donbrew

My local Chevy dealer does the salesman is an hourly employee/the sales mgr does the deal thing. The first thing the sales mgr said to me is "the price on the window is the price" I said WHAT? on a used car and you seem to be about $700 too high, he said but do those other HHRs have alloy wheels? I said you mean the silver colored plastic wheel covers? .....It all ended badly and involved the Better Business Bureau and a refund and butt kissing and my vow to the dealer owner that my money would not be coming her way in the future.

DANNY99

Go to enterprise...they are terrific.

Haplo

I have to say we really lucked out. There is a local dealer that is probably about an hour's drive from us. Tons of them closer, but even just researching online - this place was beating everyone around not just by a few hundred bucks, but by a few *thousand*. And way less miles as well.

I looked up reviews on the place.. looked decent so we went. Our personal salesman was a younger guy - he was a bit flaky but extremely good natured and did not pressure us at all. We told him flat out that we're here to test drive a 2.2 and a 2.4 to see the difference. I want a black HHR and I'm going to drive it into the ground with my job. I want to see if it will really fit the bill.

He bent over backwards letting us drive several vehicles (seeing as how they had something like 144 HHR's it wasn't hard to find the very one I wanted!!!) and all he ever asked us was 'did the diffenece in engines seem like it would be worth the extra cost to you? If so I will get the price list for the 2.4's we have on the lot.' And he did. And he got us some coffee, and we talked over the price of the one I landed on, they gave me a fair value for my trade in (perhaps a bit more than fair... eh makes it look good right? ) and I drove away with everything taken care of.

Not sure if name dropping here is ok or not, but I would highly recommend them for being a very relaxed place with a friggin' OCEAN of vehicles to choose from. They must have over a thousand cars/trucks/etc. on that lot no kidding. and over 140 of them are HHRs!!

drummerdude

oh the horrors! if i had to do it again, i would have bought my HHR thru another dealer.

i went in to see if my local dealership could help me. the salesman i talked to on the phone met me at the door. so i was thinking this was a good sign. but he said, "i'll give you over to another salesman, i just had someone else come in". ok, strike one.

the second salesman went above the call of duty. i told him what i wanted HHR Panel. colors and packages, since they didnt have one on the lot.

he tells me that they found one in San Antonio (about 5 hours from me) (white, not one of my choices, but knew that my options were limited). i said i want to see and drive it before i sign.

the second salesman hands me back over to the first salesman to wait on finance (i know i know). he just sits there acting like he would rather be doing something else. strike 2. go to finance and get ok'd (still no signing at this point).

the first salesman says it will be tuesday (this is a thursday), before car is delivered and set up. no prob. they give me a used HHR to use in the mean time. point in his favor. i was told they would have info by friday.

friday arrives, no contact. saturday, no contact. so i go in saturday. i want to see the paperwork of what is on the car. sales manager comes out and says, he found one in of my colors in Missouri. point in his favor. but neither salesman had a clue to arrival or package.

car arrives, no issues. they did have to provide some fobs as they didnt get them from the original dealer (how does that happen?).

i had to send in my survey and didnt give them all 10's.

had to go thru another way to get my XM radio/OnStar issue corrected, dealer didnt and didnt know how to extend my package.

so yeah, i was a little upset with them, but i got my HHR.

then less than a month later, i get a letter in the mail that they want to buy my wife's G6. match the payments i have even. so we go.

they have a blue metallic HHR (wife loves blue). its a 1LT. we look at it and drive it. that saleswoman asks "how do you like it". i said its not a 1LT, the onstar wasnt on it (the mirror wouldnt support it). so i figured i'd get them to throw in the FMV. go to look at pricing and they wanted 4 grand above what was listed on the internet pricing. they told me what my trade-in was. 1 grand less than KBB, she said they dont use KBB, they use NADA. she had also told me that it had been in a bumper rub prior to being sold to dealership. she hands me the carfax, the car had the report prior to be sold to an auction in Colorado. so she lied to me. the finance guy, says he cant take the car down anymore.

i just stormed out, saying you lied from the beginning on payment match, the wreck and way overpriced. they just sat there with a stupor on their face.

i noticed the same HHR on their online add for 3 grand less than what they wanted to sell it to us for. sorry, no sale.

i went back in for something and told the sales manager that i would NEVER buy a car from them again. he just looked at me in a stupor as well.

another dealership 30 miles down the road.

hyperv6

I go back and read up on the trick sales staffs use to work the deal. There are may things they can and some will do.

Two things I do is go in like I don't know anything on the car to see how honest or informed the saleman is. Often I find them more times honest but not really up on the cars themselves.

Second I never take in a trade if I have one. I get an agreed price and then I toss out the trade to see what they offer. Most times I sell the car out right as my cars are normally in good shape and sell fast. My last truck sold in hours. But one time they gave me a really good price on my Sonoma and I cam back two says later and they gave me $4500 on a 10 year old S10 with over 100,000 miles. I was only going to ask $3800 for it but the guy backed out. I only gave $9000 new for it.

Krash Kadillak

Shoping for my (used) HHR, I was letting my fingers do the walking, because I was looking for specific colors and equipment. Almost travelled 350 miles to the next state over for one, but it had been sold when I called to confirm. Drove a few local, but wern't what I wanted. Wife was looking on-line for me too, found this low-mile '06 2LT at a Honda dealer about 100 miles away. Advertised price on Auto Trader seemed pretty high.

Took a shot one afternoon and went to see it. The sales 'experience' was very cordial and professional - about what you should expect. The negotiation was rather easy - went back and forth a couple of times until we got into the reasonable area. Signed the deal. Found out later they had the unit slated for a reduced 'sale' price the next day, withing a few dollars of what we paid. If they had just shown me that in the begining, we could have signed the deal then.

ChevroletCustomerService

warhawk77,

I am very sorry to hear about your experience. If you ever have any problems with your Chevrolet vehicle or service on it, feel free to contact me.

Evan, Chevrolet Customer Service

db/sb

Ahhh.....if I'm reading the story correctly, he didn't buy the car.....and the dealership's name was mentioned in the thread. Maybe you should 'feel free' to contact them but a bad customer service experience can't really be 'fixed' by any kind of follow up action.

Father Azmodius

I'm glad you had a better experience than I did with them. I use Criswell now.

warhawk77

I am going to buy a HHR just not from them. I have already been talking to other dealers this morning and with luck I will have a deal soon.