Apparently, not my grandfather’s warning to NEVER take my car to Sears for car maintenance.nor Ron White’s jokes about Sears auto center were enough to deter us from making the mistake. We had to experience the nightmare for ourselves.
June 4, 2013, 3:53 pm
With the discount offered by Bob of free tire mounting and $10 off alignment due to the problems we encountered on May 17, 2013, we stop in to have our two tires mounted on the front of the vehicle. We are asked to pull the car into the center. Daughter drives the car into the center. She asks Carlos, “Do you want me to leave the keys in the ignition”? He answers, “Yes.” Supervisor Bob and Carlos look at our tires in the trunk. Bob asks me, “They’re not identical tires, do you still want me to put those on”? I ask, “Does it matter if they match? Are they better than the ones I already have on there”? Bob replies, “No, it doesn’t really matter that much. They are better than what you have on there now.”
We are told to give them two hours to complete the work.
We come back at 6:00 pm. Carlos retrieves our work order envelope. Daughter 2 looks and is just ready to say, “I think you have the wrong pack because those aren’t our keys,” when he pulls the key from the pack, hands it to Daughter 1. Daughter 1 tells him, “Wait, where’s the other half of this key chain”? Our key chain had a clip where one end contained the key to the vehicle and the other end contained the key fob and our house keys. The KEY we were handed was only the key to the vehicle — the other half of the key chain was missing the key remote and our house keys!
The next two hours at Sears Auto Center at the Florida Mall went like this:
Technicians/salesmen still onsite looked around the auto center and looked through the vehicle. Supervisor Bob was called at home and returns to the center. We confirmed that the key chain was completely intact when they were directed by Carlos to leave the keys in the ignition.
Store manager, accompanied by her rude and uncooperative intern, along with two men apparently part of Simon mall security arrived on the scene. We were told that they were going to view videos, search parking lot, search lockers, etc. A pair of pants discovered in the bushes by Daughter 2 and someone of these people was searched.
At one point, Melanie comes to us with a set of keys — there are several keys with a blue item that looks like a small flashlight or lighter, a gray item that looks like a box cutter on a blue parachute clip. Daughter 1 and I tell her that — no, these are not our keys. She proceeds to tell us, “These must be another client’s keys.” ??? !!!
Bob could not reach the mechanic at his home number for two hours regarding whereabouts of our keys. Fearing that Sears having our home address and that whoever may have our house keys may be attempting to rob our home, we asked “mail security” gentlemen to call the Orange County Police.
Officers arrived to investigate and take our statement in filing a police report. The keys were not recovered. The police contacted Polk County police to have an officer go to the house.
Supervisor Bob informed us after 8:00 that he was going to take $25.00 off our bill in compensation for time.
We had to leave Sears Auto Center at the Florida Mall without our key remote and our house keys that we had originally left with them.
To top this off, no sooner did we drive off the lot and get about a mile down Orange Blossom Trail than the tire indicator light turned on the dashboard!
June 5, 2013
I am expecting call from Supervisor Bob today around noon. According to Bob, he would call me today around noon with information after the technician who worked on the vehicle is questioned when he reports to work around noon. They will try to ascertain what happened to the keys when he comes in. Bob, in fact, DID NOT CALL us as he told me. Another manager, Chris, called us because apparently Bob is off on Wednesday! See that post.
Sears and Sears Auto and Tire Centers 