On January 4, my wife's car had a blowout. She had it towed to JBC Tires and they put on 4 new tires and everything should have been fine.
January 25, someone brought to her attention that one of her brand new tires was low. Assuming that it was just due to the fluctuating temperature, she put some air in it and we moved on with our lives.
Then, February 1, her tire was low again, so she decided to take it in to JBC so they could rectify the situation. We went to pick up the car and they decided to just patch the tire and let us go on our way. I was a little mad that this brand new tire already had problems with it, but they patched the new one and didn't charge me, so I figured "no harm, no foul."
But, then, came the foul. A big one.
As we were on our way home, her back wheel on the driver side fell off.
Allow me to reemphasize that
HER WHEEL FELL OFF!
We were less than a block away from the tire shop and IT FELL OFF! In the process, it severely damaged her bumper as well.
Stranded on Kearney in 5 o'clock traffic, I called the tire store and told them what happened. 15 minutes later (yes, it took them 15 minutes to get from the tire shop to us), they arrived. They cussed the guy who rotated the tires and said they would call a tow truck for us.
And then, they left.
Yeah, that's right, our wheel falls off, the tire shop sees all the damage and leaves me, my pregnant wife, and my son who is sick with a cold out in 5 o'clock traffic.
My wife and son sat in my car as I waited for the tow truck. Eventually, a crackhead ran out from a laundromat and started shouting at me, "YOU GOTTA GET OUTTA HERE!" the crackhead said, "THEY CALLED THE COPS!"
"I'm fine," I said to the crackhead as we were standing in the middle lane all alone.
Thankfully, a police officer drove up and the crackhead ran away. He informed me that a report had been filed and that I probably should contact a lawyer about the situation. The tow truck arrived, made the obligatory Ron White reference and took our car to the tire shop.
At the tire shop, I was promised that they would take care of everything and I asked, "Could we get a rental car because my wife needs to take my son to the doctor tomorrow because he is really sick."
He replied, "I can text the owner and let you know tomorrow" which didn't really help out because my wife had an 8 a.m. doctor's appointment to check on the health of our baby. I contacted my dad and he came up to help us out with that.
But it got worse.
For a month, we waited for JBC to fix her car. They told me they would contact Dings and Things about getting an estimate. They never did. On March 1, I contacted JBC and they told me to call Dings and Things myself.
Now, keep in mind that my wife is even more pregnant and has doctor's visits to go to on her day off so it's hard to get to Dings and Things but we made it work. She got an estimate that included fixing our windshield that admittedly was not JBC responsibility to fix and I turned the estimate in to JBC on March 14. I called Steve at JBC and left a voicemail that day. A week passed and he never contacted me.
So, on March 22, I called him and left a more aggressive voicemail. That made him call me back.
"Which car was yours?"
"The one with the wheel that fell off," I replied.
"Well, we had two cars in two weeks that this happened to."
After we figured out the details, Steve said, "Well, you are having us fix your windshield and that's about $200 so we aren't paying for a rental car for you."
"I consider the windshield as part of my emotional damage. You realize how much we've gone through, right?" I asked.
"Well, I don't want to have to go through my insurance," he replied as if that solved the issue. That also came off as kind of shady to me.
Worried that he wouldn't cut us a check at all, I just agreed. He said he would send me a check and he would take a picture of the check and text it to me on March 23. When he didn't do that, I texted him on March 24 to make sure the check was cut. He said it was and that I had nothing to worry about. Finally, on Monday March 26, someone from JBC called my wife to confirm our address.
On March 27, we took the car in to get repaired. We received the check by mail that day. By March 29, it was fixed and we thought we were good to go.
Then, on April 4, as my wife was pulling into work, her tire popped. We had it towed to Goodyear Tires at the Battlefield Mall. They informed me that the tire was unsalvageable and another one of the tires was in bad shape. I told them to just put on four new tires and we would call it good.
I tried to get a refund for the bad tires and Steve said if I returned the tires I left at Goodyear that he would see what he would do. Goodyear only had two of the tires left, and on April 16 Steve said he wouldn't give me anything except two replacement tires that I no longer need.
Thus ended 2 and a half months of a headache that my family didn't deserve. read more