Discount Tire reviews and complaints 1
View all 154 complaintsDiscount Tire - discount tire destroyed our car
We are an average hard working American family. We take responsibility for ourselves and never complain, take a stand or see ourselves as victims, until now!
I went to the Discount Tire store located at 1230 South Milton Road, Flagstaff, Arizona. November 9th, 2009 to have the tires rotated on our 2005 Kia Sorrento. I clearly informed the salesperson that the vehicle was 4-wheel drive and with the possibility of winter storms in the forecast “I want to ensure that my wife had safe transportation while I was out town on business”.
The manager, “Kurt” informed me that he would not rotate the tires and instead wanted me to purchase new tires right then. I informed him that was not possible today and I was leaving on a business trip.
The front tires did have an uneven wear pattern and needed to be rotated. There was still plenty of tread on the tires and would have been fine on the rear of the car until after the first of the year and we were past the holidays. The rear tires had plenty of tread and looked almost new. The set of four were replaced in 2007 and I was driving less then 20 miles a day during this time frame.
Kurt insisted that this was unsafe and offered to install a pair of loaner tires to get us through until we could replace the tires. His offer seemed reasonable and I trusted his “professional opinion”.
After about a 45 minute wait one of the young men announced that my car was ready. He thanked me and said the documents were in the glove box.
On December 7th, 2009 during a storm my wife called me and said she was having problems on the icy roads while in four-wheel drive. This was the beginning of a serious winter storm and the roads were pretty bad.
After about 16 miles of driving down state route 89a in snow and ice the car was smoking and shuttering. My wife pulled over and called me. I told her to call roadside assistance have it towed where we could have it looked at.
Upon inspection by the Kia dealership they determined that entire driveline of the car was destroyed and the tires were the blame. The service manager said, “you need to go after the person that put those tires on your car!” In reviewing the documents from the tire swap on November 9th it was clear and known to them, they put a taller pair of tires on front of the car than what was installed on the rear of the car.
Here is what Discount determined in their “investigation”:
Dear Ms. XXXXXX:
A review of the above referenced claim has been completed. According to a statement taken by the tow truck driver that transported your vehicle to Oxendale Kia you drove your vehicle in 4_wheel drive for over 30 miles on flat freeway. When the tires were installed as a temporary replacement in November 2009 it was not brought to the salespersons attention that your vehicle was a 4_wheel drive vehicle. Had your vehicle not been placed in 4-wheel drive the temporary tires would have performed without causing damage. Based on this information, Discount Tire will not be issuing any voluntary payments to indemnify you at this time.
If you have any additional information that you think may be relevant in our liability investigation, please submit it to my attention for. In the absence of any new information, our file will remain closed. Please be advised that the statute of limitations for property damage claims in the state of Arizona is 2 years from the date of loss.
Sincerely,
Claims Mgmt Dept.
Discount Tire Company
I have removed the name and phone number here in all fairness. Now, the statements in this denial letter are totally false. The tow truck driver that delivered the car to the Dealership claims to have never made such a statement.
It was 16 miles until the vehicle failed on an icy, snowy canyon road. the Kia dealerships service department agrees with the owners’ manual (with the correct tires installed) even if this were driven on a Flat freeway it would not cause any damage to the driveline.
Obviously the person who wrote this letter has never been to Northern Arizona, for there is nothing “Flat” about where we live or the drive to my wife’s office which is not via a freeway.
I was clear with Kurt that this was a 4x4 vehicle and to add insult to injury, they have put tires on this car recently and all the information about our car in their system.
We are a simple, happy, working class family. We trusted the ‘experts’ at Discount Tire with our needs. As a result, our vehicle is sitting at the Kia dealers with more than $12, 000 in damaged parts and we are still making the monthly payments on it. We have 2-car loans out- we simply can’t qualify for another vehicle loan.
Bottom line; we are stuck paying for a mistake made by Discount Tire.
I paid for a one-hour consultation with an attorney. He informed us that we would have to foot the entire bill to take this to court and could not be reimbursed for our expenses since nobody was physically injured. I am grateful my wife or some else on the road was not injured. I would not trade the welfare of others in order to force Discount tire to do the right thing and repair our Sorrento that their mistake and negligence damaged.
Do not purchase tires from any of their stores. Clearly they are not just incompetent, they are sorry people of poor character with no morals and don’t care who they hurt!
The complaint has been investigated and resolved to the customer’s satisfaction.
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I went to Discount Tire to get a single tire changed because of a flat and they told me that because my other tires had less than half their tread left they had to replace all four or couldn’t touch it. That was over $900! Forget you Discount Tire!
PLEASE CANCEL THIS ACOUNT I DO NOT EVEN HAVE ANY INFO ON THIS ACOUNT AND IT IS PAYED IN FULL. # ENDING IN9003
Having the best tires on the rear IS the industry standard. The NHTSA and as far as I know all tire makers recommend this practice. But it is not a scam, it's kind of a Catch-22 depending upon ones interpretation of the standard. In this situation the store is taking the recommendation quite literally.
What needs to be understood is what the recommendation is trying to accomplish. Which is to NOT have extremely worn tires on the rear of any vehicle. Most any vehicle, with the exception of those with mid and rear engines) has better traction on the front wheels due to the majority of the weight of the vehicle being up front. This gives the steering axle an extra edge over the rear axle in the traction department. Even with all new tires.
What happens with good tires on the front and poor tires on the rear is that the rear tires can't follow what the fronts are doing in hard cornering or evasive maneuvers and the driver can lose control of the vehicle.
With good tires all around; and by good I mean any tire that still has usable tread remaining, say over 4/32", traction on a vehicle will be fairly even and the vehicle will handle as designed. But with a tire of 3/32" of tread or less on the rear (2/32" is the replacement depth) and say 5/32" on the front then handling is going to be compromised and this is what the standard is all about.
Now, with front wheel drive cars we all know that the front wear more quickly than the rears. In my experience almost 3 to 1. I know many people that just don't rotate their tires on FWD cars and replace the fronts when they are done. Not a bad policy I think. But for a store to tell you they can't or won't take tires with 5/32" tread off the front and replace them with tires that have 8/32" of tread from the rear is most likely someone that really doesn't know anything about tires and is just following company policy. Either way, I would go to a different place to get my tires. Preferably one that can also align your vehicle and perform any suspension repairs that may be needed to keep your tires wearing properly. That way, if you do what they tell you to do and the tires don't meet the mileage claims then you have a case to get them replaced under warranty. Otherwise when tire problems strike you can end up with a he said they said scenario where the tire guys blame the car and the car guys blame the tire. And more times than not it is the tires unless there are mechanical issues with the car that haven't been dealt with. Good Luck.
I know a TIRE SCAM when I see one!
Take this scenario: I purchase 4 new 60, 000 miles $200 each tires. I don't get back right away to the tire store, Discount Tire, to have my tires rotated and I had put on 6000+ on the tires already. Being that the tires on the front of ANY vehicle wear it tires the greatest in the front and especially on the right front. I needed to take my vehicle in to have the tires rotated to get longer life and a more balanced wear on all four. But after getting to Discount Tire the manager says, "Because your front tires are more wore than your rear tires we can't put the rear tires on the front. Or policy is to always have the better tires on the rear. To rotate the tires you'll need to purchase two new tires to be placed on the rear and rotate the rear to the front. I state, "But I've put less than ten thousand miles on these 60, 000 mile tires and that's the reason I need to rotate them to the rear, so they'll last longer, because if I leave them on the front they'll wear their edges to the belt." Manager says, "I'm sorry but we can't put the more wore tires on the rear." I said, "Then I'll need to go someplace else, because the next time I come in you'll demand I buy two more new tires."
This is a scam! You could never purchase four new tires without uneven wear on the front and at that point they'll refuse to rotate the front to the rear. They're doing this to sell more tires. Be it's both the manufactures and tire stores, be it Discount Tire, Big O or many others, which are in on the scam.