Bad customer service.

Bad customer service. Is this a new theme in Northern California?

After being completely dicked around by the Malibu and Mastercraft dealers in my area (Sacramento), I ended up buying a 2004 X2 from Ski World in Pleasanton. I had a great buying experience, and I'm glad I drove the extra hour to deal with good people.

My close friends on the other hand, were set on buying a new VLX from our local Malibu dealer.

The problems started on Thursday when it was time to bring their big, beautiful, loaded, orange VLX home, but the trailer lights wouldn't work. A total of four different guys looked at the trailer and finally decided the problem was with my friend's Escalade. They took the boat home with no trailer lights, no big deal. We headed over to check out the boat, and within one minute, found a bad ground on the trailer. Problem solved.

Next on the list is the Sony CD player. The radio works, but CDs won't play. This is really a minor problem. So again, no big deal. It will be replaced under warranty.

Those are both minor problems that could happen to anybody. The employees not being able to find a bad ground is a little dis-heartening, but those weren't the actual service people, so that's no big deal either.

The fun really started on Saturday when my friends rounded up all of their kids and headed out to Folsom Lake for the maiden voyage. They haven't owned a boat in over a year, so you can imagine they were pretty excited to roll up in a new VLX. Fortunately, they were smart enough to check the plug. Alas, no plug in the boat.

Is it in the glove box? No.
In the rear storage? No.
In the front storage? No.
Where is the plug? Nowhere to be found. In the rush to get the boat out the door, a plug was never supplied.

So they call the dealership and say, "Hey, we need you to bring us the plug that you never put in the boat or gave to us."

After dropping $48,500 two days prior, one should expect a small amount of customer service, especially to make good on a problem CAUSED by the dealer.

Sadly, this is not the case with this particular dealer, (And from what I hear, all of their subsidiaries). Instead of, "Sure, we'll bring it right out."

They got, "Sorry, we've got customers right now."

My friends had to leave the lake and drive to the dealer to pick up the plug.

Now if that isn't the biggest F.U. I've ever heard of, I don't know what is.

What would you guys do if your dealer treated you like this two days after a sale?