The Pep Boys
reviews and complaints

My car overheated the day after Christmas on the way to Abilene, TX from Houston, Texas. I was in the middle of no where. (Comanche, TX) It was my water pump I was certain and I turned the car off as soon as it overheated and had it towed to Abilene. (75 miles - $260). I took it to Pep Boys. They called me back within a half hour after they had the car to tell me that the head was cracked and that it was going to be $3000 to fix it. I did not have $3000 to fix it and I needed to go back to home the next day. So I rented a U-Haul and towed my car 400 miles home ($400 to rent U-haul and tow dolly and $120 gas). I took it to my regular mechanic and low and behold- it was the water pump. I even paid the extra money to have the head and the block checked for a crack and there was not one. My regular mechanic also mentioned that there is not a diagnostic to check for a cracked head that can be done that quickly. (Oh – I forgot to mention that Pep Boys charged me $38 diagnostic fee) Pep Boys knew I was stranded, knew I needed to get home and they were one of very few places open the day after Christmas. I will never ever go to Pep Boys or let anyone I know go to Pep Boys. If anyone has any info/advice on how to report them and get them to pay for some of the cost that I incurred because of them please tell me. I am desperate and broke!

i took my truck in for a thermostat replacement and to put a new radiator they took 3 days and cost me a freakin motor they took my truck for a test drive and said they motor blew up then they show me the oil that they said they drained out of it and it was rearend grease im not stupid plus my trk was on the lift and the oil plug was still in the pan i talked to the manager and he said he saw the so called oil come out of my truck and then said it was caused from useing lucas oil in it then he told me they had a motor to fit my truck that they had with 160000 miles on it for 3500 installed i have all the paper work i took my keys and called a towtruck to pick my truck up i have 2 kids and a wife that is goin to school for nursing i cant afford to sue these guys and lose the time off fromwork so now im out a 9000 dollar truck that im still paying on and had to get another one till i can afford to fix this one i really wish i could have sued these guys because they are doing this to alot of people how do they stay in business

I printed an online coupon for Winter Preparation Maintenance Service, $10 off and the service includes:oil change and filter, tire rotation, wiper blades, battery service, top fuels and battery test. It is good at any Pep Boys until December 31, 2009. When I arrived at this Pep Boys location, the cashier refused to honor the coupon, and gave me a printout of the "real" Winter Preparation Maintenance Service, which only included the oil change and filter, battery service, and wiper blades, it did not include the tire rotation or top fluids, or battery test. The cashier stated he "did not know what to tell me" and to "take it up with them" meaning customer service/online website. I did not get the service performed, I walked out, but this is definately false advertising and signed a complaint against them with the Better Business Bureau. I tried to call customer service, but just kept getting a machine, which I refuse to talk to, I want to talk to a real person.

I went to Pepboys from a 29 minute oil change & a tire rotation on 12/05/09. I arrive before 9:00am. They completed the job at2:25pm.
I watched the service from the waiting room windows. I notice that the technician did not rotate my tires. He took my car off the rack. I went to his supervisor and said that my tires where not rotated. The technician said that they did not look like they needed rotations. I told him that I paid for the rotations and needed them done. His supervisor told him to put my car back on the rack and rotate them. I watched through the window and saw him take my tires off and rotated them. I could only see the driver side. I got my car back and went home. The next day I heard tire noises. The next day after that the noise got louder. The following morning I looked at my tires and notice that one of my hub caps were missing and some of my lug nuts were missing on the passager side. I also notice that the lug nuts were put on finger thight. Some of the lug nuts were real loose. Did the technician do this on purpose and try to kill me and my family or was this an error?. I went but to Pepboys. The supervisor reprimanded the technician and told him to apolgize to me. They corrected the tightening of the rest of my lug nuts. They did not have any replacement nuts. I had to go online and spend over $50.00 to get a replacement hub caps and the missing lug nuts. The Pepboys was located at 4500 St. Barnabas Rd. in Marlow Heights Maryland [protected]

I could have killed my family or someone else.

Horrible Repair Work! Horrible Customer Service!

I've had my car back into this location 4 times to repair my car. They've taken $2500 from me and have YET to fix my car. They replaced many parts that I am certain didn't need replacing. They've broken my engine and replaced it twice. They've taken a month and a half (so far) to make these so called repairs and have YET to get the job done right. Today I took my car BACK because, despite my replaced engine, the check engine light comes on, the car dies if it is running in park AND they actually gave me the car back without ANY antifreeze!

Customer Service is an absolute joke. Even management is completely unsympathetic. They never call you back; I've had to call daily to check on the status of my car only to continue to receive more bad news. I cannot believe that they are allowed to perform any services at all. They should stick to selling parts. Unless you need tires and MAYBE an oil change, stay as far away as possible from this Pep Boys.

Purchased a 2-guage 48 inch battery cable only to find that inside the plastic package was a 40guage 38" cable. This occurance wasted hours off my time because the product was either mislabeled or a lessor product than indicated was purposely substituted. Tried to return product, but they wouldn't take it back unless I divulged a whole lot of personal information which I didn't care to give. When I phoned 'Customer Service' at their headquarters and explained the situation, they basically didn't care that they were about to loose a steady customer over an $11 claim. This BTW was their store on South Lamar in Austin, TX.

Ohhh, pep boys... Never again! Despite hearing not-so-great things about them in the past, i'd go there frequently simply because the hours are convenient. Last weekend, I took my car there for an oil change and a state inspection. I also noticed some stiffness in my steering wheel; mostly while backing up, so I had them check that.

Well. They quoted me $1400 and told me I needed a whole new rack and pinion on a three-year-old car with only 58, 000 (That has never been in an accident). They also failed my car on the safety inspection and told me this needed to be replaced before they'd pass me. They said it was, "a huge safety issue and I shouldn't be driving my car."

I didn't even know what a rack and pinion was, but I was so freaked out! Anyway, I definitely didn't have $1400, so I called my car's manufacturer all frantic and upset hoping for some sort of help. They told me they needed an official diagnosis from the dealer first, which is completely understandable. My car passed every single diagnostic test the dealer ran on the steering system. They found nothing wrong with my vehicle — other than my tires desperately needed replacing. I knew I needed new tires, but I didn't realize they were so bad that they were causing the steering tightness! They increased the tire pressure at the dealer which right away made a huge difference in the steering.

Yesterday, I went to a trusted independent mechanic (Recommended by two of my co-workers) who installed four brand new tires and told me — again — there was absolutely nothing wrong with my rack and pinion! He also told me that even if there was, there is no way it would ever cost even close to $1400! (Oh, and by the way, he passed my car on the state inspection — which I should have passed in the first place at pep boys!) my car is fine now.

I am furious! Pep boys not only caused me three days of stress and money-worrying, but they had me second-guessing my car's manufacturer that i've been loyal to and trusted for many years! Plus I was scared to even drive my car! Not only that, but I dropped $96 on that oil change, the failed inspection, and their diagnostic fee. The oil change i'll pay for, but I want my money back on the rest! Shouldn't someone who "knows about cars" simply suggested tires first before going all "rack and pinion" on me?

Moral of my story/lesson learned = never going to pep boys again!

There is a towing company that is contracted by pepboys to tow away cars that park in the pepboys parking space but go else where to buy. On november 7, 2009 at around 9:00 a.M. My son park his car in the pepboys only parking space to have some maintenance done on the car. One of the jobs to be done was an oil change. Around 11:30 are. We left pepboys. I left in my car and my son left in his car that just got serviced. We each drove to our seperate destinations. Suddenly my son called me and said, dad the car is leaking oil. So I told him to drop off the car back in the parking space where he first park. I also park my car in the pepboys parking space and went inside the pepboys store to tell them the car was leaking. I did see a sign that reads pepboys customer parking only others will be towed by e-z towing co. The work order was under my name along with the bill thats why I did the talking at pepboys. My son decided to walk over to the mall with his mother and wife, I told him it's okay to go to the mall, I will take care of the complaint. Plus the car wasn"t going to be ready right away. Then while I was inside pepboys in line my son calls me and tells me the car was towed. The car was towed so fast that when I went out I saw the tow truck towing the car. Then the lookout person who said he was seating in a car recording the episode gave my son a buissnes card and told him where to pick up the car. He told my son that he saw him parking the car in the pepboys parking and that he walk towards the mall. I said yes he did walk to the mall. Because all I told him to was to park the car that I will take care of everything and I would call him when the car was ready. The tow truck superviser (victor / gary) said he went inside pepboys after my son told him the car started to leak to ask if there was a work order. He spoke to a worker by the name of sarah who had just fininshed checking out my sons car and gave us our receipt. The tow truck driver told us that he went inside pepboys and spoke to sarah and that sarah answered there is no work order so that why the car was towed. I have inculded my reciept to prove that my sons car was being serviced in pepboys and there was no reason for the car to be towed. I plan on sueing pepboys and the towing company. Because I believe they work in a team and that the worker gets a percentage of the $155.00 they charged me. This complaint will also be send to my lawer and better buissnes bureau in trenton. There number is 877-ftc - help. Call this number if you want to make a complaint against scam artist.

I have a statement issued today by pep boys ceo mike odell announcing how profitable pep boys has been this year, and how much more money we (Pep boys employees) are being paid. Trouble is, it is all polotics, subterfuge and propaganda (Lies for the lay folk).
I am a master technician of 20 years experience. I am smarter, wiser, and faster at my job than ever before... And yet I am making less money this year than ever before regardless of my competency and qualifications. Is it the economy you may wonder? The answer is yes... Though indirectly..
Pep boys has had issues with inventory (And still does... Though it is better than before), operations streamlining, and uncontrolled spending for some time. Our last ceo jeff rachor was paid a compensation package of approximately 14.5 million dollars for less than a year of service with us, and from the service bay perspective, his ideas were not sound to say it very politely. Now we have mikle odell (Again) and while there has been progress made in some areas, what progress there has been has been very over-rated. Is the company "back in black" (Ac/dc rippoff anyone?) this year of 2009, though it has come at a grave cost to many of us (Employees). We lost alot of money and time training for something called "drive up service". We have lost money (Locally) because of equipment that was repaired over and over again, was inoperable for more than half the year only to finally be replaced with a new piece of equipment that works... At half the cost that was already spent on repairs, not to mention service tickets lost durring that time. Pep boys is taking advantage of the economy to shaft their own employees and pay them less, pocketing the cash to pay off debt, and open 25 new service centers this year alone.
I work in a shop that is not busy enough to support all of the technicians that currently are employed... And they just hired a new one this week... We'll have fun splitting 100 labor hours a week between us... Just so we don't have to make any customer wait on anything ever... That's the plan at least... It's "the pep boys way".
An example of this fraud on the part of manny moe and jack towards their flat rate employees is their "packages". Flat rate as defined by pep boys is that we are compensated at an hourly rate as provisioned by the pep boys labor guide or mitchell equivilent. Two shocks as per the package pays.5 hrs to replace a set (2) shock absorbers... No matter what the year make and model of the vehicle is, and mitchel indicates 1.4 hours for a set (2) front shocks on a chevy astro 4x4 van. What this means is that the job is realisticly going to take at least an hour, but I will only be paid for.5 hour. Does this sound equivilent to anyone?
I have adressed this with my service manager, as well as his boss (Our dm) and his boss as well. To make this matter more complicated, other labor times have been increased beyond what mitchell reflects as an appropriate time estimate. It was explained to me that these increased labor times are intended to "offset" the other labor times that we are being screwed on... Trouble is, that comes at the cost of now defrauding *some* other customers by over charging them... To offset the losses for the other customers whom pep boys intentionally *under* charges.

I say keep it simple... If we really want to be the "we do it all... For less" leader in the industry, just drop the labor rate charged to customers up front and pay us what you agreed to pay us employees instead of over complicating everything and defrauding both your own employees and customers in some fancy dance of financial doom.

As for folks at the service desk being paid more, it's only true in busy stores where much more customer traffic is present. The new concept of trying to turn us into a "quickie lube" is also dismal... Service writers doing service... And lube techs (Installers) answering phones, writing up customers and doing more intensive service work like front end work and brakes with no training or qualifications?
I have to ask where the communication breakdown is occuring between the real world and our leaders in the pep boys orginization... This is insanity.

Feel free to ask questions or otherwise respond to this post, i'll check back weekly and respond appropriately.

I took my car to Pep Boys for an oil change and tune up and oil valve replacement. Took it in on Thursday and by Saturday afternoon they finally finished it. Drove it home (1mile) and forgot about it. Now, Monday morning as I try to leave for work, my steering wheel won't turn enough to even get out of the parking space. And no, my emergency brake is not on. The squeaking when I turn the wheel is ear piercing. Steering wasn't broken before I took it to Pep Boys. Now I have to take the morning off work and see if I can get the car back there, even if it is only one mile. $1, 000.00 dollars in repair and now I have a problem I didn't have before. Very unhappy and will never go there again (after they fix whatever they broke)!

I tried to buy not four but eight tires at the local Pepboys at 1006 New Britain Ave. in west Hartford Connecticut but guess what? I couldn't do it. Why? I was paying in cash? But I was told that I had to either have the cars with me to do the work immediately or take the tires with me in my freakin trunk. I was buying the tires for my wife and daughters cars for them to stop in the next two days for the installation. I had hoped to save them the problem of deciding what tires to have on their cars by buying them upfront. No deal. I was told this is against policy. When I pressed, I was told by "Tony" that they never did this in case they had a car on the rack that needed additional work after they had started on the tires. Now these jerks already had me on the hook for alignments, stems, balancing and god knows what else but still not good enough. You decide, these a--holes wanted to hold two cars hostage for some additional BS work or charges. Well guess what, Goodyear was happy to sell me eight tires accross the street. STEER CLEAR OF THESE CHEATS AND THEIR "POLICIES".

When i bought a clutch with a life time warrant i was told I did not need to keep the receipt because the information was in the computer. When i took it back for a replacement the store where i bought it was closed and moved so i went to another store they told me i needed the receipt. THE clutch was 435 dollars. For a poor country boy that is a lot of money.

I lost my job because i had no way to get to work

Thank you Pepboys for nothing

By broke down unemployed in Mississippi with no money.

The problems within this organization are too numerous to list here, but I'll give it my best shot. Most recently gave 2 weeks notice and was informed at the bank where I cashed my check that their payroll accounts were "hugely" overdrawn. Manager was disappointed that I elected to take my PTO instead of choosing to take the pay (after 1 year of working my a** off there, I needed to breathe before beginning my new job), after reading some of the complaints on various boards, good choice, they chop your hours by 50% upon request for reimbursement.

Manager was overheard to call customers, "F***ing loser", "F***ing crook", throwing the keys at the customer, etc. This manager has also been led out of the store in shiny stainless steel bracelets on charges of DV, in front of staff and customers, g/f and he broke out the glass to the front door of the store. Corporate turns blind eye to the truly significant issues going on in their establishments. More to come, this is just the start. This organization needs to face several class-action lawsuits, their employees and their customers

To whom this may concern;

This letter serves to file a formal complaint against the upper management of Pep Boys of California. Specifically against Ray Navares, the regional or Area manager of the Sacramento area which also includes the Reno / Sparks, NV. Area. It has become the practice to continually act in a very demeaning way, talking down to the Store and Service managers in a way they do not deserve at all. It is his contention that there is no reason for the stores to not make money.

Specifically the service departments. He has stated that either the mechanics or the service writers and service managers are not doing their job properly if they can not up sell every customer that comes in the door, any where from $500.00 to $1500.00 or more in sales. While he contends that this is to be sold as maintenance, he EXPECTS every car will need much more than they came in for originally, (even if they only came in for an oil change ) such as shocks, struts, alignments, tires, light bulbs or other accessories. If sales can not be made he blames anyone but the economy. This is not right!

In light of the current economic situation, people are not willing to spend any more than necessary for repairs or maintenance on their vehicles . Especially those who are now on unemployment or have reduced pay. This according to Ray is no excuse and he still fully expects sales to be made and is threatening to terminate any one who can not meet his expectations. These expectations and demands are totally unethical and also go against the code of ethics agreement that Pep Boys service personal are made to sign at beginning of employment, which states that they WILL NOT try to sell anything that the customer’s do not absolutely need.

I believe that an investigation should be made on this, to see if this is just a local happening or if it is the same across the company nation wide. It is my intention to send as many copy’s as necessary of this letter to the California bureau of automotive repair, Better Business bureau, Consumer reports, as well as editors of several major news papers, lawyers and any one who will listen, in order to make the change’s necessary. Even if it means terminating Ray and others like him, for the good of other employees, and the general public as well.

While I wish to remain anonymous, I hope this letter does not fall upon deaf ears, and hope that someone can help to do something about this very unfair treatment of the general public and Pep Boys employee’s .

Sincerely, ( a very concerned citizen

I took my car to Pep Boys for a simple brake job and they tried to con me into $600 worth of front end work and other stuff that I just don't need.

He told me my brake fluid was black and needed to be replaced, so I checked it and it was clear as glass. But he wanted to charge me $50 to replace it!

And there is never an option to resurface the rotors, every car needs new rotors according to them.

The mechanic only knows how to install ball joints so every time you take in a car, he says it needs ball joints.

Pep Boys is a major league CON GAME!

My car overheated badly last Saturday- Steam and everything. I had it towed to Pep Boys. They told me it was the cooling fan and replaced it .($500+) I picked it up Sunday afternoon. Got it home. Next morning on my way to work, it overheated again and had to be towed back to Pep Boys. They promised they'd look at it right away. They called me about 3 hours later and said that there was a crack in the radiator and I needed to replace it. I asked why they had not checked it on SAturday. The said they ran a pressure check on it after they replaced the fan and there was no leak. It was clearly leaking on Monday morning. Went to pick up the car with new radiator at 6:00 last night and had to wait until 9:30 for it. Paid $700+ and drove home. By the time I got home it was running a little hot. I thought that maybe it would take a while for the new fluids to get circulated and let it sit till this morning. On my way to work this morning it started getting hot again. I turned on the heater to cool it down. I don't know what to do at this point. I have already spent over
$1200.00 with Pep Boys and don't want to start over somewhere else, but I feel that I can't trust them.

On January 25, 2008 I purchased a WEN Power generator from PEP Boys Auto at 601 Sunrise Blvd in Fort Lauderdale. On July 28, 2009 I noticed a small oil leak in the engine casing, on a generator which has never been used except for monthly start-up. The Owner's Manual states the unit has a two(2) year warranty. Following instructions in the manual, I contacted WEN Power. They stated the generator was counterfeit, the manual a forgery and would not honor the warranty. I went to the PEP Boys store and complained. They said there was nothing they could do and suggested I contact PEP Boys corporate headquarters. I sent them a letter two weeks ago and have not head back. I also sent WEN Power a letter and they emailed a response denying the warranty claim. I would like my generator repaired or my money refunded.

My daughter's car wouldn't start. I had it towed to pep boys. My daughter called and was told that her car was ready. Within fifteen minutes of getting the car the car died again. We called pep boys and they sent a tow truck to pick the car up. Of course it was now too late for someone to look at it. The next day my daughter called and was told it was the engine and it was no good. Mind you I have now spent close to $400 for a set of new tires and a battery. Pep boys basically is saying its our fault. I have called customer service and have not gotten a response from anyone. Help. I can't afford to give anyone $400 for fifteen minutes of service from a car.

I bought a doodle bug 30 mini bike from pepboys. The salesperson started it and rode it out to my pick up. When I got home and checked the oil it did not have any so I added oil to it. A few hours of use it the engine started knocking loudly so I called the pepboys manager and told him when I got it home it didn't have oil in it and that it had been ran by his sales person. And no better way to say it other then he just told me I was lying and it had full oil on it so now I have to still pay for it.