Auto Parts Store Idiots

[DoubleWasp]

Originally Posted By: DuckRyder
We have ourselves to blame.

These box stores can’t sell you a 200.00 part for 100.00 and still pay, train and retain qualified people.

You want the cheapest price, expect substandard service and probably substandard merchandise.

Problem is every one has been chasing to lowest bidder so long, pretty much everyone except the dealer who isn’t the lowest bidder is defunct.


The problem is them not figuring out the good service has its own rewards in terms of business. They could sell a lot more if they would stop making life hard on people.

At a minimum, you can't tell me that the public going into a parts store and encountering bad attitudes and incompetence is doing anything to increase their business.

 

[earlyre]

my favorite parts store experience lately:
back storyfeel free to skip to the TLDR mark)
my buddies mom moved to Alaska a few years ago, but kept her house here locally, and her Aztek as well.
for the past few years one or more of her kids have been staying their off and on and driving said car, but it also sits for months on end.

this past christmas, while she was home, she replaced the battery, with one from O'rielly.(brand new, store brand battery, date code sticker on the side showing manufacture date of Nov.'16.)

in April, my buddy's BF's inherits his grandpa's house, they move there, take the little brother with them. she puts the house for sale. aztek sits in the drive way, I keep an eye on the place, get the mail, etc.

fast forward to late june.
she comes for a visit.
Car has been sitting for a couple months, never failing to start when we use it to move stuff from the house to storage.
a couple days into the visit, she calls me, the aztek suddenly won't start. I come over, and jump start it. she lets it idle for 45 min or so, to charge the batt.

next day, it's dead again. I go over, and get there as she's leaving in a rental to go visit her daughter in Cleveland.

*TLDR*
I jump Start it,again(2nd time in 24hrs), take it to O'Rielly, they test the battery, and alternator, bad battery.

I didn't have any tools with me, just went ahead and bought a new battery. go back to the house, swap the batteries, and notice the old one is the same brand, and the date code indicates it was made in Nov. '16

so i take the old one back in, to get the core refund, and ask about getting the sale Pro Rated, since this battery failed after 8 months, and says right on it that it has a 3 year warranty.

the counter lady(shirt says assistant manager)insists that without a receipt for the original(the one i'm turning in for a core) that there is nothing they can do.
I point out that it is clearly their brand battery, the datecode sticker on the side showing it was made 8 months ago.
(she did ask for her Phone Number to try and look it up in their system, nothing there, is there another number she could have used? no)
nope. without a receipt. nothing they can do. nothing at all.
whatever.

 

[Chris142]

Originally Posted By: earlyre
my favorite parts store experience lately:
back storyfeel free to skip to the TLDR mark)
my buddies mom moved to Alaska a few years ago, but kept her house here locally, and her Aztek as well.
for the past few years one or more of her kids have been staying their off and on and driving said car, but it also sits for months on end.

this past christmas, while she was home, she replaced the battery, with one from O'rielly.(brand new, store brand battery, date code sticker on the side showing manufacture date of Nov.'16.)

in April, my buddy's BF's inherits his grandpa's house, they move there, take the little brother with them. she puts the house for sale. aztek sits in the drive way, I keep an eye on the place, get the mail, etc.

fast forward to late june.
she comes for a visit.
Car has been sitting for a couple months, never failing to start when we use it to move stuff from the house to storage.
a couple days into the visit, she calls me, the aztek suddenly won't start. I come over, and jump start it. she lets it idle for 45 min or so, to charge the batt.

next day, it's dead again. I go over, and get there as she's leaving in a rental to go visit her daughter in Cleveland.

*TLDR*
I jump Start it,again(2nd time in 24hrs), take it to O'Rielly, they test the battery, and alternator, bad battery.

I didn't have any tools with me, just went ahead and bought a new battery. go back to the house, swap the batteries, and notice the old one is the same brand, and the date code indicates it was made in Nov. '16

so i take the old one back in, to get the core refund, and ask about getting the sale Pro Rated, since this battery failed after 8 months, and says right on it that it has a 3 year warranty.

the counter lady(shirt says assistant manager)insists that without a receipt for the original(the one i'm turning in for a core) that there is nothing they can do.
I point out that it is clearly their brand battery, the datecode sticker on the side showing it was made 8 months ago.
(she did ask for her Phone Number to try and look it up in their system, nothing there, is there another number she could have used? no)
nope. without a receipt. nothing they can do. nothing at all.
whatever.
thats how they get out of warrantee stuff. Place here sold ac parts with a lifetime warranty if you bought the whole kit. They were bought out and now all warranties are only 1 year.

 

[Wolf359]

Originally Posted By: bullwinkle
I don't know how AAP, AZ, and the like are staying in business-if you have the ability to wait, Amazon, RA, even Auto Anything, CarID, & eBay are beating their prices, even with discount codes, by a solid 40-50% ALL DAY LONG!!


Well if your car is broken and it's your only one, then you sorta need it right away and you can't wait. That's probably what's keeping them in business. When Amazon expands Prime Now to more markets and can get the right auto part to you in 2 hours, then maybe all those places will go out of business.

 

[CrAlt]

Originally Posted By: DoubleWasp
Originally Posted By: DuckRyder
We have ourselves to blame.

These box stores can’t sell you a 200.00 part for 100.00 and still pay, train and retain qualified people.

You want the cheapest price, expect substandard service and probably substandard merchandise.

Problem is every one has been chasing to lowest bidder so long, pretty much everyone except the dealer who isn’t the lowest bidder is defunct.


The problem is them not figuring out the good service has its own rewards in terms of business. They could sell a lot more if they would stop making life hard on people.

At a minimum, you can't tell me that the public going into a parts store and encountering bad attitudes and incompetence is doing anything to increase their business.


But you where ready to buy 3 more parts from them even after the bad service. And I bet you will keep shopping there even after continued bad service.

So why do they need to change?

 

[4WD]

The coal burner, overhead cam, and multi coil EI summed it up - and I'd recommend he try pulling weeds.
Fortunately my small town has real pros at Napa, good and long time folks at O'R ... with AZ having a bit more turn over but I tend to go there for off the shelf stuff ...

 

[DuckRyder]

Originally Posted By: CrAlt


But you where ready to buy 3 more parts from them even after the bad service. And I bet you will keep shopping there even after continued bad service.

So why do they need to change?

Think you should review the list of parts he asked for more closely...

 

[HangFire]

Originally Posted By: DoubleWasp
Originally Posted By: rooflessVW
The trick is...

To go to the dealer with your VIN. If you get the correct OEM part on the first go 'round then the prices (if they're even higher in the first place) aren't that bad, are they?


The prices for too many Ram parts from Chrysler are ridiculous. I could buy a new truck on the cost to do basic repairs.

I've bought quite a bit of factory parts for my trucks, including the larger steering boxes, front end kits, power steering pumps, and alternators, but sometimes their prices are just awful.


I sort of agree. But when I go to my local Chrysler dealer parts desk, I remind them I bought a car (used Honda) from them 3 years ago, and I get a 40% discount. Some parts are pricey, but new brake lines for my old Dakota were quite reasonable.

 

[EA82]

There are clueless counter guys at every store but every time I go to AAP I see a new face, that tells you something about the company.
Based on my experience during the years I rate the big four's counter staff like this.
Napa.
O'Reilly.
AZ.
AAP.

 

[edhackett]

Originally Posted By: DuckRyder
Originally Posted By: CrAlt


But you where ready to buy 3 more parts from them even after the bad service. And I bet you will keep shopping there even after continued bad service.

So why do they need to change?

Think you should review the list of parts he asked for more closely...

Yes, it's a good thing that several people in this thread don't work in a parts store.

Ed

 

[Ben Boyle]

My local auto parts store is an independent and excellent. here's a scene from yesterday
https://scontent-iad3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t...amp;oe=59F4C900

 

[CrAlt]

Originally Posted By: DuckRyder
Originally Posted By: CrAlt


But you where ready to buy 3 more parts from them even after the bad service. And I bet you will keep shopping there even after continued bad service.

So why do they need to change?

Think you should review the list of parts he asked for more closely...

Oh so the parts don't exists. Thats the Joke. I see the 83 corvette and VW water pump mentioned for the 1000th time also. How about the tacoma water pump gasket description?

I bet he still shops there again though.

 

[bunnspecial]

I deal with two particular local NAPA stores mostly, each of which has a couple of guys who know what they're talking about and almost always one of them is working.

Heck, one even has a great full service machine shop in the back that did a valve job on an MG head for me. When I talked to the machinist about it before taking it in, he asked me a bunch of relevant questions about the head. He then told me that he will no do an MGB head without magnafluxing it, and proceeded to rattle off the half dozen or so places that they often crack. It gave me a lot of faith in his work.

Granted there was that one time I went in and asked for a timing light and was asked for a year/make/model.

 

[gfh77665]

My NAPA is accurate. They never fail to get the right part for me. However, some of the personalities behind their counter are, um, well, lets just say "challenging" and leave it at that.

 

[Traction]

I would never have called the store on the phone for what you were trying to do, and would have personally went in with the defective part. That would have been the most effective way to deal with it. I would hate to be the guy waiting at the counter for the parts guy to get off the phone 20 minutes later, so I could pay for a quart of oil.

 

[AVB]

The counter people at our local AAP can be pretty clueless. Luckily I don't have to deal with them unless it is the weekend and the commercial department is closed. The ladies who work the commercial department are very good.

 

[philipp10]

If you want a professional type of person why would you shop at a store that pays $9 an hour.....you expect low prices then you going to get some dude that just came fro Walmart...

 

[Malo83]

My local O'Reillys has been pretty good for me, back when they were Kragens I had a lifetime waterpump that was over ten years old and they gave me a knew one no problems, keep your reciepts people.

 

[jeepman3071]

The "we can't look up parts by part number" is a lie.

No matter what part of customer service industry you are working with they all seem to suck. I work in IT and can be on the phone with support for hours as they spin me in circles trying to avoid fixing my issue. My latest tactic has just been keep going higher and higher up the chain until I get help. I tell them I don't care if I have to talk to your bosses's boss, or the CEO of the company, you WILL solve the issue that we are paying you to support.

 

[ted s]

i do know each advance store can only see waranrty info on parts sold at that store. otherwise you need th receipt