Review: Walmart Auto Care Center, Smyrna Store #406

Walmart Auto Care Center, Smyrna Store #406
570 Enon Springs Rd E, TN 37167
615-355-1029
https://www.walmart.com/store/406/smyrna-tn/details
Visit at 5 PM Central Time on Thursday, November 15, 2018

I needed my front two tires replaced and also an oil change. For the last week, I’ve searched the tire stores websites looking for the best tires to fit my budget and schedule, and for a decent price on an oil change. I tried hard to find a place other than Wal-Mart, but ended up there. I found the tires I wanted online at their site, and printed out the product pages. The website confirmed that the store closest to me had them in stock. I left work early to make sure I was there in plenty of time for them to change two tires and do an oil change.

I left work an hour early, knowing that they closed at 7, and didn’t want to arrive at the last minute. I arrived by 5 PM and I showed the clerk in the Auto Car department the printed pages showing the tires I’d picked out. He checked their stock and confirmed they had them, so we moved forward with my ticket. I declined road hazard service, and asked for a full synthetic oil change. He advised me that they recommend that new tires be installed in the rear of the vehicle, and older tires moved to the front. I agreed, providing it didn’t increase the cost. He confirmed it did not, but then told me he had to go get a manager to approve them moving my old tires to the front of the vehicle, even though it is their recommendation. He returned, saying he received the approval. He finished working up my ticket, and quoted a prices of approximately $260 plus tax for the full synthetic oil change and the two tires.

I sat down to return a call to my boyfriend while waiting, since he’d called while I was speaking with the clerk about my ticket. Shortly after we began our call, one of the mechanics returned to the waiting room to tell me they would not be able to change my oil that evening because my oil cap was apparently missing. I had no idea that it was gone. My boyfriend was on his way home from work, and agreed to go get a new one and bring it to me, so I found one at an auto parts store nearby. I told the clerk at the counter what our plan was and asked if they could move forward with the oil change knowing that we’d found a cap and it would be there by 6:30 PM. They said they had to make sure it fit the vehicle before they could do the oil change. Fair enough.

My boyfriend arrived by 6:30 with the oil cap, and handed it over to the mechanics. They returned shortly to say that it didn’t fit and they wouldn’t force it, so they still refused to change the oil. We asked them for the cap and its box back, but they said they were trying to clean the cap first. We asked several times for it to make sure they didn’t dispose of the box or the cap as we wanted to return it to the auto parts store. They finally said they’d put it in my car, and my boyfriend did find it there when he went outside to check.

Meanwhile, a different clerk was at the counter, and proceeded to ring me up. He rang up a total of approximately $292, at which point I refused to pay, telling him that the price I was given for both oil change and 2 tires before they began the work was only $260 plus tax, and it should have gone down if they didn’t do the oil change. I showed him the printed pages with the tires that I had asked for, showing they were only $82 each and could not possibly total $292 with installation ($15 per tire) and tax. He reviewed the ticket and decided they must have put a better tire on my car. He then told me they could either put the ones I wanted on my car now, or they could sell me the more expensive ones at the same prices. I told him I needed to see the specifications on the new tires before I could make that decision, but if they matched or exceeded the features of the others, that would be fine. He waved a paper in front of me, but wouldn’t let me see anything that told me the brand or features of those tires, simply stating that they had a better mileage warranty. Then one of the mechanics returned and stated they had actually put the tires I originally requested on my car, but that they’d re-done the ticket when the took the oil change off and must have rang up the wrong tires. So, the clerk then proceeded to create a new ticket with the correct tires. He showed me a total with no detail, and asked me if that was correct. I said it seemed closer to what I was expecting and paid. After he gave me the itemized receipt, I examined it to find that they had charged me for the road hazard service I had declined. I told him so, and he refused to fix it, saying I had to walk all the way across the building to the front of the store and wait in line for customer service to fix it. He insisted there was no way he could fix it. I was pretty frustrated that he was sending me all the way across the store to wait in yet another line to fix his mistakes, but it seemed there was no other way to fix it.

Also, from the moment this clerk started ringing me up, I periodically asked him where my car keys were, explaining that the last time I’d used Walmart’s auto service department at a different location several years ago, they let a mechanic clock out and leave with my car keys in his possession and it took him 2 hours to return with them, leaving me stranded at the store ready to call the police. In that amount of time, that employee could have made copies of my car keys, taken my address of of my registration or out of their computer system, etc. Even after hearing my concerns, this clerk then told me that happens sometimes, but it is OK, and that their own location has only let an employee leave with a customer’s car keys 3 times. He was actually bragging about that. I told him that was horrifying, and he said it is normal. I don’t think the customers this happens to would agree that this should be considered normal.

When I arrived at customer service, I waited in line behind two other customers. Once it was my turn, I explained what had happened and a supervisor and the customer service clerk both expressed confusion as to why the auto service clerk had insisted I come to their desk to fix the erroneous charge, telling me he most certainly could have and should have done it himself. They refunded my money, and I told them the worst was that knowing the auto service department closed since we were waiting at customer service, we now would have to walk all the way around the building in the cold and dark to get to our vehicles. The supervisor called and made the auto service clerk wait to let us out their door which was closer to our vehicles.

When we arrived back in the auto service department, the clerk that refused to refund my money pulled my boyfriend into the back room and started to whisper to him while looking at me. I immediately stepped in and asked why he was whispering to my boyfriend about MY vehicle and MY transaction. I own that vehicle, I paid for that service. The only reason my boyfriend was there was to delivery a new oil cap for me. I told him it was completely inappropriate and misogynistic to speak to my boyfriend about my car and my transaction and purposely exclude me. He then told me he had not actually removed the road hazard service and that I could still use it even though I’d received a refund. I told him I didn’t want it, wouldn’t use it, and just wanted to leave. They keep the auto service exit locked, and you cannot leave unless their employees let you out. We had to ask him at least 4 times to let us out before he finally would.

We left Walmart and went directly to the auto parts store to return the oil cap. They checked the part number, and said it was definitely the right cap. Then we all went outside to try it, finding that it did indeed fit my car. Either the mechanics at Walmart were morons who lack the ability to screw an oil cap on or they were lying because they didn’t want to do the oil change.

Next, my boyfriend checked my tires, finding that the new tires were installed on the rear of the car instead of the front. Remember when I started the order, the clerk told me they recommended that new tires be installed in the rear and old tires moved to the front? Remember he had to get manager approval for that? Well, they ended up not doing it, even after telling me this was a safety issue.

Once home, I reviewed my receipt again, finding that they charged me 3 tire fees for only 2 tires. There should have been only 2 tire fees. I’m not going to try to get my money back for that one, since it is only $1.50 and not worth my time or pain in going back to the store for it, but it is yet one more mistake that Walmart’s auto center employees made in this one transaction.

In this one transaction, there were a minimum of 8 mistakes made by Walmart’s auto service employees. Mistakes happen sometimes, but this number of mistakes should never happen within one transaction or to one customer. When I arrived home, I called to speak with the manager on duty, who responded in a way that conveyed he felt the appropriate level of horror at what I’d experienced at the hands of his auto service employees. I do believe he was sincere, but I also believe that it will take a lot to fix what is wrong in Walmart’s Auto Service department.

#Walmart #WalmartAuto #WalmartReview