I wrote back in February (page 4 of the forum) that a rocker panel or skirt broke off of my Mazda 5 after a long frigid cold snap. I questioned whether the sustained cold snapped the plastic clips and was told no, I likely ran over something and broke the clips myself. I hadn't but that's my word against theirs. The long and short is that I wrote head office, who sent the letter downstairs to some customer service rep. He 'investigated'it by calling the dealership's service manager, who said he was positive that I was at fault. After a series of phone calls to me at work telling me that the dealership has to be headoffice's 'eyes and ears', the service rep basically sent me a letter that said too bad , so sad but you have to pay the $400. plus labour and taxes to have it replaced as it is not a warranty issue. I took the car to another dealership in another city, over an hour away for a regular servicing and discussed the issue with a service rep there. I was looking for a place to vent, not for a handout at this point. He then spoke to the manager and they graciously ordered and installed the panel yesterday at cost of material less cost of labour and taxes. I will continue to go out of my way to this dealersship for warranty servicing now. I will not go to the local again unless it is an extreme emergency. As to whether I purchase another Mazda will be decided when hubby's car is ready to be traded. We will decide then whether we want to travel the highway for two servicings. The dealerships may be the eyes and ears of headoffice, but I feel they are becoming blind and deaf to customers and are not worrying enough about things after the car leaves the lot.

 

Well said mazda5momma!!! Each dealership is different and sometimes just takes going to a different one to get an entirely different response. I remember your original post about the issue. Felt then as I still do now that they should have had to show you the evidence of the impact that caused the panel to break away from the vehicle. The panel should well be able to withstand a small impact and one that was substantial enough to cause complete breakage would have shown up by a telltale impact mark on the underside. Without that evidence they should have had no recourse but to replace as a faulty part.