<p>Have you called AAA yet and gotten an explanation for the interminable delay? And on Tues will you find out from the highway dept why in the world they would tow someone to the side of the road and leave them there instead of taking them just a little bit further to civilization?</p>
<p>Actually, no I haven’t called AAA yet and I’m not sure I’m going to. They seemed so disorganized during the 6 calls on that day that I’m not in the mood to deal with them again (unless absolutely necessary). I’m also wondering if the fact that my son told the first tow guy that he needed a tow off the parkway in order for AAA to respond was the reason why they literally towed him just off the parkway.</p>
<p>After thinking about it for a couple of days, I decided to call AAA and complain about the service. The man that I spoke with checked the AAA records and they recorded the time of my son’s call to AAA to be around 6:00 pm on Friday and AAA didn’t come to help until 11:30 pm. It’s all in their records. I also complained about the tow truck demanding $580 in cash in the middle of the night or he wasn’t going to take the car of the flatbed truck and was going to take the car back. I also complained about the 6 phone calls to AAA and not getting any explanations or satisfactory responses. We also complained that AAA promised to call us back during this time frame and fill us in on what was happening with our son yet not one of them (including a supervisor who promised us a phone call) called us back.<br>
We saved the case# as well as the Tow company’s receipt–C & C Automotive Repair Services, Inc.–New Rochelle, NY. Our complaint is now in AAA’s system and one of their customer service complaint management people is supposed to call us back. Do you think they will? LOL</p>
<p>I hope you hear from them within a day or two. If you don’t, I would call back! Be prepared with what type of compensation you want when they call. At the very least, I would ask for a year free of AAA service; maybe an upgrade in your plan. You might want to be bold and ask for a refund of the tow service. I know you would have had to pay for the tow no matter who you had use, so maybe have them split the charge with you.</p>
<p>Feel out the CS rep that calls you and see what you think you can get from them. I have had success with getting what I want from the CS reps as long as I am calm and nice. I usually do better with the women. Just the past week while talking to AT&T about putting my husband on an unlimited data plan on his Palm, I was able to get them to give me a $75 credit for the overage my husband accrued. For some reason he though he had an unlimited internet plan when he didn’t!! I take care of most of the plans for cable, phone, etc… and he had no idea how much it would cost to go over!!</p>
<p>nysmile - I’ve learned a lot from your thread - I had no idea there were places AAA wasn’t allowed to go. And aside from long waits, we’ve never had any trouble with service. I would like to hear what customer service says when they get back to you. If it isn’t satisfactory, how about all us CC friends (what are friends for?) call our own AAA services, and ask if this is normal service and something we should be concerned about. Maybe if AAAs all over the country start getting calls, they might see ramifications of poor service. </p>
<p>You have been much calmer than I would have been, I’m afraid. Leaving my kid out alone on the highway in the middle of the night … not okay.</p>
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Definitely follow this advice. It’s worked well for me and you should hear the stories my D who was formerly a customer service person for a major electronics retailer tells. If a person rants and screams, they’re likely to not get their way. If they curse they’re likely to end up getting hung up on. If they speak calmly, logically, albeit firmly, and ask to speak to a supervisor if they’ve not reached a satisfactory conclusion with the first CS person, they can have a much better shot at getting their way.</p>
<p>AAA needs to do something - 5 1/2 hours and 6 callbacks is way ridiculous. I do think the AAA CS person will call you back now that you have a case number.</p>
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<p>23S off the Hutch/Merritt Pkwy is an incredibly safe, residential area. That’s Scarsdale/upscale White Plains. I lived there before.</p>
<p>Anyways Lexus has a similar thing with 24 hour roadside assistance, but I found that Lexus will get your call and just call AAA for a tow truck (put a flat tire in my mom’s car). But it was in broad daylight, on the Stanford campus, and the tow truck arrived in about 25 minutes. We went out for a jamba juice in the meanwhile.</p>
<p>They sent a guy from New Rochelle up to Scarsdale to do the towing? There’s the reason it took so long! Because there’s not a single service station at Scarsdale that can handle the case at 6:30 in the evening, right?</p>
<p>I admire your son’s persistence…seriously. If I were him I would have just called a cab to the nearest Metro North station and taken the train home after about 2 hours. I can always deal with the car later. Not that I’d be willing to make an 8 hour drive home in the first place-I would have probably taken Amtrak or flown home. ;)</p>
<p>Not that I’m a total spoiled brat-I don’t trust myself to be able to drive that long. My back starts hurting after about an hour and a half of nonstop driving, even with heated seats to relax the pain away.</p>
<p>Just curious - I know that you don’t give your kids an allowance - who is paying for the $580 tow fee?</p>
<p>Obviously, we as his parents paid for the tow and never expected him to pay for something like this. As I said in the other thread about “not giving our kids an allowance”—our sons (as well as all of their friends and most of their peers) work during the summer months. They earn their own money to pay for their incidental things like—gas for their car, entertainment money, additional snacks/food/coffee outside the home, music, electronics (we will purchase replacement laptops if the ones that we all ready bought them break), etc. </p>
<p>I’m assuming your post was meant to be sarcastic because of your strong opinion that kids shouldn’t work but rather spend their time having fun and doing whatever they choose to do during the summer months. Although I may not agree with that philosophy, every parent has the right to decide what is best for their family. Personally, I feel kids get a lot out of working and earning their own money. No matter how menial a job is, they’ve learned valuable lessons from them. They’ve also learned to never judge a person based on the “status” of the job but rather have respect for the person and their work ethic. </p>
<p>I’m still waiting for AAA’s Customer Service to call back. Son left at 8:30am today for his drive back to college.</p>
<p>Not necessarily sarcastic, but trying to learn your priorities. If you re-read my posts I never said that “kids shouldn’t work but rather spend their time having fun and doing whatever they choose to do during the summer months”. However, I do believe that if they want to have a luxury such as a car, they’re on their own for cost, repairs, and insurance in addition to gas. In fact, I also said in previous posts that they are on their own for extras such as trips with their friends. An allowance enables them not to have to work during “education” time for standard spending money.</p>
<p>It was sarcastic and meant to put me down because in our household we expect our kids to work during the summer in order to earn money to pay for their books and spending money throughout the year. Yes, we paid for the tow and I seriously doubt any other parent with the funds on hand would not have done the same if their kid found themselves in a typical situation. </p>
<p>This thread is about AAA and the experience that we had when S’s car broke down on a parkway as he was driving home from school for the long weekend. If you want to discuss issues regarding “allowance”, please do so on the appropriate thread.</p>
<p>By the way, as I was typing this, S called to say that he make it back to school—7 hour drive without any complications. I’m still waiting to hear back from AAA.</p>
<p>Let us know what AAA says. They owe you an apology and some money (at least a refund of your AAA fee for the year), in my opinion.</p>
<p>Re: #92 - done. And had I had the funds on hand I would have paid too - but expected reimbursement.</p>
<p>BTW - I’ve always found it helpful to get the actual name and phone number of the tow service that AAA is calling and call them as well. I’ve reached them before AAA has on more than one occasion.</p>
<p>Did you figure out what was wrong with the car yet - bad water pump, burst hose, hole in radiator?</p>
<p>It’s still at the shop and we haven’t heard yet. We do know that the fan wasn’t working, the battery wouldn’t hold a charge, and within 3 minutes of running the engine–the temp. gauge went all the way up and we could smell something overheating.</p>
<p>Car Diagnosis–thermostat inside the radiator needs to be replaced as well as the motor that runs the fan belt/fan.</p>
<p>^^ What I like about my ole 66 Mustang - thermostat sticks open if it fails (but it’s never failed) and no motor for the fan - only a belt that’s easily seen and fixed for < $10.</p>
<p>At least it doesn’t sound like too expensive of a fix.</p>
<p>nysmile, I would chang emy mechanic after this one. I don’t see any reason to let the car run hot for 3 minutes to see the fan isn’t functional. It took a very short time to do significant harm to the internal part of engine if you start to smell things.</p>
<p>UUD, the newer cars have one or two fans in additional to the fan runs with water pump. Those fans run on motors controlled by temperature sensors. </p>
<p>I am also surprised to hear that a themostat could cause overheating. because the fail mode should be 100% open.</p>
<p>I had a conversation a few days ago with a friend about AAA–they were recommending it as a way to save on hotel bills. I explained that in my experience, dealing with AAA was far worse than dealing directly with a local tow company AND I’d found cheaper hotel prices simply by calling and asking if I could have the AAA rate even though I wasn’t a member.</p>