Angry Benz owner goes on showroom rampage

[HighestOfHigh]

Sudeep K. Agarwal, a Mercedes owner in India, decided he'd had it up to here and wasn't going to take it anymore. Over a period of a few years Agarwal took his Mercedes to a dealer in Bangalore to have the same problem repaired, but the dealer never got it fixed to his satisfaction.

During one more trip to the dealer, the dealer told Agarwal they had no spare car to offer while his Benz was in service. Making things worse, Agarwal's driving was apparently called into question by the dealer staff. He immediately pledged "I will show you how to drive the car," then delivered on it by getting in and plowing onto the showroom floor, taking out a few new Benzes in the process. He scored three direct hits and was finally overpowered before he could score a fourth.

While this might all sound crazy – because it is – our tipster offered a bit of background to the breakdown. According to our reader Toni, dealers and manufacturers in India hold absolutely all the cards when it comes to addressing consumer complaints, as "there are no lemon laws" and "a typical court case takes ~10-20 years to resolve." From the way Toni makes it sound, after spending all that money on luxury some buyers end up spending all their time on redress. Not that the justifies doing an impression of Crash Bandicoot...

- Angry Benz owner goes on showroom rampage — Autoblog

 

[Mr Robert]

Lemon laws are great... consumers without power are dangerous.

 

[Wolfgang]

The complaint: "His complaint that he was sensing left pull and every service he got it done did not get the problem rectified."

Might it be related to the crown of the road? http://www.dirtandgravel.psu.edu/resources/tech_bulletins/crown_cs.pdf

 

[Human]

Haven't we all felt like this guy one time or another?

I have with the local BMW dealer's workshop ONCE now I do not have a problem with the sales executives but my BMW's are serviced 250km from home @ a BMW dealer in Midrand JHB

 

[Sayyaaf]

Tell me about it Human. I wouldn't go this far though. I might raise my voice a little but never more. Last time I tried to avoid making a scene and left. The receptionist followed me to my car. She refused to give me the workshop manager number to file a complaint against one of the sales staff. I went home, and a simple email to Porsche sales department solved the problem in the regional office. However, some sales guys are intolerable.

The problem over here is different I guess, we have plenty of rich people where they usually don't care if the car is going to stay for a day or month in the workshop, for me, I care. They treat everybody similarly as if you own a whole fleet of Porsches/BMWs/MBs.

The funny thing is that usually the sales department are much more understanding than the service department, some brands don't even allow those department to argue over a customer car. My X6 had an infinite debate over a problem I had with the sales. The car was sold as a sportpackage fitted car while it wasn't. So when I complained about restricted top speed, their service department replied the car is not having sport package which shocked me because I saw it in the specs sheet. Now ping pong emails between departments and I was lost in between, so I ignored the whole matter since as per them, it can't be retrofitted with no permission from BMW AG (as per my dealer). The only middle ground we found is a good resale value when exchanged with another car.

Aweful sometimes, but a nice argument can get you places.

 

[Centurion]

Violence doesn't solve anything, but intellect and wisdom does. I have yet to buy a car and deal with dealers and sales people. In the area of consumer protection I'm very skilled and regularly make claims on defect products. In the recent 12 months I have successfully made numerous claims. In fact, tomorrow, Dell will be paying a visit to my house to swap out the speaker, keyboard and motherboard of my laptop. When I bought it I was unhappy with the screen and made Dell change the LCD panel from a Sumsung one to an LG. It's a highly specific requests that most compnies would not honor but Dell came through for me.

Biggest triumph is HP refunding me half the cost of a my HP laptop after two years, and I didn't buy it from HP directly but from a retail chain. The GPU had toasted the mother board twice and eventually Nvidia came forward and stated that some of their GPUs suffered from an engineering defect that led to overheating and can impossibly be corrected. So even if the motherboard and GPU gets replaced, the laptop will inevitably be toasted again. A few days after I read the statement I wrote HP a letter stating they are knowingly selling faulty products. There's no stronger ground for making a refund claim than that and before I knew it, HP got in touch with me and refunded me my half money in a matter of days.

Not to be rude to anyone who might work as a sales person here, but in general, sales people are quite ignorant and tend to be illeducated about what they are selling or even consumer protection laws. The more you know about your right, products and how the industry operates -- the easier it is to beat a sales person down to a pulp in a dispute. In reverse, the less knowledgable and insecure you are, the eaier it is for them to fend you off. Knowledge is power and confidence leads to triumph.

 

[Gullwing]

I wouldn't drive into a dealership like that, why destroy my car? I have dreamed about burning the dealership down... or high power BB gun at all the windows of dealer owned car on the lot... or a baseball bat to the right tem.... Yes I hold grudges over some things and it isn't even my car I am still pissed off about.
*** I have never done any of that or recommend doing any of that***