The smile on my face:

 

Jack, Debbie,

It was a pleasure meeting the two of you. I'm so glad we were able to make WhiteLightnin look the way she was prior to the accident.

A few adjustments, repainting the entire bumper and replacing the grille sure would have made you happy if the previous dealer took a day out of their time to make you happy.

The two of you are perfect mini people and I wish you all the happy motoring experiences you deserve.

Mark

 

Mark you truly are a rare person in this day and age! Great job my friend!

 

Awww...

I have been following this and am glad to see a happy ending!

We need a happy tears smiley

 

It was nice to see her smile over her car. We need more mini owners like her and Jack.


Mark

 

I'm so happy to see her get this just right. I know when I looked at it, there were a few obvious things, especially the paint they did. I'm no body guy so I mainly was looking to see what wasn't OEM. and getting those headlights adjusted is such a pain. Good Job

 

Wow! I need you in my area just in case Mark!

What did you have to do? I know you said grille, paint, adjustments. What was wrong? What did they not do?

 

Just got to seeing this thread. You're a good man, 'crush. A good man

 

Not much... that was the funny thing, the dealer could have taken care of it and made her happy by spending less than a day on it.

The radiator support in that car bolts in. It needed to be adjusted. It was causing a bind so when you closed the hood, the hood would pop/twist by just opening it.... that's why she could never make it look the same when it was closed... it was always flexing the hood.

The bumper was **** poor. They were paid to paint the bumper and they only painted the upper part and center trim. Nothing matched.

Then to make matters worse, she complained about the finish and they must have spotted it in on the top while still on the car. There was white overspray over the frame rails.

We took the bumper off and completely took it apart, refinished it and reassembled it. The color match was much better.

The headlights needed adjustment again since we moved the radiator support. We aligned the hood and found out the grille was never replaced. (broken tabs)

Other than that, there wasn't much. I understand the dealer thought she was being picky (and in my opinion, justifiably so) but he could have turned a customer's attitude around and made her a life long customer by simply fixing what she didn't like.

Now, she'll never go back there and will politely remind anyone that needs bodywork not to go there. Dumb business move IMO.

Mark

 

I've read this with much interest. The body shop in question would have been the one I would have used in the event of an accident with my Clubman. I bought it from the Mini dealership in this complex. It was at least gratifying to hear that the people at the dealership were upset with the body shop also. They seem to be pretty good people and I would hate to have to worry about the service my car will receive. But as far as body work, They'll NEVER see my car there.

 

Who actually messed up the car? As I am understanding it, the MINI dealership doesn't do body work? Sounds like the other associated brands up & down the street are probably fixed at this place too? I truly hope that MINI dealership makes it (went to the grand opening and all), but we have had a couple of service issues.

 

Yeah, I think that bodyshop is loosely affiliated with all of the dealerships in the complex. More than likely it is run as a stand-alone operation.

When you say you have a couple of service issues, have they been bad experiences? I'll be taking my Clubman in soon for some "adjustments".

 

Glad to hear your MINI is fixed. Kudos to Mark for fixing it right.

Happy motoring.

 

The first time we had the Clubman in for service, they said the chrome strips under the barn door windows had been recalled for replacement. Nobody had any idea why, they looked fine. They didn't have them in stock, so we arranged to go by there on the way home from a later trip to have them replaced. Next time: Nothing much going on in the service dept., but it took a really long time. (By the way, we ate lunch there and the grill was really good.) When they brought the car around, we tried to open the barn doors and our keys wouldn't open them anymore?!?! They took it back and reprogrammed it, then they worked fine. Got home (60 miles) and while unloading the car something didn't look right. The right chrome trim was on the left barn door and the left trim was on the right door! Upon closer inspection there were pry marks in the paint too. Called them up and asked if I could try to reverse them and they said fine. Masked off the paint (like they should have), pryed them off and put them on correctly, then touched up their scratches. For what it's worth, I also reported it on the customer survey that came later. (Excuses: Ours was the first one that they had to do this + new guy= lucky us.) No big deal, but I'm hoping when I take in the '05 for the CVT oil change, it's not the first CVT they've ever seen. Again, I really do hope they succeed, they seemed to be nice folks (won't be asking for any body work though). I don't like driving over 200 miles one way to the other dealers and I don't know of an independent MINI mechanic in our area.
P.S. Nice job Mark!

 

Thank you everyone for your welcome comments! I just smile when I look at her now, I even giggled when I opened and closed the hood today! LOL (Getting 37 mpg when calculating after a fill up last night didn't hurt things either )

I know the situation should have never happened but having the opportunity to meet Waylon from Way Motor Works in Atlanta (he inspected the mechanical repairs for us) and the opportunity to see what a man with pride in a body shop can do, Mark from Collision Specialties from North Carolina, was a wonderful thing that came out of it. I wouldn't change that part for the world! Mark and his family were wonderful, he made arrangements for a hotel and even had us a rental car waiting, we couldn't have asked for a better experience while there. I think his wife and daughter loved my little Yorkie, Molly, so much he has to buy one of those though! LOL

I'm definitely a MINI person, that is for sure!

 

Another example of the Mini community,and one individual that came to the aid of another in a most compassionate way... For the love of a Mini.....Up with MINIS

 

Oh...BTW, I like your white with silver stripes...Awesome combo...

 

You summed it all up in a very simple way!

I think she's elegantly understated for a MINI, I love it, the color combo works great for me!

 

I just finished reading through this thread...and I'm extremely glad to know that there was a happy ending to this story. It's totally awesome that orangecrush stepped up and offered to make things right. This is an excellent example of what makes the MINI community so great. Bravo!

 

CLAP CLAP CLAP to all. I got interested in this thread because I have bad luck in local morons hitting brand new cars of mine, AND in 2/3 of those incidents, I had the body shop either a) take forever ("oh, VW parts are so hard to find". HAH course I didn't know any better, I had only had the car for four days when my idiot neighbor hit it with an F-150 so hard it bent the front axel and caused the rear wheels to come off the curb) OR b) the second time, they caused more damage on the complete opposite side of the small fender repair needed to a woman backing into me in a parking lot, while I wasn't even moving..explanation, after they denied it over and over again until my insurance rep came out and put his foot down: "oh well sometimes the lift..." WTF was my car doing near a lift?!?!)

Kuddos for you for keeping your foot down on the repair, and not giving up either. I was like you, totally bummed and didn't see any fun in Jetta after the first hitting experience. I'm glad you were able to get it right in the end

OrangeCrush: I wish you weren't so far away from me, but I'll keep you in mind if the moron-magnet gets installed on the MINI. I double-checked to make sure it didn't sneak onto my options list, but maybe it's just me Good to know people like you exist in the world. After my terrible experiences with the first body shop, I used Checkbook Magazine to find another body shop up here and they did a great job on both my mom's Rav4 and Jetta (he got a footprint to his front fender when mom heard about brother wrecking her Rav4..*sigh* body shop tried to do it for free, I refused, so they gave us a 50% discount on the work because they found the entire story somewhat hilarious, and accomplished the difficult pop-out without paint). If this new shop falls through when the first moron in the parking lots/neighbor hood come flying at my car, I'll think of you. Charlotte isn't that far from DC and I know people down there anyways
On another thought, her picture at the top of Pg4: is that your currently damaged MINI? If so..sorry bout that, and now you're faced with memories when all you were trying to do is make it right for someone else Will be great to watch you repair your own front end

 

wahoo shoe, it was a 7 hour drive for us BUT soooo worth it to know that someone was going to do the work that cared so much about the MINI and it's community.

IT is sad that he took care of my bad experience now deals with his own.... The very best experience I've ever had with a vehicle is being so lucky to meet orangecrush!

YES, that is his bad *** MINI which will receive tender loving care (wish I'd gotten a photo of the "MINI parking only in the front of that parking spot!). LOL

As his wife Amy said "YOU MINI PEOPLE!" LOL

 

Always willing to help.



Yeah, unfortunately, I've got some damage.

BUT, on the brightside, it's easily fixable and I'm painting the whole car to something I've wanted to do but never wanted to do to my new car.

So, something good is coming out of it.

Mark

 

Great thread and great job OC!

 

Well, that's making lemonade out out of some sour lemons.

I hope the new paint job is everything you want it to be!

 

This is way off topic but...

Orange Crush you look EXACTLY like my old boss. Like a twin or something!!

Please continue the discussion and disregard this post!