Maguire Audi Ithaca

by feckman on 09/30/2011

We recently purchased an Audi A7 from Maguire Automotive. We are from Albany, NY and this was an out-of-town deal. While we’re happy with the car itself and pleased with the price we paid, we’re not thrilled with much else. After spending a good amount of money on a new luxury sedan, we are left feeling like we purchased a used car that had been ridden hard and put away wet. The car had been on their lot for months (and looked like it), but we were assured that it would arrive after having been “fully detailed.” Unfortunately, this was not the case. Upon delivery, the exterior was filthy and the interior was at least as bad. It clearly had not been cleaned in any way since we looked at it earlier in the week. In addition to copious amounts of dust on every possible surface, crumbs in every seat in the car and smudges almost anywhere possible, there were even coffee or soda spills in the cupholder and on its lid. As for the exterior, the entire car looked like it hadn’t been washed in weeks (maybe months) and the wheels were absolutely LOADED with brake dust. The drive from Ithaca to Albany isn't that long and it didn't rain the day the car arrived, so it clearly hadn't been washed before arriving. Even worse, one of the rear-passenger sill plate LEDs was not working and will require a visit to our local Audi dealer for repair. In addition, their Internet Sales Manager, Beth, was dismissive from the start and made us feel like our business wasn’t important to her. Instead of offering possible solutions to the issues that inevitably arise in out-of-town deals, she acted as though our legitimate concerns were inconvenient distractions. More than once she used the "sorry we couldn't make it work out" line without ever having offered options to *make* it work out. It actually took our own car buying agent to salvage the deal for them in the end. Otherwise, our salesman, Rick, was fine and answered all of our questions, but we were quite put off by his comments at delivery about how much fun the car was to drive and how fast he drove from Ithaca to Albany. That would be like telling someone how much fun you had doing donuts in the parking lot after borrowing their new car to go get a gallon of milk. And then asking them for a $70,000 check. None of these things are show-stoppers, but they're certainly not the kind of things that leave a person with a good feeling about their “new” luxury sedan nor the dealer that sold it to them. We’ve seen and heard the “Maguire’s difference” marketing material, but excellence in customer service needs to be earned in your dealings with every client every day...regardless of what the brochure or website says. In fairness, we did get the car we wanted with the options we wanted at a reasonable price and everyone we dealt with was cordial and fairly responsive. When we took the time to inform the General Manager about our experience, he was apologetic and offered us a professional detailing. A nice gesture, but more trouble than it’s worth. The one bright spot in the process was the assistant salesman who worked with us, Yamir (I hope I'm spelling that correctly!). He was friendly, genuine and responsive -- even taking his time to hunt down an A7 catalog where none seemed to be available. Ultimately, car buying is as much about the overall experience as it is about the price -- especially at the level of an A7 -- and the taste we’re left with isn’t great. Instead of feeling excited and satisfied with our purchase, we were left feeling disappointed and angry that so little attention, care or respect was given to our purchase, our car or our satisfaction. And while we'll certainly forget these problems as we learn to enjoy this amazing car, I don’t know that we’d give this dealership the opportunity to earn our business in the future. We’ll always drive an Audi, just not one from Maguire’s.

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