Firestone Tire & Service Bad Service Creates Worse Problems For Customer Austin Texas

My car was overheating in town, but not on the highway. I took it to Firestone off William Cannon where I have taken some of my other cars in the past. I paid for the diagnosis and then the problems began. I figured it was a fan that has gone out, but they declared it was the thermostat in the diagnosis. They reported to me that my radiator cap needed to be replaced and they wanted to charge me $41.00 for a radiator cap. I protested the amount for the radiator cap and the individual than gave me a discount bringing the price to $28.00. I protested and asked to speak with the manager.

The manager of Firestone claimed that his person must have hit the price for the gas cap instead of the radiator cap. I than exclaimed to him that I have never seen a gas cap cost $41.00 and then he lowered the original radiator cap down to $16.99. This showed me out of the gate that the manager was already trying to deceive me and gave evidence that he was rectifying the attempt to overcharge me for the part.

I went ahead told them to replace the thermostat and radiator cap. I called asking to pickup the car and they said it was being tested, but little did they know I was already in the parking lot on my cell phone in my wife's car. The car was actually not being tested, but remained in the bin by itself. The manager than said it was ready for pickup, so to their surprise I was in the waiting room the next minute.

I took the car home and thought all problems were fixed, but it actually is when all the trouble started to occur. When I arrived home coolent was all over my garage floor. I brought the car in to Firestone first thing the next morning and they checked out the car saying they did not tighten all the hoses, which led to my next problem. They said the clamped the hoses and I should be good to go, but when I arrived home from work that day I heard a loud explosion when I turned off the car.

The radiator exploded leaving a large hole at the top of the radiator. I had the car towed back to firestone to fix the problem I learned that they caused. Firestone called me the next day explaining to me that I had a large hole in my radiator and would not take responsibility for the damage. They suggested that I purchase a new radiator and then they would charge me to for the labor. Once they have the new radiator than they would diagnostic to see if they are at fault.

This is coming from a company that has lied to me twice and did a half job of service and did not even test their service making me come back the next day so they could correct their mistakes. Speaking with other reputable service shops I found that Firestone could be totally at fault because when they clamped the hoses the second day, when they were supposed to do it the first day, did not flush the hoses and replace the missing coolent from it leaking the day before. The air in the hoses heats up and expands especially if the lack of fluid in the radiator is causing it to overheat. The air will build up so much pressure than it could blow the top off the radiator.

I assumed the new product (radiator cap) they sold me would prevent this from happening because radiator caps are supposed to let the pressure seep out and not explode. I called the manager and customer support in corporate. Both of these tools were very unhelpful. The manager who I had spoke with lied and explained to me that he was a general manager when in fact was a service manager. The service manager is claiming zero fault even though experts in his industry say that the car was misdiagnosed at first and then the hoses where not handled properly, thus causing the irrefutable damage to my radiator and car.

Damon
Austin, Texas
U.S.A.