Car started shaking violently and turned itself off this morning.. Tried restarting it.. Car shakes and CEL comes on... Call Irvine Mini, the reservation lady tells me if I bought my car there, loaner cars are available... get the car towed to the dealership. And now they are saying no loaner car for Mini's..
I would've towed the car to Crevier, which was closer, but since I needed a loaner car (job interview tomorrow), I get this.

Well the car is only 3 months old, with aobut 3000 miles on it.. and it's already broken..

Shelly Automotive group (Irvine BMW/MINI's parent) never seize to amaze me with their ugly tactics. We bought a new BMW @ Shelly BMW in 2004, and I found out a month later (while seeing chipping paint during a car wash) that the car has been repainted. BMW voided my new car paint warranty. and the GM of Shelly (Chip Irwin) told me that they repaint cars all the time, and nothing I can do about it.. oh well..
2 for Shelly, 0 for me..

 

"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."
Perhaps they're the Ferengi of the Mini world?
Forget those idiots exist.

 

Its way worse than that, they are easily the most obnoxious dealer I have ever dealt with. Sadly we have a BMW and a MINI and they are our closest dealer. I refuse to take Godzilla there any more and after the last trip - which has now escalated into attorney letters - my wife is also boycotting the place.

 

Interesting reading too...

http://www.dealerrater.com/dealer/Sh...MW-review-114/

 

Repaint cars all the time? Brand new cars? And not telling you? And why didn't you sue them? You'd definitely win something. I am sure BMW NA would also be interested in knowing that a dealer is selling brand new repainted cars and not telling the buyer, especially if they do it "all the time."

 

I drive an extra 3 two hours to take our MINI's to competent dealers because the closest dealer to me would not be competent to change the oil in my lawnmower.

Since I have to drive at least 2 hours to the nearest dealer, I might as well drive a bit further since it will take me the whole day.

 

I remember in the "old" days of MCO, we used to have a "dealer rating" section which was very helpful to sort out the "good" and "bad" dealers based on individual experiences. After MCO changed to NAM and migrated to the current message board platform, the dealer rating section dissapeared for ever...

 

I feel your pain.

We adopted 2 MINIs from Irvine MINI. Each time we brought them in for service, we were disappointed with the level of service. It didn't help that they kept changing service advisors.

None of the previous SAs were as bad as ...the Lahna. She is the reason we go to Crevier for service now. It's almost night and day with the level of customer service you get at Crevier versus Irvine. Lahna has very little knowledge about our MINIs and she could care less about any issues you may have. Trying to get a hold of the Lahna is also a chore.

Although I can't stand the Lahna, the incompetence doesn't end with her. I brought in my MCS to have a loose screw under the exhaust manifold screwed back in properly. Lahna takes the screw and drives my MINI around to the techies, she returns and tells me the techies believe the screw is from an aftermarket part and they will not screw it in. I try to convince her that it is an OEM screw but she only believes what the techies say. So I go to the other SA, give him the same spiel, he takes my MINI around the back and returns with the same response. I tell him that all they have to do is lift up the MINI and they can see where the missing screw goes to and that it is not an aftermarket part. No dice. So I have to go to the parts desk, ask them to print out a diagram of the exhaust manifold with the related parts, and match my loose screw with the screw in the diagram. I then meet with the Service Manager and inform him what a great job his people aren't doing. So he brings my MINI to the tech bay, we walk back there and they raise my MINI. I show them exactly where the screw goes. Instead of just screwing in the screw, the service manager and the techie spend the next 10-15 minutes searching for mods on my MINI. The service Manager shines his flashlight on my rear shock absorbers and tells me that they are aftermarket and that is why the screw came loose because I modded my MINI. I pointed to the BMW OEM part sticker to shoot down his claim. He goes back to searching for mods. He asked if I did any mods and I answered yes, I had a pulley and CAI put in. The service manager quickly concludes that installing the pulley caused my screw from the exhaust manifold to fall out. UGH!! What incompetence!

Irvine MINI stopped offering loaners back in 2005.

I hope you get your MINI back soon.

 

I think I remember a lawsuit from a few years back where a dealer (possibly a BMW dealer) was sued for re-painting new cars that were damaged in transit or on the lot and not disclosing it to buyers. I guess the industry has a short memory...

 

In California, remember these three letters: B A R.

The Bureau of Automotive Repair. About the only thing service people really fear. My sister is the retired manager of a Sears auto, and the BAR was the only thing they worried about. She never got dinged.

 

I purchased my Mini from Irvine back in Aug and they told me that I'd get a loaner car when it was in for service. I took my car in to get a few things done the first week (so maybe that's the reason) and I got a loaner.
They were nice to me when I purchased my car, I guess I'll have to find out when I take it in for it's first service here in about 2,700 miles.

 

My MINI is in for the third time regarding a shifting issue (whether it be transmission or computer related). First time in they replaced a module on the trans and called it fixed...same problem occurred the following day. Second time they swapped out the entire trans...had the same problem when I drove away from the dealer. Now it is there for the past three days and they still have yet to determine the cause. They claim the computer says there is nothing wrong so the service manager drove it home to see if he could get it to act up...we'll see what they say today I guess.

another issue is the loaner cars they have given me, a toyota camry and toyota matrix...hard to enjoy any motoring in these cars...I curse them everyday they keep my MINI from me.

Is the Lemon Law applicable after three visits for the same problem?...I've wasted three days off from work and five total trips to the dealer (150 mile round trip from my home to have them work on it).

Not Impressed with them at all so far.

 

At least be glad you are getting some sort of loaner transportation at no extra charge to you...

 

Posts like this help OUR community to rcognize the good from the bad... also inform the BBB, BAR, and local Mini club.

 

Wow... any time I start to get a little frustrated with my local dealer (Midwestern Auto Group), I'll have to read this thread. I literally CANNOT believe the treatment you guys are enduring out there. No place is perfect, but these guys are a real piece of work...

Out here any time I bring my car in, a few days later I get a call direct from MINI asking me about my service experience. If I give them anything less than 5/5 then the dealership hears about it. Seriously - they consider a 4/5 a failure! I usually have their service manager calling me up every time I bring my car into the dealership to ask me if I'm planning on giving them perfect marks, and if not, how he can personally fix it so that I DO give them perfect marks when I get my call. Sounds like THESE bozos would get negative scores from me. If it were me, I'd be calling MINI corporate to complain and ask them point-blank if this is the sort of treatment you can expect in the future (with a threat to buy Japanese when you replace the car).

Sheesh!

 

i can't say anything good about my Subaru dealer, ImagoX.

it really depends on the person in charge Euro, American, or Japanese.

 

It's dealers like these that caused me to adopt my car buying strategy... I go shopping somewhat grunged-out in a flannel shirt and jeans, and I see how they treat me. If they're dismissive, arrogant or ignore me, I go to another dealership.

I actually had one guy at a MINI dealership tell me "Look, we both know that you're not driving off the lot in a MINI today, so why not let me work up some numbers for you?" Oh, really? I had the money in my pocket and the intent to sign, actually. Jerk-wad there lost the sale.

 

Did another sales person at the same dealership get the sale?

 

Copied from my post elsewhere regarding the 'service' at Irvine BMW/MINI
___________

My wife has a BMW 325i, its a lovely car except for the iPod interface which I personally detest, but she finds to be 'OK'.

Last week she mentioned to me that it was not working - plugging in an iPod did not give the usual 'BMW' display, and pressing the input button gave the 'no disk' error. so she called Irvine BMW and they asked her to book it in and they would fix it.

So we dropped the car off and I took my wife to work.

At 3:10 I picked her up and she retrieved her voice-mail. The message was that the iPod would not work if the car had XM, but they have changed the oil ???

Well yes she has XM, but its a $50 Roady XT rather than an XM direct unit.

The unit transmits the music via FM. She relays this message to me and I am already for a fight as I am at a loss as to how this might cause the iPod adapter to stop working.

She calls the service 'executive' and gets his Voice mail - she leaves a 'what the heck are you talking about' type of message. Actually it was a fairly harsh message, but I digress....

We get there at about 3:30 and seek out the service guy, he says that they have changed the oil, but the iPod adapter does not work with XM. My wife points out that it has worked for many months, He is absolutely adamant that BMW say that the two cannot co-exist.

Finally I step in, I point out that the XM unit is not connected to the radio and the the iPod adapter simply stopped working a week ago, he just keeps repeating that BMW say that they two cannot work together, I am yelling at him, causing a scene asking if he understands what I am saying. He says he understands, but it is pretty obvious that he does not understand me.

I explain - pretty forcefully - that the XM unit is not actually connected at all to the head unit. I actually offer to bet him $1000 that it is not connected and that it therefore does not use the same inputs as the iPod / CD Changer. He however is adamant and will not be persuaded.

So the service tech gets called over, this guy also re-iterates that BMW say that you cannot have both XM and an iPod.

I bet this guy $10,000 that he cannot find a connection, and that the XM unit that I am using does not even go close to the CD changer inputs. It finally dawns on him that the service 'technician' that had written the report simply saw 'XM' and figured that it would not work - he calls the head etch.

The head tech offers to take a look, and if the unit is faulty will swap it out for me - hooray.

The Service 'executive' meanwhile tells my wife that she should be more descriptive on her fault definition, apparently writing 'iPod adapter broken' was insufficient !

20 minutes later he has swapped everything and it all works, apparently the unit was 'faulty' so he replaced the whole kit - at no charge !

Also despite requesting that they did not wash the car, they did so, presumably using something like muddy water and iron filings - the paint is now swirl city (*sigh).

We left the dealership at 5:45 almost two and a half hours after the ordeal started !
_____________

Due to the nature of the Service 'executives' remarks and behaviour, my wife called BMW NA to complain, a couple of the expressions that he used towards my wife have racists conotations, my wife is seething over this and was beyond angry when she called BMW NA. He infered that the reason that they had not been able to fix the iPod adapter was because she had incorrectly advised them as to the nature of the issue.

Writing 'iPod adapter has stopped working, please fix' was insufficient apparently ?

BMW NA have subsequently requested that the complaints be detailed in a letter, this has been done via our attorney. Our attorney is involved only because we want to ensure that we word the complaints correctly due to the racists remark accusations.

 

Go Get'em Max!

 

so... I just found this thread. I just put down a deposit at Irvine. is the service that bad? Have they cancelled their loaner program? i had heard of people getting loaners and had simply assumed that they still offered that. Would it be worth it to pull out and go to Crevier or Long Beach? Does anyone know what the wait is like at either dealer? Irvine is closest to me so when I was ready to get the MINI I went to irvine. How wrong did i do?? :(

 

Pull out, go somewhere else. Look at the dealer rating and feedback in the link posted above.

REPOSTED: http://www.dealerrater.com/dealer/Sh...MW-review-114/

 

Famillarstanger, it does not matter where you buy the car from. You can still get it serviced anywhere you want. Southbay BMW has really great deals and they support a large local mini club you should join called SCMM.org Southern California Mini Maniacs. I have my car serviced at Crevier and they have been OK. I too had major problems at Irvine and will nevere go back. I bought my car at Crevier. My salesperson, Christian, was great but the manager pissed me off. Do your self a favor and call Amanda at South bay Mini. Her and her Father are very active in the club. It would be worth the drive to save the $$$$.

Email me a message if you want furter info.