Kia of Anderson

We have a 2011 Kia Sorento V6 in which the engine blew exactly like in the Robinson et al v Kia Motor case and in relation to many customers who have experienced the same symptoms since 2002 (read on topclassactions.com and similar websites) I know my car is not that generation but it is too much of a coincidence that my car had the same symptoms!!!

We bought the vehicle in March 2013, we had spent most of our savings, buying an ‘as new’ car which wouldn’t and shouldn’t have any major problems, and if anything WERE to go wrong, then at least the amazing warranty would be there to cover it….I LOVED THIS CAR

August 2014, our engine blew and I was DEVASTATED...Called Kia and a service rep answered, I had a screaming hungry baby and Kia was about to close so I had to call there and then…he was rude and very nearly refused to give us a loaner car to a loyal customer because we hadn’t bought the car there!!!

My car was towed to Kia of Anderson, South Carolina, who by assumption have blamed it on a clogged oil filter and said it will take 3 weeks for a new engine to come and that we would have to pay for it ourselves. Given our circumstances, a new engine would definitely put us in a very compromising situation and could well have left us bankrupt, especially as we had bought the 'new' car with most of our savings, thinking that nothing major would go wrong with it and if it did, it would be covered under warranty!

A year before this, I had the filter changed by a 3rd party who stated I had an oil leak, within the month an engine light had come on...KIA blamed the engine light on a faulty battery (but to any automotive knowledgeable person would claim BS) whilst the oil leak was a faulty gasket/seal on the oil tank. 3 subsequent visits were taken for the same oil leak and in every visit the car had new oil.

The engine blew a month ago, while being close to home and at slow speed; we have been extremely luckily in that if it had blown whilst on the highway doing 70, we may have possibly died! Kia of Anderson originally refused to repair the car under warranty through 'lack of maintenance' and only then had told me they do not change the oil filter on warranty repairs. The only decent service rep stated to the other guys that we had enough oil changes to warrant a repair, but the other service rep and then service manager adamantly disagreed.

At this point, we had consulted a lawyer and wrote to the dealership, copying the General Manager stating that the car was still under our 2nd owner warranty and had a clean service history and log of oil changes. We gave them 10 days to respond and agree to rightfully repair the car under warranty. The district manager called my husband and asked if we would like to pay for it ourselves (*** NO) as they were also told by SM that we were not covered by warranty. As the deadline approached, they reluctantly agreed to COMPLETELY replace the engine as an act of good faith.

For this 1st month, they hadn’t physically looked at the car, and was left in the same place the tow truck left it and lovingly gained a parking ding to my previously pristine car. My husband and i are quite knowledgeable about cars and took it upon ourselves to check the oil filter and dipstick (Although we were dumbfounded to think 4 sets of new oil could clog a filter within a year or so.) We found the filter and oil still to be clean and only 'wrong' thing was that it was full of metal shavings!...we took photos and marked the oil filter as evidence.

The regional manager contacted us saying that the oil wasn't quite as sludgy as they thought and agreed to do the repair. At this point my husband and i had done our research on various sites so requested a FULL diagnostic report on why the engine blew up. The dealership manager was also dumbfounded that a 3yr old car engine would blow up and for some reason the service manager has 'left'. We got a call from CSR (who has been VERY awkward with both myself and my husband, even before this matter occurred) who said the new engine will be in in 2 days (note the time frame from above) and when my husband proceeded to ask why the engine blew up, the guy still went on to say that it was due to a clogged oil filter!!!

As mentioned earlier, we were told we were getting a ‘new’ engine, only to find out weeks down the line that they were reconditioning our original engine head and getting the rest of it new. Close to 2 months since the blow, we got the car back…25 miles down the road, the engine light came on, got home, there was a very hot and gassy smell, so we checked the oil tank dipstick…it was EMPTY and didn’t even register on the stick!!! Took it back the following day after filling it with our own oil, only for the mechanic to RESET the oil light (ie not fix the cause) and whilst this was happening, my husband filled the GM and the new service manager in with everything that had happened up until then, to find they were dumbfounded and for us to find that they ALWAYS change the oil filter, even under warranty. This meant that the original reason for not honouring the warranty claim was in fact BULL.

NOTE…WE NEVER GOT THE REASON WHY THE ENGINE BLEW

Whilst they were looking at the car, GM said he’d make us smile with a deal for a comparable car and that he would be doing us a favour, and give us retail price for our car ($21k), which we thought was awesome! But no, he offered us a discount that any other customer would get if they tried. So we politely declined, explaining that Kia could have very easily bankrupted us in the engine blow process and any spare money we have is spent on our fixer upper home.

So off we went again, but ONCE AGAIN, 25 miles down the road the engine light pinged again, so we returned to kia for the 3rd time in 1 day, this time they kept it, the GM gave us the comparable car we picked out earlier as our loaner car. That next week, we were notified that the oil return valve was blocked by ‘swarf’ left in the engine block, a further week and a half to complete this.

800miles later, we took a trip to Atlanta and realized there was an oily substance splattered all over the back of my car and again, devastated my car was broken again, we feared we would never get home. Another return to Kia the following day to find that I needed a new transmission put in, as it was transmission fluid all over the car. At this point we were shown a 2012 Sorento sx with lower miles and the sales guy said the GM would want $22k for it so we would have a think about it.

Another week or so later, the car was done (and disappointingly not cleaned from all the fluid)…we were told we would be getting the paperwork for the transmission and the engine work the following week in the mail…( now a month later, STILL NOTHING) We drove the car away and IMMEDIATELY we discovered the car was no longer smooth, you can feel most gear changes and gear 3/4 is jolty both on change up and change down. On a longer drive, we also discovered that there is also a rolling/whirring type noise coming from the engine bay and the car noticeably shakes 40mph onwards!!!

Fed up with the car at this point, we thought we would have a go at trading in for the 2012…GM NEVER SHOWED after agreeing with him and a sales guy that we would be there at a set time after hubby left work so we could do a deal then feed the kids and get them to bed. The sales guy had to ring the GM several times to find that he wanted to give us the LOWEST book price for our car (a hefty $5k less than he previously offered us) and wanted us to give him a further $3k! and that this was his ‘gracious favour’… REALLY?! So all in all the GM may be a decent manager especially if you are adding to his yearly salary, but if you have a problem, let alone have had SEVERAL problems, he doesn’t go out of his way to help loyal customers, despite his claims of good favours etc.

This has been stupidly frustrating and depressing for us as a family with 2 very small children who have emigrated to the US from England. Previously we have both had our previous cars for VERY long times and had planned on keeping the Sorento for over 10 years. Not to mention being given a loaner car for over the 1st month of the engine fix that was not comparable to our main car in size or in spec…and being given new cars as subsequent loaners was indeed nice, but in no way compensates us for all the *** we have been through, especially being without our main car for over 3 months total within this last year.

We are now stuck with a car that has lost value because of these issues; we are VERY disappointed with the state the car has been left in. The attitude and service we have had from Kia of Anderson and Kia as a corporation has deterred us from EVER AGAIN having a Kia in future