Below is a copy of an e-mail I sent Spirit Honda in El Monte, CA. To all buyers...DO NOT waste your money here! They have no clue about customer service and could not possibly care less about buyers after they have your money. The following situation could happen to you. If you care about your credit you will realize that the following is extremely scary. Please note that the dealership never responded in any way...

"You may or may not recall selling me this car on February 18, 2007. The purpose of this e-mail is to ask you to please forward my comments to your general manager (who refuses to return my calls). I have run out of options. I am trying to be a gentleman and am encountering an on-going problem with Spirit Honda that needs managerial attention. My intention in this communication is to allow the general manager an opportunity to preview the following message which will be posted on every Honda message forum I can find and will be sent to Honda Customer Service. As a gentleman I will also post any reply or correction your general manager wishes to offer.



I purchased my 2007 Civic Si Sedan on February 18, 2007. That day I wrote a check for $5,000. The money to cover my check left my account on February 21, 2007.



On April 12th I received a letter from TRS Recovery Services indicating that my check had been returned for insufficient funds. I contacted TRS and conducted a conference call with my bank. During that call TRS was assured by my bank that my check was never returned for ANY reason. I then faxed copies of my statements and proof of posting to TRS. After a couple of days I was told that my documentation was insufficient. TRS refused to provide me with any proof that my check had in fact been returned in violation of Federal and State law.



After a week of unsuccessfully dealing with TRS I contacted Spirit Honda for assistance. Together Spirit Honda staff and I concluded, once again, that my check had never been returned. Your bank, Bank of America, steadfastly refused to research the issue and insisted that they had proof that my check was returned. After some prompting from your employees Bank of America researched the issue and determined that my check had been sent back to Spirit Honda in error. I was informed by your staff that a different $5,000 check written that same day bounced, and mine had been negligently identified as the bad check.



By May 12, 2007 (30 days since I began trying to resolve this issue) I finally got an e-mail from your dealership telling me that they had received something in writing from Bank of America and that they were working with TRS to stop the collection process.



As of June 5, 2007 I have received nothing in writing from either TRS or Spirit Honda indicating that the collection has stopped. Thus I have been dealing with this situation almost 2 months and it remains unresolved. More than 8 hours of my time have been wasted on a problem that could have been easily avoided by a simple phone call from Spirit Honda. Had your dealership bothered to contact me before referring this to TRS Recovery it would have determined that my check had not been returned. Spirit Honda could have gotten its money much faster, could have collected the actual bad debt (which you may now have lost the ability to do) and could have avoided wasting 8 hours of my time. You also could have avoided alienating me as a customer.



The 8 hours that I wasted on this problem cost me money. Although the staff at Spirit Honda have been very pleasant I have been offered nothing other than an “I’m sorry” to compensate me for my trouble. I have left two messages for the general manager to afford Spirit Honda the opportunity to demonstrate its commitment to customer service. The manager’s failure to return either call is a clear expression of that commitment. What is apparent to me is that this entire nightmare was caused by Spirit Honda’s policy of not trying to resolve the problem before referring me to TRS Recovery.



Part of our contract was the covenant of good faith and fair dealing. In my opinion the preceding facts reflect Spirit Honda’s violation of such covenant and resultant breach of our contract. As such please let me know what arrangements you would like to make to pick your car up and return my money to me.



I plan to share my experience with every Honda buyer possible. As consumers we have the right to use our purchasing power to reward companies that give good service and to avoid those that don’t. It is my intention in posting this message to help future buyers make an intelligent decision about where to spend their money by presenting a factual account of events. There is an abundance of Honda dealerships and buyers should spend their hard earned money someplace that will at least pretend to value them as customers.



I have done everything possible to present a factual account of the events. If Spirit Honda believes that any of the foregoing is untrue or simply wishes to express a contrary opinion I will post your comments along with mine. As such I will wait a couple of days before posting anything on the internet to give you a chance to respond.



Again…please let me know what arrangements you want to make to come get your car and return my money.



Thank you for forwarding this for me. "

 

The problem may lie with BofA, I had a problem with them when I wrote a large check. They were notified to hold the funds for that check to clear even though the funds were available, they placed two holds on it and then they preceeded to bounce the check. That was over the course of two weeks, and when I called BofA they couldn't figured out why the check wasn't clearing. I went ahead and close my account and took the cash to clear my balance.