I was taken advantage of pretty bad here. I went for an oil change and to have my muffler looked at. They came back and said I had to replace my serpentine belt and I reluctantly agreed, but for some reason they loosened my tensioner bolt and left it loose, which resulted in it backing out, the tensioner pulley to shift out of place, and thus destroying the brand new serpentine belt. While driving home, I noticed a really loud squeaking. With the serpentine belt not working, my power steering fluid stopped pumping and the power steering went out while driving causing my car to loose control and to go off the road. When I had it towed to them to look at, I told them to just look at it but don't do anything without my authorization. After 30-60 mins after they looked at it, they brought me over to look at it and my tensioner was pushed back into place and the tensioner bolt was broken off inside of the engine block. They denied breaking it even though I had pictures of it not broken hour before. They told me it was not their fault and was Toyota's fault for not recalling a poor design. They said I would have to pay to have them fix it, which would involve un-mounting the engine and partially removing it to to be able to drill the bolt out. I told them to hold off on doing anything because I wanted to investigate their claim. I called and asked a friend of mine, who is a Toyota service mechanic with 22 years of experience, for his opinion and showed him all the pictures I took before they touched it the second time (without permission, might I add). He said the pictures proved definitively the problem was caused by mechanic error and he had never heard of any problems with the tensioner bolt like they claimed. I brought this Toyota mechanic with me to talk to the manager. The manager said he was currently too busy to talk and that we could wait. Annoying, but willing to wait, we stepped outside to wait and are chatting together for a few minuets when all the sudden 4 cop cars (yes 4) pull up all around us and asked for our ID's. THE MANAGER CALLED THE COPS ON US AND REFUSED TO TALK TO US. After the cops realized what was going on, they told us this was the 4th time this year Monro Muffler has done this to other customers. The cops said it was a very shady practice, but that Monro Muffler calls the cops on customers who have a complaint about the work they do, and the reason for this is the Monro has a policy that if the cops are called, they refused to talk to you or to allow you on the property. When I tried to call their corporate office, they just asked me "are you Mr. Miller?", and I said yes. I was told to never call back and hung up on. So now I am left with my tensioner assembly laying in pieces on the floor of my passenger side seat and looking at $400-$1000 cost to have it fixed and the people responsible for it are refusing to even talk to me. The cops encouraged me to pursue legal action against them because they don't want this kind of shady business practice in their town, but that their hands were tied and it was a matter for the court system.
