Volkswagen of Olympia

Forewarned is Forearmed My favorite coach, John Wooden, used to say, “Failure to prepare, is preparing to fail.” This is especially true when purchasing a car from most car d My favorite coach, John Wooden, used to say, “Failure to prepare, is preparing to fail.” This is especially true when purchasing a car from most car dealerships, including VW of Olympia. We hope you benefit from our unfortunate experience. The car dealer is counting on you not being prepared; your ignorance is their bliss… I am a (bed-bound) quadriplegic and my partner is a newly diagnosed insulin-dependent diabetic. She would be making the car purchase. She has an 830 credit score, and we let the dealership know early on that we could afford a $16,000 down payment and negotiated a $26,000 dollar price on a 2014, one-owner car with 18,000 miles on the odometer. We are well-qualified buyers, who do our homework when making major purchases and want to inform you how to improve your buying experience by documenting our problems with Uhlmann Motors (I-5 Cars) ownership and management (Heidi Pehl, Principal). We know now we should have checked online reviews like this , Truecar.com and the Better Business Bureau where this dealership fails to score well or even belong to the BBB. Heidi Pehl does business under several names (Uhlmann Motors, I-5 Toyota, Lincoln, Awesome Ford, Scion, Awesome Trucks, Awesome RV, South Sound trucks, VW of Olympia). Don’t try comparing prices or follow up on a referral between these dealerships, because as a consumer what you don’t know is that in spite of different names, they are all owned by the same owner. When making a major purchase, especially a car, a home or even a funeral, what you don’t know can hurt you. Beware high-pressure finance, delaying and upselling tactics used by this ownership group and many other car dealers during your final, hours-long purchase meeting. Bring your laptop, a book, order in food, or even better; USE THE TIME THEY ARE MAKING YOU UNNECESSARILY WAIT TO WRITE YOUR OWN DEALER REVIEW. Why does this purchase meeting take hours? Because - they have ways to get you to spend more. It’s called “UPSELLING”. Go ahead and “Google” it. Let me give you a clear example. Let’s say I’m your commander in chief and you are America, and I know you are committed to my ‘War on Terror”. Now, once I know you’re hooked and committed to buying my “War on Terror”, I use your enthusiasm to sell you an even more expensive, yet totally unnecessary, “War on Iraq” for my own ends. Now watch this “upselling” concept play out at Volkswagen of Olympia. We just purchased a used (Certified Pre-owned “CPO”** See Note Below) 2014 Jetta Sportwagon TDI for $ 26,741.00 from the Uhlmann Motors, or I-5 Cars group in Chehalis and Olympia WA. We had a deal arranged with our excellent sales consultant, Mike Davis (currently working at VW of Olympia) for $26,000 – including tax and license). We heartedly recommend sales-associate Mike Davis. He is the one bright spot in our experience and tried his best on our behalf to get us the second key fob (Located a day after the sale at another Uhlmann Motors dealership.) He even offered to help my partner return her rental car and advise her on selling her trade-in after the dealership reneged on taking it. Talk about service above and beyond! He was great to deal with. Then things changed for the worse. On the day we were picking up the car, they changed the deal we had agreed to. They surprised us by adding an additional $800.00 charge for the Certified Pre-owned designation. We asked for the CPO designation because their ownership group failed to indicate a single oil change on the CarFax report during the first 18,000 miles of the car’s life. When we called them on this problem, their in-house proof suddenly appeared 48 hours before our purchase. We felt suspicious and wanted the CPO for peace of mind. ** We called around and found out it costs a dealer, $400.00 to do have a VW Certified Pre-Owned. This means Uhlmann Motors doubled their cost for the CPO designation! That is a 100% mark-up. Sorry – that is not fully truthful - to be exact, they knocked off $59.00 when I complained about their inflated charge so technically they didn’t double their price at the last minute CPO price, they inflated it with a 93% mark-up and their fast-talking sales manager told us they were doing us a favor by knocking off $ 59 from the $ 26,800.00 purchase price, saving us .0022 percent Who takes credit for giving a two-tenths of one percent discount on a twenty-six thousand dollar car, (Upselling Alert) when they just added $800.00 to the purchase price for a CPO, that hours later, his finance manager says is not “real coverage” compared to the even more expensive extended warranty he is trying to pressure us into buying? Are we nuts? The 4.5 + hour-long purchase meeting was even more remarkable. I called the dealership when my beloved left to pick up the car at 3:00 PM. I let them know she was a newly diagnosed diabetic and got shaky if she was away from food and/or insulin for more than a few hours. She arrived before 4 PM with a cashier’s check for $16,000.00 and an expectation that her previously filled in credit application had been filed. Remember, she is a pre-qualified, ideal buyer with an average credit score of 830. During the next 4.5 hour long ordeal, my beloved was kept waiting. They repeatedly tried to upsell her an extended warranty for $3,400. Suddenly the Certified, Pre-Owned designation they charged us 7was seemingly not worth much, and car we had researched (and they sold us on) based on the reliability and economy of the TDI engine, couldn’t be responsibly sold without an expensive, extended warranty. She repeatedly said “No”. Approximately two and a half hours into the purchase meeting she said “No.” and asked to conclude the contract, Chris Couch, the hard selling, fast-talking finance manager tried to get her to buy the $3,400.00 extended warranty by saying they would give her a deal and reduce the cost of the extended warranty by $1,000 dollars bringing her total vehicle cost to below $ 30,000. Wow! What an upsell, but wait, there’s more… When that didn’t work, he presented different payment options that all included the extended warranty. But wait, there’s more… When he presented another option, he left the room to get the remarkable deal he was offering “approved”. (Beware – these monthly payment options all stayed about the same, he finally even offered lower payments, burying the lead that the term of the loan got longer and longer to pay an additional $2.400 to $3,400 + interest over our agreed to price! (Remember - We never dealt with or spoke with Chris Couch, finance manager before that final purchase meeting.) During this time my partner asked for the second key fob. They said they did not have it for her. It had been left at another Uhlmann Motors (I-5 Cars) dealership in Chehalis, WA, but they would track it down for her. (*We did receive it a day or two later.) She also asked about the Owner’s Manual. They did not know where it was, but that because she was refusing the extended warranty and purchasing the Certified Pre-Owned car (Remember, they had just charged us $741.00 for this designation) as-is; she could purchase one at her cost from Volkswagen for approximately $ 60.00. What do you think of this unbelievably cheap parting shot? She called me at approximately 8:15 PM to convey her distress, I told her to find the finance manager and say that, “We are unequivocally saying NO to any extended warranty and that I need to leave now to take care of crashing blood sugar.” When she found Chris Couch, he was sitting, not with the mysterious higher-ups who could approve his deal offers, but with other dealership employees, laughing and shooting the breeze. The extended dealer delay tactic is an all too common dealership ploy. She concluded business and came home at 9:15 PM, shaken, not stirred, from what should have been a joyful experience. When purchasing a new Jetta - Sportwagon TDI with panoramic moon-roof, you should not come home feeling harassed, delayed and feeling played by a sophisticated dealership with more tricks than you know. I don’t recommend anyone go in alone to purchase a car at a dealership like this, especially if you are a woman. It could prove very costly. Oh, and the missing owners’ manual – Hero sales consultant, Mike Davis called the car’s previous owner the day after the purchase and let us know the manual was in a special compartment in the Sportwagon. We wish you well in your own car purchase. Forewarned is forearmed. More