COVID-19 Lockdown Period Excessive Extended Warranty Pricing by Mercedes-Benz Bryanston (foremerly known as Sandown Motors) and subsequent evasion/collusion by Mercedes-Benz South Africa Customer Assistance Centre

This is a complicated case to which I have lots of supporting documentation and I will attempt to unpack it as concisely as possible for you here. A few months ago, I was looking at purchasing a used Mercedes-Benz E-Class and subsequently engaged with Tracy-Leigh Carlin from Mercedes-Benz Bryanston, who, only after much prompting and follow up on my part, agreed to provide me with a quote on a used E400 on their floor. I required a further extended warranty quote and after much deliberation on my part, she eventually provided me with a quote, which seemed grossly inflated and out of line with similar offerings in the industry. When queried, she claimed that the quote was system generated and provided by the F&I person on their floor, Rosa Nunes.

As I was shopping around for similar cars at the time, I came across another used E-Class, this time a slightly more expensive V8 Bi-Turbo E500 model being sold by Glen Kekana at Grand Central Motors Midrand. His service was exemplary it has to be said and he provided me with an extended waranty quote without hesitation and without repeat prompting. His extended warranty quote was more than half the amount cheaper than what was quoted to me by Mercedes-Benz Bryanston for the very same MBSA warranty product and to top it off, his was for a larger engined, more expensive, more powerful model. Something didnt seem right and I contacted the D.P. of Mercedes-Benz Bryanston, Shaun Solomon, who said that he would speak to Rosa Nunes and investigate and get her to send me a new, revised quote. Shortly thereafter, I got sent exactly the same quote as before! Sensing something wrong, I decided to contact the Mercedes-Benz Customer Assistance Centre, whereafter comms from Mercedes-Benz Bryanston to me immediately ceased.

I linitially lodged a query with one of the consultants there, requesting an investigation into the huge variance in extended warranty pricing between the 2 dealerships and was told that I would get a revert within their 48 hour turnaround time. A week later, without feedback, I called them and was told by the consultant that my case was passed onto the Team Leader/Team Manager, Ruth, who immediately marked my case as closed and hence struck off the system and hence not requiring a revert! I eventually managed to speak to Ruth and she said that I should resend all the information, in order for her to reopen the case, which I did! After a long period, again, no feedback, so I took it upon myself to call them again.

This time I spoke to a consultant by the name of Victoria Mphela, who said that Ruth had apparently resent me an email and subsequently reclosed the case! Since I had not received any email from Ruth, I asked Victoria to forward that mail to me. Instead of doing so and answering my questions, she then sent me a cut and paste of Mercedes-Benz's extended warranty terms and conditions and a follow up email stating that this was the company's final stance, without answering my questions whatsoever! In my correspondence with Victoria, I copied the Customer Assistance Center Manager, Lance Mooney on all correspondence but he refused to engage with me, despite multiple requests on my part and only started calling me telephonically after I escalated the matter within Mercedes-Benz, through contacts I had within the company.

Lance claimed that even though he was copied on all the correspondence that I CC'd him on, he did not have any of it anymore and that I should resend everything to him, which I did! He then promised to speak to the head of warranties to ascertain the variance in the quotes and confrm if Mercedes-Benz Bryanston's quote was in fact system generated. I got a call back from Lance a few days later and he said that he believed that the quotes were system generated but could not account for the huge cost variance. I requested that he get to the bottom of this with the warranty department and confirm with me - something that he has failed to do, to date, despite repeated prompting on my behalf. This is where the trail went cold and which is what prompted my post here.

It is my belief that the continual evasion of answering my questions, speaks of possible collusion between Mercedes-Benz Bryanston and the Mercedes-Benz Customer Assistance Centre, with the manufacturer seemingly covering up for this dealership's manually inflated pricing and misinformation in this regard and then trying its best to "sweep my query under the carpet". My advice to anyone considering dealing with Mercedes-Benz Bryanston, is to go in with eyes wide open and cross shop all quotations received from them. Buying a Mercedes-Benz from them, or from any Mercedes-Benz dealership for that matter, may inevitably lead you into interacting with Lance Mooney and his Customer Action Centre team and here you will get first hand experience, of what poor customer after sales experience within the motor industry is like. Fortunately my engagement with Mercedes-Benz and Mercedes-Benz South Africa was off putting enough to lead me to puchasing from another brand.