Toyota of Dallas

Dealership mechanics misdiagnosed repairs needed resulting in $1500 additional cost and the problem reoccurring less than 3 months later. I had my 2005 MR2 towed to Toyota of Dallas dealership on 3/23/16 after the engine died in traffic and would not stay started. After the service technician diagnosed the issue that day, the service adviser called to inform me that the ECU needed to be replaced. He gave me an estimate of $1600 and said the part is back-ordered and would take 3 or 4 weeks to be delivered. I informed him of some repairs / maintenance that had been done within the previous 6 weeks: Oil change, replaced air filter, spark plugs, all coil plugs, top 2 oxygen sensors and cleaned Mass Airflow Sensor. I had a previous issue with misfires on two cylinders which was resolved by replacing the coil plugs. I asked him if there were any OBD codes and if they tried to reset the ECU. He said the technician did not see any new codes, only the misfires from the previous issue. He assured me the technician had checked out everything to determine it was the ECU. I bought my car in 2005 from this dealership and had service done there many times in the past. Until this visit, I had always received good service and never had any issues. I brought my car to the dealership since they have the latest diagnostic equipment and certified technicians. Since I was having another issue, I felt I needed that level of expertise in case it could be a more severe problem. Unfortunately what I experienced was more of a disservice. I expected a highly qualified technician to diagnose and repair my car but what I got was a novice who misdiagnosed the issue which ended up costing me over $1500 in unnecessary repairs. The ECU part surprisingly arrived after only a week. The technician installed it but that DID NOT FIX the problem. The service adviser called and said they replaced the part but that it now had a bad coil plug and gave me the price for a new one. It seemed odd to me that it "suddenly" had a bad coil especially since I was assured that the technician had thoroughly diagnosed the problem. Since I still had the original coils and 2 of them were known to be good, I brought them to the service department. The technician replaced the bad (new) coil plug and the car started running fine. I believe that this was the issue all along. When I arrived to pick up my car on 4/1, I waited approximately 40 minutes until they finally brought my car up to the front. There was no explanation why it took so long. On the way home I had to make a stop and the car barely started. I drove straight home and tried again to start the car and it would not start and the battery seemed completely dead. That must have been what took so long to get my car, they had to jump the battery. There was no mention of any battery issues while service had my car or when I picked it up. There were also no issues noted on my final invoice within the summary of work done. I talked to my service adviser about the issues and he offered to detail the car for free, which I declined. I never received any follow-up from the dealership after that. The car was running fine until 6/12/16 when I had the EXACT same issue with the car. After attaching an OBDII reader, I found it had a code for P0354 Ignition Coil D. I replaced the coil with the last good original coil that I had and the car started fine again. It appears the new set of coil plugs that I had installed were faulty since two had now failed. This confirmed my suspicion that the ECU was not the real issue and it shouldn't have been replaced. On 6/17/16 I sent a certified letter to the managing partner at Toyota of Dallas. After no response, I sent a certified letter to the Toyota Corporate Headquarters on 7/21/16. Toyota Motor connected me with the Service Manager for Toyota of Dallas on 8/25, he refused to address the issue saying that the car left his service with no error codes so it was fixed. He would not address the issue that when the ECU was replaced, it did not fix the problem. Not until they installed the coil plug would the car run normally. Toyota Motor referred the issue back to the local dealer and washed their hands of it. Toyota of Dallas made excuses about the age of my car and that they had not serviced it for several years. The bottom line is that they replaced an expensive part without proper diagnosis which did not fix the issue. Beware getting service done at this dealer due to their questionable business practices. After being a long time Toyota owner, I can no longer recommend buying a Toyota product or their "certified" services. I have also filed complaints with the BBB.