from this dealership. I am not getting anything back from them, and I don't mind spending another hour summarizing this for you. At least you can be smarter! Alan More

Jason really could use some help with his customer service skills. He displayed a very rude and negative attitude. I wouldn't recommend my worst enemy to Acura of Tempe. service skills. He displayed a very rude and negative attitude. I wouldn't recommend my worst enemy to Acura of Tempe. More