I've used Al Lawrence Sunoco for nearly 20 years, and never had a
problem
with either their diagnoses or their repairs. This sounds like a very
unpleasant
situation, but I don't think it's the norm for them.

-----Original Message-----
From: John Ellingsworth <john@elli...>
To: University City List <univcity@list...>
Sent: Sun, 08 Jan 2006 21:49:10 -0500
Subject: [UC] car ache

  Just wanted to pass this on as a warning to the rest of the list.

My wife dropped our car off at the Al Lawrence Sunoco gas station at
4601 Walnut St. 8 AM Wednesday morning for a routine oil change. When
she went back that afternoon to pick up the car, she was informed that
  in addition to the oil change, the car had to have 4 qts of
transmission
fluid added to it. The owner's son claimed the car was completely out
  of transmission fluid and the mechanic was unable to back the car out
of
the garage after service. As the car had been working perfectly fine
when dropped off, my wife disputed the charge and had words with the
man, asking him why he hadn't bothered calling and informing her that
the car wasn't working properly and/or asking whether she would like
  said transmission fluid added - or, she added, even bothered calling
to
  inform her that the car was done and ready for pickup as he had said
he
would (she'd had to call, and he had not mentioned any of this on the
phone). When she asked what he would do if she refused to pay for said
fluid, he replied he "would go and drain in out". My wife was
  understandably upset and said she felt his handling of the situation
was
unethical and she would no longer be a customer.

  After paying for the charges, she went out to the car, and after
putting
  it into gear, was able to drive only a few feet before the car
stopped.
  She tried again, and again, and although the motor seemed to be
running
fine, the car would not engage and move forward. For a car that had
been working perfectly up until that morning when she'd dropped it off
for an oil change, this was too much. My wife had it OUT with the
owner's son, who informed her that he would "fix it". I came straight
from work as soon as she called and told me what was happening. About
  an hour later, we were told in a round-about way that the mechanic
who'd
worked on our car - performing an OIL CHANGE (and BTW we're still not
  sure if we got the oil change that we did pay for) - accidentally
mixed
up the transmission fluid and oil compartments and/or the oil and
transmission fluids. My wife received a refund for the transmission
fluid they'd tried to get us to pay for, but we've yet to get a full
explanation as to exactly what they did to our car. As of this writing
  (Sunday evening), our car has been leaking fluid and in addition
smoking
everytime we drive at some speed or go any significant (over 10 mile)
distance. We wanted to take the car to my father-in-law's mechanic
right away, but he's unable to see us until the end of this upcoming
week. So today while at my in-law's I drained the transmission fluid,
  hoping to fill it properly. It appears as though they did pour oil
into
the transmission, as the liquid looked less red and much darker than
normal. We drove home just a little while ago (from Bucks County) and
by the time we arrived at the corner of 46th and Baltimore to buy gas,
the car was smoking so badly the guy at the pump next to me warned me
twice "to get it looked at - that's how cars catch on fire."

Needless to say, we are PISSED. My wife wants to file a police report,
and we need to get the car looked at by a reputable and trustworthy
mechanic. My sister-in-law has detailed what we need to do to go
  through small claims court and we are willing to take action if need
be.

We want people to know what happened to us, so it doesn't happen to
anyone else. That's Al Lawrence Sunoco, 4601 Walnut, where NOT to go
for a routine oil change, or anything else for that matter. Thanks for
your time.

-- Regards,

John Ellingsworth
http://john.ellingsworth.org
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