Celica Forums General Discussion General Toyota vs. Independant Dealers

Well today I took my car to an independant dealer instead of Toyota. The guy asked me if the car had been an out-of-state car. I had to call Toyota to find out but it was true, Toyota had won my car in an auction somewhere in Ohio. They said the car had one previous owner before me. The independant dealer took a look at the recipts Toyota gave me for the work they did to "fix" my car. Turns out the spark plugs had orange rust on them which Toyota did NOT change out for me when it says they did on the recipt. In fact, the dealer believes they were the original spark plugs the car came with. He also found that the car had been in an accident before I owned it because the whole body is a little tweaked(I only noticed the hood being a little bent). The guy is going to take my car around tomorrow to get a better check on it. I'm not mad right now that the Toyota dealer cheated me as much as it scares me the price could be great. But I am confident this guy knows what he's doing, being an ex-Toyota maintainence person himself. Wish me luck that everything goes smoothly tomorrow.

that Toyota dealer sounds pretty dumb.

Which one, the one who is helping me now?

im starting to believe that toyota does care more about making money than selling healthy cars.

Yeah, I don't know the particulars but the first time I went into the dealership they changed my "noisy" belt for $60 + labor. I thought the belt would be about $20 max.

belts shouldnt be that expensive. I had a prob with my mom's 98 camry and the alternator belt was making noises. so i bought one for under 20 bux and i changed it myself with the aid of my mechanic friend. toyota ripped you off man

Thanks midnight, that wasn't the first thing they did that caused issues. I'm sure not to go back to that dealership again for help. The belt I had before didn't seem to make that much noise, I'd a done the installation myself if the contents under the hood weren't so compact heh.

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Bastards...