is it possible to find good service in s. calif

[novfilms]

we bought our x5 several months ago from nick alexander imports. although we live about 35 miles away in the palisades, just north of santa monica, the service package they offered made it seem like the right place to make a deal.

the service package includes a loaner and flat bed pick up and delivery for service. great deal right?

well, the flat bed needs to be ordered several months in adavnce. that's ok for us, we have a 3rd car. but the loaner was also a key.

so, last week, our x5 is parked on street in westwood and someone (hit and run) sideswiped the car knocking the mirror off. i speak to the salesman at nick alexander and he assures me that they will get the parts i need and set up the loaner if we drop off the car. i also let him know that while the car is there he can retro fit the sirius radio set-up into the nav system. so even though the mirror is a minor thing (the plastic casing was totally in tact) the dealership would also get the sirius installation.

so, my wife brings the car in this morning and no loaner, service guy has never heard of us, nothing ordered...my wife turned around and left. my mercedes mechanic found the parts i need at south bay bmw and he'll put them back together. but what do i do about service. i've heard nothing but bad things about santa monica and when we were looking to buy, beverly hills was a joke as well. not on price in either place just attitude.

we've had good luck with mercedes and this is our first bmw in years but i'm not sure what to do about service. nick alexander is completely unreliable and santa monica and bev hills seem lacking as well. has anyone had a good experience anywhere?

thanks for any help

alan siegel

[x5GuyInLA]

Hi Alan,

I live not too far from you in Santa Monica and my neighbor down the street works as a field engineer/mechanic(I think that's what he said) for BMW. He said that the service at Bev Hills BMW is pretty good, much better than Santa Monica. I think it all depends on the service guy you work this though. I think the guy he recommended was Sam. I don't remember his last name, but when I talk to my neighbor again, I'll ask him. I have yet to bring in my X5 for service(knock on wood) as I bought it a few months ago too, so I don't have any first hand experience with them.

[UCrewX5]

Crevier BMW has a very good service reputation

[motordavid]

What year is your X?
Never heard of "ordering a flatbed" months in advance? WTF? Like predicting when you will need a band-aid and "ordering" one.

If it's new, the flatbed comes, within hours...if it's CPO or used, dunno.

What the hell is a "service pkg" besides some foo-foo Stlr add on margin bs?

Unusual questions in your post...the MB stlr isn't full of bs, too?

I'd drop that Stlr like a case of rabies.
GL,md

[The Big Easy]

Absolute nonsense.

Send a flatbed for delivery and service........ I would send that truck to the stealer's house for picking up his wheels at 01h00.

Sorry, I would be able to suggest a good dealership in OR or KY.

Cheers,

[ifly]

Had good luck with the following;

South Bay BMW, but if you did not buy from them I have heard some stories on loaners

Century West BMW in Universal City, had no problem with them.

Crevier BMW in Santa Ana, but that may be too far of a drive for you.

[novfilms]

30 hours later, and not even an apology from my sales guy at nick alexander. i really didn't care about the flat bed thing. that was their perk to get people using their service that live at distances like us at about 35 miles away. but what really bothered me was that after being assured that i would be taken care on this repair, who to talk to, ordering the part...nothing was done. no loaner, not on the service list, no parts ordered. his claim that he would be available on his cell 24 hours a day. bullshit. never answered his phone, or page. and as i said...he still cares so much for his customer base that he hasn't even called to say, what can i do to rectify the situation. not even, sorry about the misunderstanding. sorry you had totake 2 hours out of your day to find out we don't have our shit together...

if i handled my business that way, i'd run out of clients pretty fast

alan

[kirkX5m]

Originally Posted by UCrewX5

Crevier BMW has a very good service reputation

i must bring up the issue of crevier being "good"
my sister's 330 had just gotten out of warranty by 10 days (mileage was still low) and her car broke down near Crevier. instead of towing it back to where we bought it (bmw of riverside) she decided to take to crevier. to make a long story short, because the car was so close to being out of warranty, they could have done the repair for free. instead, they wanted to charge about 1200$ for the repair. bmw of riverside's john horgan tried really hard to talk to crevier and pull some strings to have them do the repair for free since they could, but they did not budge and wouldn't do it. we ended up towing the car back to bmw of riverside, paid crevier their lame 150$ inspection fee and had it repaired free of charge at bmw of riverside....
this happened about 4 weeks ago.
crevier did call back since they had nothing but 1's on their bmw NA survey to apologize but whats the point really?

[Thunder22]

South Bay is definitely the way to go. I bought my '01 4.4i from Long Beach because at the time i was living down in Newport, but after about 6 months i moved to Hermosa and South Bay was the closest dealer. At the time they were over on the PCH by Artesia, but have since moved to Hawthorne.

They always took care of me, gave me a loaner if one was available etc, and they were a lot smaller back then. Btw - Long Beach was just as good.

The one dealer I would most certainly NEVER go to is Sterling in Newport, take my word for it.

[novfilms]

an update...yesterday, dec 5, i finally got a call. not from the owner, elizabeth alexander, but at least someone replied right away to the complaint i sent to them by mail. she was solicitous, but when she might have stepped up to the plate and even offered to pay for the gas to go down there and back (i would have been pleased by the offer and that alone would have been enough) she didn't. the 10 dollars is meaningless). my point is just for most of us, even the elementary form of courtesy would be meaningful. i'm quite certain that if any of you out there treated your own clients like most of these dealerships treat us after we've spent 35 to 85 thousand dollars. we'd be looking for new clients.

the head of the internet dept, edmund, has yet to call and apologize for even any misunderstanding. it's beyond me how these people operate. it's possible others have had different experiences, but when i owned new mercedes and range rovers, my dealers, simonson and hornburg went the extra mile to make things work. contrary to others' problems, hornburg went so far as to go to bat at the national level and get land rover to replace a new car for me. i'm not sure now why i didn't just buy a new rover. well, the extra 35K probably did it. but whether you pay 50 or 80, courtesy is courtesy.

oh, for those of you that misunderstood the "flatbed" issue from my original post...nick alexander is really in the middle of nowhere relative to most of los angeles. to entice buyers that live far away, they offer a flatbed pickup and delivery of your vehicle when it comes time for service. send the flatbed out to get your car. bring the loaner with them. when the car is ready, they send the flatbed back with your car and take the loaner. in theory, it's great. but then you realize, the flatbed needs to be ordered within 1000 to 1500 miles from your service. god only knows if you have to wait an inordinate amount of time to get your car back. it's not like there's a truck just waiting for your car to be finished. still, the bmw loaner is at least a nice option. but in practice, even this was not handled with any class or honesty.

just for convenience, i'll probably just go to santa monica and take a valium...

alan