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Dealer's Tricks - bait & switch, etc.
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But you bring up a good point .. where was the guardian ..? .. in most states a contract means about -0- unless the guardian has approved it and signed off on the whole enchilada .....
Terry :confuse:
Actually my mom is older than this gentleman and is still driving. But she doesn't live near here. :-)
As far as the state taking action, Idaho isn't big on consumer rights (you should have heard the stink when the state turned down dentures for some elderly resident on Medicaid).
Steve, Host
Just to clarify, that statement is not correct. A power of attorney does not remove any power from the one executing it (i.e., the "principal"). It only gives the appointed agent authority to act on the principal's behalf to bind the principal. That's all. For example, I've executed a power of attorney that gives my wife authority to act on my behalf in certain circumstances. If one of those circumstances was purchasing a car, she would not be able to come behind me and void a car purchase. However, she could buy a car in my name, and I would be stuck with it.
I think what you were getting at, chuck1, was a guardianship of the estate, like a couple other's have mentioned. In a guardianship situation, the poor man likely has already been found incompetent to manage his own financial affairs. In that case, the transaction would have been voidable.
Given the facts we know, it had to be quite obvious this man made a mistake by pulling into the dealership for service on his Toyota. It's unconcionable that first, the salesperson viewed it as a sales opportunity, and then exploited it. And second, that the management (sales manager as well as F&I guy HAD to be involved), would let the sale go through.
No one forces any of us to buy anything. Someone made an effort here to take advantage of this man to trade in a brand new loaded Toyota (At $30K+ new value...when all he was looking for was some service help) on a Focus (which looks to be a "base" model since it looks to have crank windows), and somehow convinced him his problems would be solved by doing so. The numbers had to be terribly skewed and someone had to notice this, but let it "slide" anyway.
This guy didn't even know what happened to him until his family became involved.
This speaks to the lowest common denominator of human behavior, aside from all the other so-called "facts" in this case.
If it were my father, under these circumstances, I'd be calling every radio, newspaper and TV outlet I could find to report this.
From reading the news articles, it sounds like Lithia (and/or the dealer) made some settlement offer to the family which was rejected. Maybe it wasn't enough or the family is so outraged they want to try to get some moral justice. I think this is the original story when the news first broke here. (Boise Weekly).
Lithia is a big company with ~88 dealerships and over 5,000 employees so you'd expect a few bumps now and then. Their stock was down 9 cents today but it's trading close to the yearly high. This may be just a little blip on corporate radar although lots of veterans groups are also mighty upset.
Steve, Host
Thats their business statement - what a joke!!
This leads me to question if maybe it was actually a 4Runner instead. There have been several occasions where I have read a story in the paper, then after talking to someone actually involved in the reported situation, about 20% of what was in the paper was incorrect. I have also heard from friends that have issued quotes to a print reporter, only to have a different quote actually make the publication.
How much inappropriate selling practices the managers hear about and ignore from their salesmen is open to debate. But, it appears it happens far to often.
He doesn't have a lot of money but he does have a big heart. He was sending a couple of hundred dollars a month to parasites who dogged him constantly.
This story sickens me.
Salesmen who aren't as fortunate as you, who live paycheck to paycheck....may try "stuff" in order to put food on the table. So, I am questioning how much pressure a dealership puts on a salesman to sell. What type of pressure might of this salesman have been under to have done such a dastardly deed? Or, maybe he was just a jerk to begin with?
Another newspaper article said the RAV4 was $28,000.
Yes,of course, there is pressure to sell. Most salespeople are on straight commission and many of them do live month to month. In addition, if they don't produce, they are sent down the road.
Any decent person, however, would have recognized what was happening. If the story really happened as described, it was a horrible situation.
We recently had a normal acting woman buy a used car from us. Two weeks later, she traded it in, another week or so passed and she was going to trade it in again. At that point, we recognized something just wasn't right.
We refused to sell her a third car.
As I said, a story like that just sickens me and I'm sorry if I snapped at anyone.
I believe this was a case of some unscrupulous sales persons/managment working on their own.
As more facts come out, it looks like this fellow paid $28K for a new RAV4. Dealership traded him out of it for a new $13K Focus, even up. Dealership said they would take back the Focus for it's "trade value" as compensation to unwind the deal. Gee, that's big of them.
Best thing for the dealership to do, to keep from more negative publicity.....give the man his original $28K back and take the Focus back. Better yet, in a show of good faith, give the guy a new loaded Explorer. Whatever they lose monetarily on such a deal, it will still be a bargain compared to having this fiasco linger.
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
"
In the words of John McEnroe.....
YOU CANNOT BE SERIOUS!!!!!
Yea, I would like to hear from these yo-yos as well. LIKE HOW ARE THEY GOING TO MAKE GOOD?
It turns out this old guy is a Veteran and their organization has heard about it. They are talking about getting all the Veteran organizations behind this guy. If they call for a boycott, get reserve and active military, AND THEIR FAMILIES, to boycott this company and all their corporate dealerships, they will lose FAR MORE THAN A COST OF AN EXPLORER!! This story has infuriated me!!
thats a very bad argument, its not the case of make that particular deal or make no deal at all. If the guy walked into the dealership with a $28K car and walked out with a $15K car and a check for $13K you would have a valid argument. But that wasn't the case was it?
I don't think anyone would have been upset with the Ford dealer if they just showed him the door and pointed him to the Toyota dealer since thats where he thought he was going.
Sorry the dealership should have seen that this was not right and never had made the deal. I can't see any defense for what happened.
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
But in the case of the elderly gentleman with the RAV4. It was soooooo obvious he wasn't right, yet the scum sucking sales folks at Lithia Ford did the deal, and did it good to him.
No one expects anyone in car sales to evaluate someone who is border line mentally ill, but when it's sooooo obvious someone isn't there, if they do them "good" and it comes out in the open, they should pay dearly.
What would be the defense from the dealership personnel.....we snookered this guy to the tune of $13K-$15K? Guy wanted Toyota service, but we sold him a Focus instead? We saw an older gentleman (regardless of his mental state) and decided that instead of showing him where to go to get service, we'd take advantage of him?
I don't see any way how this is defensable on the dealership's personnel part. There is no way that they didn't know that this was, in any way, shape or form, the wrong thing to do.
This gentleman was right about one thing when he said his RAV4 was stollen when quizzed by his family.
That is why I hope the family sues, and they PAY DEARLY.......
I can't imagine ANY JURY IN THE WORLD finding for the Dealership... those scum bags!!
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
They traded straight-up, a brand-shiny-new Ford for his used Toyota. Shoot, they could have cut the trade-in value to 50% of the Focus price, added mop & glow, extended warrenty, pre-paid service contract, and wrapped it up in a high-rate loan. (I think we'll skip the credit-life on this one).
Yeah, they could have taken advantage, but they kept their mission statement in mind... :P
james
Probably only because no insurance company would accept the policy because of his age. I'd bet the salesman at Lithia Ford tried though.
Note to folks posting here: Use Lithia Ford in your posts, increases visibility and search hits with Google and Yahoo searches.
There is nothing in either of the articles that mentions anything like that. Why would you assume that? Shame on you. One of the articles did say, the family had been trying to take his driving away, but that's not easy.
"In Dad's case, anyone who spends two minutes with him would realize that he's not really here with the rest of us, not understanding questions, misinterpreting things, repeating himself, and so on."
It seems crystal clear to me: the old man was incapable of driving, yet his family let him. While it may be somewhat complicated to have his license revoked, they could simply have taken his keys away. He's probably so far gone he would've thought he lost them.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
How long ago were you a BMW salesman?.... As far as I can remember, they haven't had any...
Check this out:
http://www.edmunds.com/advice/incentives/holdback/index.html
I have been in this situation with my mother-in-law. It is NOT EASY AT ALL to take away or revoke a driver's license. And you simply can't take away car keys because people still have feelings and rights.... unless you go to a judge and revoke some of their rights. Until you have been in this situation, you don't know what you are talking about.....
Well if it goes to court (which I very much doubt!) you are not going to get any jury to think like you. I hope the Ford dealer gets taken to the cleaners!
This was outright robbery. The civil lawsuits should follow only after the district attorney puts some people in jail for some hard time.
Brought in a $28,000 car, left with a $13,000 car! They just did not use a gun.
The salesman, the finance man that everyone has to see these days, and the management person that signed off on the sale - send them away.
Only if something like this is done, will there be an impression made on the other people in the business that might be doning things like this.
I've been there. My sister actually had to deal with most of the stress involved. I pulled the coil wire from Dads old truck. This let him keep the key, and attempt to start it. My sister and brother-in-law, who lived nearby, had to dodge his requests to 'come over and start my truck', etc.
It's tough. This is your parent. The person that directed you in earlier years. They aren't going to believe you, their child, know what needs to be done for them.
And we all couldn't imagine any jury in the world finding for O.J. Simpson or Robert Blake or Michael Jackson..... hmmm...
That would depend on what the dealership tried to do to right the situation. Sometimes the "victims" are in it for the money and at times the juries have surprised them.
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
I've been there. My sister actually had to deal with most of the stress involved. I pulled the coil wire from Dads old truck. This let him keep the key, and attempt to start it. My sister and brother-in-law, who lived nearby, had to dodge his requests to 'come over and start my truck', etc.
It's tough. This is your parent. The person that directed you in earlier years. They aren't going to believe you, their child, know what needs to be done for them.
No one said it would be easy. But under these circumstances, where the old man's son admitted that his father was mentally incompetent, a tough decision has to be made. When it comes to public safety vs. a senile old man's feelings, it's pretty obvious what's more important.
Celebrity trials are a whole different issue. I live in California, I am very familiar with these...
There is nothing published to assume this is the case. Maybe you should read/re-read the newspaper articles. The dealership HAS NOT DONE THE RIGHT THING AT THIS POINT IN TIME!!