Getting Service

I was wondering from those of you with service issues that purchased from outside your area if you had any dealer you brought it to give you a hard time or a snide comment of bringing it for service but not buying it there. Especially for a bad one like the turbo issue.

Mine allegedly comes in on Saturday, and I bought from a dealer 45 minutes away. My local dealer is like 10 minutes away but 1. Didn't have the inventory and wasn't particularly thrilled in taking an "order". 2. They're really hard to deal with. They don't budge on anything. 3. Are doing 3000+ MA (where I got sticker with the dealer I bought from)

But their service is probably the best of the three Toyota dealers within an hour of me

 

I'm curious of this same thing. I bought mine almost 2 hours away with a dealership like 10-15 mins from my house. I bought 2 previous toyotas from the local one but their lack of inventory and $6,500 MA lead me to the further dealership to purchase.

 

i've bought 2 tundras and 1 sequoia. none from my local dealer. i've spoken to them as to why. a couple are the reasons you've specified. never got a snide comment or anything. i only bring mine to do the free services and warranties. other than that, i've not needed and/or do my own maintenance. so they're probably pissy about it, but never once said anything to my face.

 

Why would they act that way? Anything covered under warranty, gets billed to Toyota corporate. Free maintenance services included.
If you're paying out of pocket for service, you're the same as any other customer. They don't lose money.

 

Pretty much agree. For most dealerships, sales and service are two different arms of the same company. You might get some baked in service perks as part of the sales pitch, but beyond that...service doesn't care about the sales side, and vice versa.

 

There's 11 Toyota dealers in the STL area, the last couple I've gotten from a different dealer than serviced mine which is much closer to where I live and never had a problem.

 

Thing is, even if you didn't buy the truck from that particular dealership, they still stand to gain your maintenance business. I could be wrong but I'd be really surprised if any dealership (especially right now) is going to fault anyone for buying a vehicle elsewhere.

Lack of inventory is a two fold thing.

1. It means they aren't selling as much as they likely could.

2. It means that people are having to buy elsewhere.

Especially once you bring in a Tundra, I highly doubt anyone is going to think two while doing the service on it. I get the concern (trust me, my mind works similarly most of the time) but I really wouldn't worry about this at all.

 

I'm fairly lucky; there's pretty much one Toyota dealer (Seeger Toyota in St. Robert, MO) that is within a 60 minute drive, but we've bought 4 vehicles from them, simply because they've been great all along. Only reason I'm not buying a '22 Tundra right now is because I just paid mine off, and I'm good with what I got; but were I inclined to, I'd be able to purchase @ MSRP and get a lifetime engine warranty from them. Not too shabby.

 

I swear I read somewhere that nowadays service is more lucrative than sales. Not that hard to believe.

 

It sure does seem like the dealership values the service aspect more than the sale itself.

One of the dealerships I had talked to a Tundra about hit me up & told me that even though I had bought a truck elsewhere, they would appreciate me using them for service.

Just to give you an idea, I'm going to be using a dealership near my house, even though I bought it 1,300 miles away. I'll be buying parts from them as well. In the end, they stand to make more in services than they would have off the vehicle anyways.

 

I've actually done this with our previous Ford Fusion. After the warranty claim on my previous '13 F150 (where the service department told me the defroster on my back glass was covered under warranty, but it was permanently affixed to the back glass...which was NOT covered, and therefore they couldn't replace the defroster glass ), it was sort of the beginning of the end for them. Conversely, I've never had any issue w/my Toyota dealership. I asked if I could watch them do the repair on our previous 2000 4Runner once. Their response was to say "Sure,", pull up a chair for me to sit in, and get me a coffee to sip on while I watched them.