Originally Posted by ZoomZoomH

well not so fast, i haven't yet reported back about my visit to this dealership, so let me detail what happened and THEN you can make a judgement

so i brought my 8 in for a few warranty-related items, i stated the following items:

- engine hard starting
- film deposit inside headlight housing
- squeaky brakes
- white foam on dipstick
- squeaky driver seat

how they addressed each one:

- reflashed (!) my PCM (even though I'm not in the MSP04 VIN range )
- gave me the 'cannot reproduce' response
- replaced front brake pads with updated ones
- replaced dipstick with the new dipstick assembly
- re-tightened all bolts on driver seat

so 4 out of 5 ain't that bad, plus I wasn't really sure on the 'film inside headlight' thing either, so I guess I'll just try again in the future lol

I dropped the car off around 9 in the morning, they had all the work done by 2

wasn't charged a single dime, since they were all covered under warranty :D

anyway, so because of this thread, the first thing I checked once I got the car back was to check the odometer reading, and it is about 20 miles more than what the original odometer reading as stated on the repair invoice . Granted I had them do the brake pad replacement TSB, so I was expecting them to test drive the car a bit to bed in the pads a little. 20 miles seems a tad high, but then again, i've already done things in my 8 that NO ONE should be able to do on the street without causing body damage, so I just go *shrug* :o

overall I had a no-fuss experience with them, nothing spectacular but nothing terrible either. I guess the YMMV cliche applies here :o

Originally Posted by afeldman327

Like I said before, Rosenthal Mazda has been very good to deal with overall. Just this last experience with them had me aggravated.

Most things in life don't bother me. One of the few things that does bother me, however, is being taken advantage of and being lied to. This was a prime example. It's one thing to drive my car 40 miles without authorization, but it's another thing to lie about the reason behind it. Car dealships are stereotyped as shady businesses for a reason, and no matter how tight this particular operation is run by their GM, there is still a resonating component of shadiness. The service manager could have admitted guilt, and offered me any number of things to quell my dissatisfaction and assure me that my car is unblemished in any way. Yet all he did was gave me a knowingly BS story and offered me a free oil change.

Sidenote: One of you mentioned Steve Miller, the service manager. He cursed me out when I initially asked for a warrantied clutch. He called me "f*^!ing crazy" and stormed out of the room. Now I have a letter from him authorizing a new clutch at a very minimal price, should it ever wear out. Rectified situation? maybe, but certainly a painful process.

I will take my car into them again mainly because of the convenience factor...I live in the Ballston neighborhood and I can walk there. Plus I trust their technicians who work on rotaries. I just want to publicize my experience so they realize their mistakes and will not take advantage of any other customers.

Good luck with all of your dealings with Rosenthal, and feel free to contact me with any questions or comments.

-A