Saturday, August 19, 2006

Dodge Dealerships

For anyone out there considering the move to a Dodge Caravan -- think carefully. It's actually not a bad little car but it does have some annoying problems and the Dodge dealerships aren't particularly helpful. We've had a lot of suspension problems with this car (and apparently so has everyone else who owns one judging by what I learned on the net). Now so far everything has fallen under the extended warrenty and we have had to shell out very little for repairs. However, the dealership has never been able to do the work in one day and frequently I have been without a car for up to 3 days. They also seem to always be able to find at least $400 worth of work that isn't covered under the warrenty that absolutely must be done. According to what I read from others who have owned this car, Dodge acknowledges the problems, but just refers everyone back to the dealership where they purchased it. What has happened to standing by the product you produce. Dodge isn't paying for the repairs on this car -- our extended warrenty company is. If they know that this model has these many problems you would think they would take responsiblity for them wouldn't you? And, you would think that once a problem is fixed, that you wouldn't have to fix it again. Wrong! We've had the bushings replaced on the front end at least twice. Power steering has been completely overhauled twice. I drove that last Ford van 167,000 miles and never replaced bushings or sway bars. I did have to have the power steering system completely replaced while it was still under warrenty (only up to 36,000 miles) and never had another problem with it. Needless to say, I will not buy another Caravan.

2 comments:

jjp said...

Our choice looks better and better, even if our car has a bullseye on it...

Doc Payne said...

Hmmm... I love my Dodge... but its only got 10k miles on it yet..