This review is based on two different car repairs I had done in the past few months. Both cars came back looking great from their repair, but there were aspects of Fix Auto's customer service that need major improvement.
My first car repair went well, until about a week later when we realized that the front license plate was missing. Apparently someone at Fix Auto threw it away instead of putting it back on the car. Tony, the manager, promised to reimburse me for the cost of replacing the license plate. That's all well and good, but it was still an avoidable inconvenience to take the car to the DOL, pay the $75 for new plates (since WA does not replace a single plate), take the receipt back to Fix Auto, and wait 2 weeks to be reimbursed by the company.
My second car repair went downhill from there. When I received the estimate, I asked the estimator how long the repair would take. She told me it would be about 4 days, so I carefully planned my schedule to find a week when I could be without my car for that long. When I brought the car in on Monday afternoon (for work to start on Tuesday), I double-checked that the car would be done on Friday. The woman checking me in told me it would take a full week, which meant I wouldn't get my car back until the following Tuesday. I was flustered because all my careful planning was useless, so I told her I would have to return home, rearrange my calendar again to find a full week I could be without my car, and make a new appointment with Fix Auto. I was emotional and shaking, and I wasn't as polite as I would normally be ... but I didn't overstep any boundaries. Tony came out from the back and asked me if they were failing to satisfy me. I said something along the lines of "Yes, sort of, but it's OK because I will bring my car back when I can figure out my schedule." At that point Tony said, "That's if we ALLOW you to come back here." I was shocked at his behavior; instead of de-escalating the situation he deliberately inflamed it. If one of my employees had reacted in that way to an emotional customer, I would have pulled them aside for some individual coaching on how to best approach this type of situation.
I ended up leaving my car there although Tony further stated that no one at Fix Auto would ever provide a completion date to their work ahead of time. I've taken cars to various auto repair shops over the years, and never have I visited a place that DIDN'T provide an idea of when the repair would be done. I was worried about some sort of retaliation, so I called the next day to apologize for my emotional behavior, although I fully believe that Tony was equally at fault for our verbal exchange. He never apologized, but instead said to just forget about it.
The end result was that my car repair was finished by noon on Wednesday, only a day and a half after I dropped it off. What was the point of all Tony's posturing and getting me upset about nothing? It left a bad taste in my mouth about this business. Perhaps they have so much business that they don't need to care about their customers; at least, it sure seems that way.
Interestingly, I called the number Victoria provided in her reply and they said there was no one there by that name. read more
