Hendrick BMW in Charlotte, NC

[Juanted]

We've bought two cars (my X5 and my wife's X3) from Hendrick.

First the good (service department):
Their service department is wonderful! They have always treated me extremely well, and taken great care of my X. I have nothing but glowing things to say about their service department. They are professional, accomodating, knowledgable, and competent. Great folks.

Now, for the bad (sales department):
We ended up getting a GREAT deal on my wife's X3's lease. This, however, was a result of my complaining to the service department about the sales department. It's really a long, complicated story, and I won't bore you with the details. I will only say that they were using EVERY trick in the book to NOT honor an ad we saw in the paper ("the ad was wrong," "it's a loss leader, and we've already leased it for this week," "it's the wrong model," etc.). I took my X5 in for its scheduled maintenace, and, as usual, my service advisor treated me wonderfully. I then asked him, "how come you guys get it, but the people in front do not?" He looked at me with a confused look in his face. I told him what had been going on with the sales reps. and he said, "Would you mind if I bring it this up to my general manager's attention?" to which I said, "go ahead." The GM called me later that day, and I explained to him what had been happening. I said to him that even though we wanted to buy his product, we were ready to walk and go somewhere else; that folks like MB, VW, Porsche and Acura also had wonderful products, and that customer service HAS to be the one thing that sets them apart. He agreed. He was very nice, very professional, and said, "whatever I can do to make this right, I will." So, in the end, they did make everything right, and we ended getting the X3. They did treat us very well, and the experience was very pleasant. I was told that this is a new general manager who is trying to ensure that the quality of the buying experience is as good if not better than their cars.

We love our cars, and, as I said earlier, their service department has been wonderful. This is why we will likely give them another chance when it is time for me to get the X5 in '07.

Juan