Mercedes-Benz International

I broke the medal on my door/ignition key and had to order new one. The cost for the key was $196.47 and once the key arrived I was told the service department needed to program. Once the service department started working on the car, they called and told me that they cannot program the key because the battery was dead. They quoted me $167.00 for a new battery and they will be charging me another $145.00 for an hour labor to replace the battery. They said it would be an additional $145.00 labor for programming the key. After some dispute of an hour labor charge to change a battery they agreed to waive the charges on replacing the battery and just charge me for the battery and the key programming. After the battery was replaced they called me again saying that now they cannot program the key due to an AAM module that needed to be replaced and it will be another $800.00 parts and labor for them to program the key. If I did not pay the $800 the key remote will not work to lock and unlock the doors. I told them there was nothing wrong with the door locks before. I disputed why the computer module controlling the door locks would suddenly not be working when only the medal part of the old key had broken. They had no explanation. Because I did not pay the $800 he said I would have to open and lock the doors manually. Then I was told that they were finishing up cleaning and washing the car, and the car will be ready by 5pm. I went to the dealership around 6 pm. When I reached the dealership my car was filthy inside and out because they had left it out while the key was on order, worked inside it without paper, and it had not been washed like they said they were doing. The manager was very rude and pretended to not believe me that my car door locks were working when I question why there is a charged of programming if they did not program the key. The service manager, Maurice, then starts accusing me of saying that the service department deliberately broke the module - which I never thought of that but the way he was acting you would think it was the case. It is possible that this was the case of all time great coincidences. The module happens to crash at the dealership, the battery happens to die at the dealership, and the service manager happens to be defensive and rude about it for no reason. He then thinks it is fair to charge for the key programming even though they did not program the key. I owned many Mercedes Benz models in the past SEL, SL, 2 times ML and this is the worst service department I have ever experienced. I will never go back or recommend this dealership.n Ruiz