After nearly eight years of doing business with 401 Auto, I can honestly say that I will never do business with them again.
My first experience purchasing a Honda Civic was relatively smooth. However, this was during COVID and everything was handled over the phone. Unfortunately, my experiences after that have been nothing but frustration.
After about a year of owning the Civic, I was encouraged to trade it in for a Jeep Cherokee that already had more than 150,000 kilometres on it. Four years later, I still owe more than $20,000 on the vehicle and have spent approximately $6,000 on repairs. I also purchased an extended warranty because I made it very clear that I travel long distances on a regular basis. When issues arose, I found that the warranty coverage I expected was not honoured.
The trade in process itself was a nightmare. It took approximately three months for the Jeep to be ready. During that time, I was making payments on both the Honda Civic and the Jeep even though I had been told that 401 Auto would be taking over the Civic. I was promised reimbursement for those payments, but it took more than two years of phone calls, follow ups, ignored messages, and unanswered questions before I finally received the money. The only reason the issue was resolved was because I posted a negative review online. Once they finally paid me what I was owed, they immediately asked me to remove the review.
Even after all of that, I continued receiving calls encouraging me to trade in my Jeep.
More recently, I purchased a trailer through CampMart. I was under the impression that the trailer division operated separately from the automotive division at first, but unfortunately the experience was just as bad, if not worse.
Before signing the paperwork, I was told that delivery was free and that if warranty issues arose, someone could come directly to my property to perform repairs. This was important because my seasonal property is located more than an hour away from the dealership. However, when the trailer lock broke, I was suddenly told that they did not have anyone available to come on site and that I would need to bring the trailer back to the dealership for repairs.
Since the trailer was already installed on my seasonal property more than an hour away, with a custom built deck surrounding it, removing and transporting it back to the dealership for a simple lock repair was completely impractical and contrary to what I had been told when I purchased it.
After numerous promises that someone would call me back and repeated delays, I eventually became so frustrated that they simply provided me with a replacement lock and I repaired it myself.
To make matters worse, after only one season of use, the awning broke when I opened the trailer after winter storage. When I contacted CampMart regarding warranty coverage, I was told that the trailer was out of warranty and that I should have purchased an extended warranty. The problem is that no extended warranty was ever offered to me when I purchased the trailer.
After years of dealing with ignored calls, broken promises, delayed resolutions, warranty issues, and poor customer service, I have finally learned my lesson.
I plan on paying off both my Jeep and my trailer and eventually upgrading to a larger trailer. However, that purchase will absolutely be made through a different company.
Based on my personal experiences over the past eight years, I would not recommend doing business with 401 Auto or CampMart. There are plenty of other dealerships and trailer companies that deserve your business far more than this one. read more
