I need to vent, so I'm articulating my experiences over the past week... on this forum.

I moved away from my college town, and I haven't been able to make it back to finish my audio system. I have been driving around with an exposed subwoofer and amplifiers for some time right now.



I took it to the most respected shop in town, where I thought I was paying for them to carpet my box, and build a cover for the amplifier and subwoofer. I told them I want to be able to have boxes of nails in the back, and not worry about puncturing the subwoofer. The woofer box also needed to be removable for a possible, however almost 100% unlikely, day at the midnight drags. I told them to make it look stealth.

Well, $500 later, I pick up the car, the first time. They carpeted my box, but said that the woofer grill would be available the next day. Instead of an amplifier cover, they build an amplifier mounting board, meaning it looked the same, but there was a board under the amps. I told them that wasn't what I wanted, and they said they were going to build a cover for the amplifiers when they installed the woofer grille. Fine, no big deal, I thought.

I pick it up from the store the next day, and they had the grille and amplifier cover on. The cover wasn't stealth, like I requested, but a open-faced box that pressure fit over the amplifiers.

I thought, "Ok, it wasn't stealth, but it was done, nuff said." Then, when I was trying to track down a couple of horrible rattles, (which one of them happened to be the amplifer cover hopping up and down on my amps) I noticed that they did not replace the molded carpet piece behind the subwoofer. The box was rattling against the metal.

I called the store, who still had the piece, and all the clips. (Suprisingly, they did not lose anything). I removed the box, to install the lost piece and begin to notice something horrible...

I guess they didn't have any matching dark charcoal carpet, and they did not go acquire some. Instead, they put black speakerbox carpet all over all the remaining pieces of my trunk, so it would match. They glued black carpet to the molded carpet on the passenger side, as well as the large piece under the amplifier. The carpet was laid right over the holes the plastic assembly clips normally fit in, and sealed in the removable taillight panel. The pieces are just wedged in my trunk, without clips, and showing exposed holes where the clips would normally be.

I am steaming pissed off.

Here's the cost:

$500 for labor/parts at the stereo shop
$300 to purchase replacement panels for the ones with carpet on them (I have a quote.)
$??? of my time to remove all the ruined panels and reassemble my trunk with the un-altered parts

I do not want to mention the name of the store, because I want to give them a chance to make things right. I am going to talk to them first thing tomorrow morning.

Does anyone have any recommendations?

Thanks,

Alex

 

Alex, you vented, and it sounds like you need to take the new replacement parts to them, tell them to do it right, by explaining to them what you expect to see when you return to pick up your car...if they aren't able to do the job as you requested, they owe you some money back...it also sounds like you are trying to work it out, since you didn't want to mention their name....good for you...blow your stack only after giving them a chance to do it as you requested...sometimes jobs get passed off to someone else to do, without the proper instructions....they still need to make it right...

 

Thank you for your advice, doc. I hope they understand, and I keep my temper under control.

I am not entirely displeased with the work they did. It looks OK. It's the fact that it's going to cost a lot of time and money to replace the parts that were unnecessarily upholstered that pisses me off. Here are a few pictures:


The snaps' holes are covered up, as well as the tailight access panel.


Overall, it looks like what I wanted, but I didn't want to ruin my factory pieces to get there....

 

Yes.

First Off, start at the top of the management chain and make an appointment to go over what happened and what you want. Don't be nasty but don't be shy about getting things fixed right. You didn't bring them a pickup truck with holes rusted in the floor so they should have known better...

You should be able to get them to replace the damaged materials to factory original, especially if you never told them to trash it and if you never told them do what they did in that regard.

Read my thread elsewhere about dealing with dealers - same rules apply

https://www.crossfireforum.org/forum...ad.php?t=26081

For your own future reference, with custom stuff, you really have a lot better chance of avoiding this if you write everything down, go over it with the service writer AND the technician who will do the work. You will be amazed at the communication problems that come up during the conversation that you can correct. Keep a copy of the instructions for yourself and use it to seek wellness if things go wrong.

Sorry to hear of your troubles.

 

As a passing (and off-topic) comment, I am curious to learn how satisfied you are with the cargo curtain that you have installed. Does it work well? Is it well made? Easy to install?