Sarwesh Karki | Page 2

rjbyrom responded

The tear was actually on passenger side, I typed it incorrectly.

rjbyrom responded

This letter is one among many we sent to Kia. Nothing was ever done. A repair that probably would've cost $400, ruined any chance of us buying another Kia and paying thousands to them over time for a car and interest. Ridiculous business if you ask me! January 2, 2023 To whom it may concern: My name is Janet Byrom. My husband Robert Byrom and I chose to purchase a 2022 Telluride on February 2, 2022. We needed a dependable and reliable car. Based on Consumer Reports we had decided this was a good choice. We looked for several months to find a Telluride and the pricing was very competitive. We found our car at Southwest Dallas, TX location, which is over an hour from our home in Rockwall. We finalized our purchase paying about $9,000 over MRSP. We are both retired, Robert a City of Mesquite employee and Janet is a retired first grade teacher in Rockwall, TX. We planned and saved money to make this purchase. It had been almost 10 years since we had purchased a vehicle. We paid down approximately $40,000. Therefore, this purchase was not done lightly. We realize this is a lot of information, but it is necessary for you to understand our situation. I am currently going through cancer with treatments at MDA in Houston, TX. To date, our car only has about 8,000 miles on it. In October, I noticed a tear in the upper passenger seat. (Pictures attached) We have never had anything sharp or other things that would’ve torn this seat. We contacted our dealer (Southwest Dallas) and were told to contact PermaPlate. See email attached dated September 23, 2022, where Siskin assigned us a claim number. I spoke with a repairman named Richard who did work through PermaPlate. He has been doing these types of repairs for 30 plus years. After he looked at the pictures, he told me that I should contact the dealer and that this should be covered under warranty. He also stated that there is no way this could’ve been done by us and that he could only make it about 85% better. So, we contacted Southwest-Dallas to evaluate our problem where the car was originally purchased. Rarely does anyone answer the phone there, so after numerous calls and a couple of weeks later we were asked by Joel Santhosh, a service employee at Southwest Kia Dallas to send pictures of the tear. See email attached dated October 4, 2022, where I, Janet sent him the pictures. We received an email (see attached) on October 5, 2022 from Joel stating that the service manager stated that the tear was done by “outside influence”. Joel told us that the district manager, Matt Pfifer is the one who turned us down. This was very upsetting to us, as we know we didn’t do it. Because it took so long to get an answer from Dallas, we decided to contact our local Southwest – Rockwall dealer in person. After meeting with their service team members, Charles DeHorny and Jimmy Scott and showing them the tear, they told us that this should be covered under warranty but had to be approved by a manager. Another 3-4 weeks went by, and we finally heard from Southwest-Rockwall via cell phone that our repair would not be covered and that per the district manager “we did the damage, and we were shopping it around trying to find someone to fix it under warranty”. This was ridiculous, and somewhat infuriating to be accused because we live in Rockwall and were getting no answer from Southwest Kia-Dallas. Our reasoning was let’s go to the closest dealer for convenience sake. I was also told from Charles DeHorny, Rockwall service representative that if it were up to him, this would’ve been repaired, but the manager, Matt Pfifer “never approves anything”! After all the above, we contacted the Corporate office in mid to late October, and after numerous calls and change of representatives, we finally get an answer in December stating that Kia would not cover the repairs. We are so disappointed with the service and treatment after we purchased this very expensive car. We would like someone to reconsider the situation. We do not want to have to continue to pursue this in the legal system, but you are leaving us no other choice. We will be contacting Consumer Affairs, Better Business Bureau, local media sources , and legal services. We feel we’ve been very patient with Kia and are not wanting this to go on any longer. We hope to have a positive response very soon. Thank you, Janet and Robert Byrom