National Tire & Battery Rip Off

[ddixon]

A few weeks ago I had National Tire & Battery in Lancaster Pa. replace 2 tires on my 2001 S40. Top of the line Michelin.
In about a week a rear suspension noise developed. I took the car back to NTB , explained the problem & suggested they check whether they had tightened the rear suspension camber adjustment cam bolts.
They wrote up a list of suggested repairs : Rear coil spring is broke. C/V axle repair/replace CV joint/half axle.

I thanked them & told them I would do the repairs myself,as I have been a mechanic since I was 18 years old, now retired. (I am now 76 & it takes me longer for each job, but still fixing.)

Well golly gosh you can imagine my surprise, when I checked out my car, & discovered no broken coil spring,nothing wrong with either CV joint . In fact the only trouble with my car was that BOTH camber adjustments were so loose the lock nuts were backed off 4 complete turns. I am now going to tell this story to as many people as I can, because I cannot believe they are so incompetent. Which leaves stupidity & or dishonesty. DD

[Volvos rock3]

I stopped in there once to have them rebalance 16" tires on one of my trucks...They wanted $22.00 a tire HA! left and never went back...

[BoomerFT]

I have had similar problems with them. The last time they charged my card for repairs that had not been done. I was young at the time and didn't realize they didn't need a credit card till work is completed.

[Billc1015]

Any time a repair shop tells you something that you don't think is right, tell them you want them to show you the failed part while the car is still on the lift.

[MadeInJapan]

I have a modified '07 S40...done in Germany under the supervision of Volvo...it's legit and there is nothing that keeps someone from working on my car due to the mods that it has.

I took my car to NTB yesterday - we have serviced all of our Volvo's there for years but no one I used to know there works there anymore.
All I wanted was tires rotated/balanced and an alignment.

They had me wait for 2 hours and finally came out to tell me that they couldn't touch my car due to the modifications.
I asked them why and they told me it was their company's policy not to work on cars that were modified. So I asked them if they could at least rotate and balance my tires. I would get an alignment elsewhere.. Once again, they repeated that they couldn't touch my car.
I asked them if I brought in a tire one at a time if they would balance them (it's not that big a deal to take tires off and put them on another location)...They told me that if they knew it "came off of that car," they couldn't touch it, spewing the same line- it was against company policy...they knew me by now because I was ranting- so no go on them... I told them they lost the business of all 4 of the Volvo's in our family.

On an unrelated but related note- a few years ago, I stopped in at a different NTB after putting on new rotors (OEM Volvo) and new pads - also Volvo pads- on my wife's V70. All I wanted was for them to check the alignment. After some time they came out to tell me that I needed new rotors and they happened to have them in stock- mine were past the point of being able to be turned because they were so thin and beyond spec because of the way my pads had eaten into them. With that, I began to rant and rave in their customer area, making sure that everyone there (and it was crowded) heard me tell the guy that I had just put the new rotors and pads on myself (less than a few miles away) and that they were scam artists, and I would not sent my worst enemy to them to have their car worked on...Several people got up, asked for their keys and walked out when I did.

So yeah, after what happened a few years ago and what happened yesterday, (I had given NTB a second chance because I knew people who worked there), I do not ever plan to give NTB my business again and I will tell as many people as I can that they are a crooked organization. In hindsight, it was probably good that they didn't touch my car.