[808MGuy]

I'm sure a lot of you already know this but I figured I'd just share some of my experiences with them so that other people don't have to go through what I did.

I actually didn't have any problems with the sales part of it but the guy who sold me my car is long gone and it sounded like he wasn't very happy there. He has since moved to Mercedes. The bigger issue is that their service department just plain sucks. The techs are incompetent and the management is even worse. My car is well out of warranty now but even when I was under warranty they routinely messed up stuff and always had an excuse why it wasn't their fault. Here are the 3 major issues I had with them but there was many other smaller issues.

1. I had water leaking into the cabin and building up on the floor in front of the passengers seat. Dealer looked into it and did a leak test. They said they found that the vapor barrier on the door head some areas were the betalink wasn't sealing so they suggested resealing it with new betalink. I was out of warranty already but didn't want to deal with it so I told them do it. I go back to pick up my car and the tint on my drivers and passengers side front windows are scratched. It looked like they were jamming a screw driver between the window and the window seal. For what, I'm not sure. When I pointed it out to them, I was told by the service manager that it's not their fault because tint is not installed from the factory. After much back and forth, they agreed to pay for the replacement of the tint which I had done at T&T. Luckily, T&T said my tint was still under warranty and only charged $25 which the dealer reimbursed me for.

2. I had a rear trailing arm break while I was driving on King St. Took it to the dealer and they blamed it on my Eibach springs. Highly unlikely but I got the point that they were going to try to blame anything aftermarket. So I told them to just fix it and I paid. I go back to pick up the car and they give me all the paperwork including the alignment print out. I see about half the numbers on the alignment print out are red meaning that its out of spec. I ask them what happened with the alignment and they tell me that's the best they can do because my car has aftermarket springs. They didn't know that I had just had the car aligned less than 2 weeks prior by another shop and they got it to factory spec. When I showed them the print out from the other shop they agreed to try again. The next day, I get it back in spec and they tell me the reason it wasn't correct the first time is because they had a new tech working on the alignment and he wasn't familiar with M3s.

3. This past weekend I was getting ready to replace the spark plugs since they were due (I'm at 67,xxx miles). Service interval for those according to the manual is 37k miles and it was last done by the dealer at 30k miles. I take the covers off the engine to expose the ignition coils and I see that 2 of the heads on the coils have been broken off. The only time that cover was taken off previously was when the dealer replaced the plugs at 30k miles. Understanding that 30k miles was over 3 years ago, I figured I had little recourse but I would send the service manager a message anyway. I send him picture of the broken coils and explain the situation. He calls me back and says it's been too long and they are not responsible for it. He also said there is no way to know who broke it. Then in a total idiot move, he tells me maybe they just broke from wear and tear. No I don't know what kind of wear and tear could happen on the head of the coil. I explained to him that the coil is under a cover and there is nothing that should ever come in contact with it unless it is the tool to remove it. Then he tries to blame the shop I took it to to have the plugs replaced and I told him I removed the covers myself. He sounded surprised and said he didn't know I could work on my own car. At that point I was really pissed because he was treating me like someone he could push around because he didn't think I knew anything about cars. When I started to ask him questions about what he knows about what it takes to service that car he got quiet and just said he doesn't know. I think he finally got fed up with me just totally going off on him and he offered to give me 2 replacement coils for the ones that were broken and I could fix it myself. I said fine and his exact words were "come pick it up at the part desk" followed by him just hanging up on me. I guess I know why he's the service manager now. Totally fits the profile of typically BMW owner. Giant Dbag!

I even had a meeting after the tint issue with the service manager and the QA officer. They tried to tell me that their service department was the best option for servicing my car because they have more knowledge and all the correct tools that most other shops can't or won't get. Well, my experience with them is that I could get any backyard mechanic working on old Hondas to do better work than them.

Bottom line, just don't buy a BMW if you live on Oahu. It's just not worth having to deal with them.