The Troubleshooter 5-2-25

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Ripped news need advice, so you don't have to come running.
Just as fast as we can. Shooter's gonna help coming man.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
This is the Troubleshooter Show now, Tom Martine.

Speaker 3 (00:30):
Hey, good morning, good morning, good morning. This is John
Fuller filling in for mister Tom Martine on the Troubleshooter Network.
Today is Friday, which means it is car Day or
truck Day or car.

Speaker 4 (00:43):
And Pitch today, don't forget and.

Speaker 3 (00:45):
Pizza Day and all sorts of other good days. It's
beautiful outside. We should all be outside enjoying ourselves in
this beautiful weather. Joining me in the studio today. We
have our esteem guest Jeff Vic and Kevin Culkin, who
are here every Friday with Car Day, and we have
Deputies Doc and Deputy Dmitri in the house and we

(01:09):
are here to help you with all of your problems.
We answer questions, all problems, take complaints, and particularly today,
we help work through every issue you could come up
with regarding your vehicles and stuff. So whether it is
a warranty issue, a maintenance issue, a repair issue, a complaint,
a problem, a challenge, whatever it.

Speaker 5 (01:29):
May be, give us a call. Today.

Speaker 3 (01:31):
We have a couple of follow up issues that we're
going to get to at some point today. One of
them is regarding a vehicle. A young lady called us
the other day with a challenge with the local dealership
and a warranty that was not covering her transmission repair
I think it was, and so Deputy Dmitri has a

(01:53):
follow up on that, and then we're going to go
first off here to a a gentleman that called yesterday,
and you'll recall that he had just purchased, well recently
purchased I should say, a Ford F one fifty and
had bought an aftermarket warranty. And so I will welcome
back to the show Billy, who is on the line.

Speaker 5 (02:15):
How you doing, Billy good?

Speaker 4 (02:17):
How are you good?

Speaker 3 (02:18):
So Billy, Just so the listeners are up to speed. Here,
you bought a twenty eleven F one fifty that had
almost well like one hundred and eighty four hundred and
eighty five thousand miles on it at the time that
you bought it.

Speaker 6 (02:32):
Correct well, it had one hundred and ninety five. That
was a miscalculation on their part, okay, so they thought
it was one eighty four and actuality it was one
ninety five. Well, he had mistyped it when he typed
it in, so they knew it was one ninety five.

Speaker 3 (02:53):
So the warranty company knew it was one ninety five. Yes, sir, okay,
So their documents. I've reviewed the douments, by the way,
Billy sent us a document yesterday. Both myself and Dmitri
have read it a number of times. We have that
in front of us. Their documents all say one eighty
four to five, right, for give or take, and so

(03:15):
to bring the I mean, really, when we're talking ten
thousand miles, flip flopping the four in the five or not?

Speaker 5 (03:22):
The or not the crux of our issue here today. Correct,
But to make.

Speaker 3 (03:26):
A long story short, you drove away a happy camper,
You financed the vehicle, you're making payments on the vehicle,
and you're making payments on this aftermarket warranty as well. Correct, Yes, sir,
all right, and then you fade off into the distance,
and then all of a sudden, the turbo goes out,
shells out, and shoots a bunch of stuff down into

(03:48):
the motor and kills the whole engine.

Speaker 5 (03:50):
Correct.

Speaker 3 (03:52):
Correct, how much is it supposed to cost you to
fix that whole engine?

Speaker 5 (03:56):
Repairing that vehicle.

Speaker 6 (03:58):
So where's that now? Is dealer and they're just completely outrageous.
I did get another quote, okay that I sent over
to them, and it's roughly about fifty five dollars.

Speaker 3 (04:12):
Okay, So the new quote that you got was fifty
five what the.

Speaker 5 (04:15):
Dealer tell you?

Speaker 3 (04:18):
Absolutely nothing, It was free.

Speaker 5 (04:23):
They didn't give you a quote at all.

Speaker 6 (04:26):
For the Oh for the dealer, yeah no, so their
quote was twenty thousand.

Speaker 7 (04:33):
Oh okay, Well that's the difference between rebuilt and used, right, Yeah,
there's no way.

Speaker 8 (04:37):
It's five grand. That's all used.

Speaker 5 (04:39):
So what do you think five grand is trying to
rebuild the.

Speaker 3 (04:41):
Existing that's a used setup, just to use motors, motor
dropping one yep, yep, labor and everything that's that's that's low.
That's thirty low. That's pretty low.

Speaker 9 (04:50):
Even with that, depending on which warranty company this is,
a lot of the warranty companies will only pay for
use replacements, particularly on higher mileage vehicles.

Speaker 3 (05:00):
We're not even there, you know, okay, we're just trying
to figure out how bad the damage is. So so
what I'm hearing you say is the best deal you've
got is about five grand to put in a used motor,
and that's through. Is that an approved like real shop
or is that a buddy that does work?

Speaker 6 (05:16):
Or no, it is an approved shop?

Speaker 3 (05:19):
Okay, cool, all right, so fast forward. We then contact
the warranty company. And the warranty company is a company
called Endurance, and the Endurance contract is here in front
of me. And Endurance had signed a contract with you
promising to cover the next one hundred thousand miles of

(05:40):
your ownership for the low low price of four thousand,
seven hundred and thirty six dollars. They were going to
cover that thing mostly bumper to bumper, all the internally
lubricated parts, and a whole laundry list of stuff, plus
everything under the sun that they wouldn't cover, right, yes, sir,
and you contacted them. Now I'm I'm curious. You told

(06:01):
us yesterday that they just flat denied your claim because
they said that you misrepresented the mileage. How did they
come to find out that the mileage was different than
what they thought it was?

Speaker 6 (06:13):
So when I initially signed the contract, I'd let them
know that it was one hundred and ninety five thousand.
The gentleman that typed it in fat finger the key
did whatever. So when I had presented my claim, the
maintenance records on that truck showed more than one hundred

(06:34):
and eighty one hundred and eighty five, right, So the
last maintenance record was like a one ninety five.

Speaker 3 (06:43):
So are they using the provision that says you didn't
provide normal maintenance on the vehicle and that's why they're
going to deny it?

Speaker 5 (06:50):
Or what are they saying?

Speaker 6 (06:51):
They're telling me that I didn't update with the actual
odomino reading inside the thirty days allotted, But I had
no idea that they needed that information.

Speaker 3 (07:06):
So I count myself as a pretty good reader. And
I read that sucker three times at least. And I
didn't see anywhere in there that it said that you
had a duty to update and bring them up to
speed on anywhere. Did they cite some provision of the
contract that they're relying on for this, No, sir, just

(07:26):
word of mouth.

Speaker 5 (07:30):
Okay, did they deny it in writing?

Speaker 10 (07:34):
Now?

Speaker 6 (07:34):
They haven't given me anything in writing.

Speaker 3 (07:37):
Did they say that you had materially misrepresented the vehicle
and that's what they were relying upon?

Speaker 8 (07:43):
Pretty much? Yeah?

Speaker 5 (07:45):
Not pretty much? Did they use those words?

Speaker 6 (07:48):
Not exactly? They turned around, and so the whole denial
was because I didn't call in with the original o'domino reading.
The estimate that I gave them was less than six
hundred miles off.

Speaker 3 (08:05):
Okay, so I'm confused again. You told them one hundred
and ninety five thousand. Somebody fat fingered the one eighty
four or one eighty five on the contract, and then
they noticed that some of your maintenance records were off
by ten thousand according to their books. Did they ask
you about the milage? I mean, how did this come up?
I don't really know how we ran into problems with them.

Speaker 6 (08:28):
So the shop had called me, the dealership had called
me and said that, and Durance had denied the claim.
So I had called to find out why, and their
excuse was because I didn't update the o'domina reading inside
that first thirty days.

Speaker 3 (08:51):
Okay, all right, Billy, hang on a second. We got
to go to a quick break. We're going to try
to analyze this thing here and come up with a
game play, and so hang type for a second.

Speaker 11 (09:07):
Go with a sure thing Denver's best roofer excel roofing
dot com.

Speaker 12 (09:11):
You don't pay a cent until you're content than.

Speaker 11 (09:17):
Time for an insurance check up free no obligation comparison
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three O three seven
to seven to one.

Speaker 5 (09:27):
Help.

Speaker 11 (09:27):
You'll think you're his only customer when you choose Frank
durand the real estate Man dot com to list your
home with Remax Alliance three three nine two zero sixteen
twenty two.

Speaker 3 (09:44):
All right, good morning, We're back live on the Troubleshooter Network.
John Fuller here filling in for Tom and Mark and
in the studio with Meir, Jeffick and Kevin Caulkin. Today's
car Day, and we are knee deep in an issue
with that started yesterday. Zoe. I promise I'm going to
get to your issue here in just a little bit,

(10:04):
but hang tight with us. Uh. Just to recap, Billy
bought a F one fifty and bought a warranty on it,
and we're going through a number of steps here to
figure out why exactly this warranty company denied Billy's claim
when the turbo went out and the whole motor got shot.
And we're kind of we're kind of going in circles here,
Billy between you know what happened, and and and the

(10:29):
Kevin in the studio here maybe solved it by guessing
that the original misstatement was that in an application that
was made to them that they're relying upon, is that
where they got the one eight five plus or minus
mileage on this vehicle over the phone, over the phone. Okay,

(10:51):
so you know, here's here's my take on it. Okay,
I've read the entire thirty six page contract like three
times at least. I've highly lighted it, I've gone through it.
I've got it here in front of me. I'm going
to tell you why this was perhaps the worst financial
decision that you've ever made in your life. And then

(11:11):
I'm going to try to tell you why or how
we get out of this thing. Okay, if you misstated
the mileage and and I don't think there's any allegation
that there was some intentional misrepresentation going on. It sounds
like to me this warranty company is trying to use
that misstatement quote unquote of miles to somehow almost invalidate

(11:36):
the entire warranty. And the only way to cure that,
you know, that breach, if you will, is to give
you your money back on it and to just just wipe
it off and you know, wipe the slate clean now
for you. That still leaves you with a truck that's
got a five thousand dollars repair that you need. But
that's better than oh and five thousand dollars on the

(11:58):
warranty and a truck that has a five thousand dollars
motor that it needs, because you're still making payments on
the truck and you're still making payments on the warranty.
And so we got to get rid of the warranty
and get rid of the payments on the warranty, and
that at least frees up a couple hundred dollars a
month for you to figure out how to pay for
this five grand. But here's a couple of things that
you may not have noticed. And I'm just I'm really

(12:20):
not calling you out on this building because you're one
of thousands of people that enter these things. I'm just
trying to make people understand why these things are so
bad of an investment to make on your vehicles. The
first thing is they're not unlimited. I mean, you're not

(12:42):
buying a new vehicle with a bumper to bumper, take
it or leave it, anything that happens to this vehicle,
we're going to cover it. These things are one hundred
percent of the time capped and limited in the amount
of money that they'll pay out on a deal.

Speaker 5 (12:57):
It's kind of funny.

Speaker 3 (12:58):
We're sitting here in the studio and there's a commercial
for this outfit that just came on the television in
front of us, So what a what a coincidence?

Speaker 5 (13:06):
That's just that's just too darn funny.

Speaker 3 (13:08):
But but nowhere on the commercial does it show that
they're capping and limiting their benefits to the amount that
that that they do in the contract. But but surprisingly
here would you do you know what the cap is?
Have you looked at it to see.

Speaker 6 (13:24):
I have read through that contract and I do know
it states and labor costs.

Speaker 3 (13:31):
Yeah, no, here's what it states. We're never going to
ever pay more than ten grand period over the life
of this contract. So that could be you know, five
different repairs of two grand, but once they hit ten
they're done.

Speaker 13 (13:44):
Or.

Speaker 3 (13:47):
The trade in value of your vehicle at the time
that the the the covered repair you know, needed to
be made. So so you're talking about an f one
fifty that's on I was fifteen years old with two
hundred thousand miles on it. Do you know what the
value that truck is today?

Speaker 14 (14:05):
I don't.

Speaker 5 (14:07):
I'll tell you that Nada's trade end value puts it.

Speaker 3 (14:09):
At between about five and maybe sixty five hundred dollars.
So here's the thing. The maximum they're ever gonna pay
on that contract is about fifty five hundred dollars. Let's
call it six just for the easy math. Okay, okay,
So you paid almost five grand for a warranty. That

(14:30):
maximum is going to never pay over the life of
the warranty more than six thousand dollars towards a covered
repair if they even decide that it's truly a covered repair.

Speaker 7 (14:43):
And and that's a shrinking cap too. Next year, that
truck's going to be worth less.

Speaker 5 (14:48):
That's exactly right.

Speaker 3 (14:49):
And so you know, they allegedly covered that thing out
to two hundred and what they thought was two hundred
and eighty thousand miles. What the heck is an F
one fifty with two hundred and eighty thousand miles worth
earth two grand, three grand.

Speaker 8 (15:03):
It's going to every month it's going to be less.

Speaker 3 (15:05):
So every month, their maximum exposure goes down, but your
payment stays the same, and you're you're paying interest on
that every single month for the life of this thing.
Does that seem like a good investment for you? Not really?
No note of And I'm guessing that I'm guessing that
nobody sat down and explained that to you, that we'd

(15:28):
like to sell you something that's going to cost you
a fortune. We'll never pay off a benefit on it,
and if we do the value, the benefit's going to
eventually really quickly be less than what you're paying us
for it, right, I mean, that's just crazy that anybody
would buy these things. And so you know, here's the
good news for you, Billy, And I mean this sincerely.

(15:51):
This company had thirty eight hundred complaints against it last year.
They do seem to be fairly responsive to very public complaints.
And I think that what we should try to do
in this case is have Deputy Dmitri contact this company
on your behalf. It may require you to be on

(16:11):
the phone with them. I don't know what level of
communication they'll have. And we want to just try to
get this thing done and canceled and get you back
whatever we can on it to try to make you
whole and at least get you out from under this or.

Speaker 8 (16:28):
Pay for the used motor. Well, I mean that would
be the ideal.

Speaker 3 (16:31):
That would be the ideal thing to do, is that
there's there you know, maybe that's really the starting point, Dmitri.
There's been no material misrepresentation. This thing is like, you know,
we're talking minuscule percentages of the overall mileage. There was
nothing material. It was done over the phone. They can't
prove that it was a willful misrepresentation. They've got a

(16:52):
buyer's order, you know, that was filled out by the
guy that filled it out, that puts the mileage on
there that everybody thought it was. There's nothing material and
it is what should be a covered loss. But worst
case scenario, if you only get him out of it,
you've done him a.

Speaker 15 (17:09):
Favor, right right, And now, one of the things that
our caller needs to keep in mind is I too
write the contract and if he is successful at canceling
is which there is a cancelation provision and there is
tact It seems to be pretty straightforward. He's not going
to get a refund for what he already paid.

Speaker 3 (17:26):
Well, I don't think he's going to get that anyway,
because he financed it, so it's not like he paid
it off in full out of cash. So the best
they can do is to try to unravel this saying,
and yes.

Speaker 15 (17:36):
It will be pro rated, but you know, but it's
better than god knows how many more years of almost
two hundred bucks a month for a question.

Speaker 14 (17:44):
Wouldn't it be helpful at all to ask them to
send him a written statement of why the denim acclaim
so that you have something concrete to talk about when
you call them.

Speaker 3 (17:57):
That's never a bad idea. I mean, you guys deal
with this warranty company. What's your experience with them?

Speaker 7 (18:03):
I mean, well, the all warranty companies look for an
out right, that's their first step is to try to
figure out how to not cover stuff, so, you know,
and I can see why they have a mileage clause.
I mean, this one, okay, wasn't as as egregious as
you know. I had three hundred thousand. I told you
I had fifty thousand, so I'm sure it was just
an automatic trigger, you know, and a conversation made just

(18:26):
solve the whole thing.

Speaker 3 (18:27):
It's curable, not ten grand off the end date of
this thing and call it good. I doubt seriously that
their actuarial tables make a Ford truck with one hundred
and ninety five thousand miles anymore experience like they actively
like they wouldn't have covered it Ford truck with one
hundred and eighty five thousand.

Speaker 5 (18:44):
I mean, come on, it's not it's just not that big.

Speaker 7 (18:47):
Of most of these outfits, you get to the right
person with the right attitude, with the right information, and
it's solvable.

Speaker 3 (18:55):
So that's my hope, and and you know, maybe we
can deal with it. I'm we're going to talk at
some point when we get a break in the action
today about the rest of the provisions in this and
how absurd they are with regard to the arbitration provisions
and how that actually, you know, how that actually works out,
and what rights you truly have, And I will map

(19:16):
out for you what it would look like if you
truly said, by dang it, I'm going to fight these people,
and I'm going to go down that road and see
what happens. And I think you'll just be shaking your
head about, you know, how ludicrous this whole contract is.
So so I want you to give your contact information
to Kelly.

Speaker 5 (19:34):
I know she called you today and she has some
of it.

Speaker 3 (19:36):
But Dimitri will be in touch with you and you
guys are going to work together and hopefully we'll have
some good outcome, you know, at some point in the
near future. Okay, Billy, fantastic, All right, Bud, good luck,
and we'll talk to you again soon. Okay, we are
going to go take a real quick break. We will
be right back. We've got a couple of calls backed up.

Speaker 5 (19:53):
Zoe.

Speaker 3 (19:53):
We're going to deal with your issue with a moving company,
and we've got Duey on the line with the transmission issues.

Speaker 5 (19:58):
So hang tight, we will be right back.

Speaker 11 (20:04):
Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com.

Speaker 12 (20:08):
You don't pay a cent until you're content.

Speaker 11 (20:14):
Time for an insurance checkup free no obligation comparison call
Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens of
insurance companies find out now three all three seven to
seven to one help. You'll think you're his only customer
when you choose Frank durand the Real estate Man dot
com to list your home with Remax Alliance three oh
three nine two zero, sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 16 (20:35):
All right, I'm speechless.

Speaker 3 (20:45):
Here John Fuller for the Troubleshooter Show. Here we are
having a riveting conversation where Dimitri is trying to explain
to us that nicotine is practically good for you. I
think is the best way to sum it up. So
we are having a lovely discussion about that. But we're
going to go to the phones again here. And Zoe,

(21:06):
you've been holding for a while. You've got an issue
with a moving company. What is going on?

Speaker 5 (21:10):
Zoe?

Speaker 12 (21:11):
Hello?

Speaker 17 (21:12):
So I recently moved from Colorado to Massachusetts, okay, And
I did some research online of movers that are good
with interstate travel, and I reached out to Minard's Trucking,
which is actually a broker which I was unaware of, okay,
and they contracted me with Swift Moving Services okay. And

(21:34):
when they came to pick up my stuff, it was
already a day late and didn't I wasn't contacted about
who my carrier was, so I was unclear of who
to pay, how to pay, and then get to my roof.
I told everyone I have clearer communication that I needed

(21:55):
my things by than April nineteenth. When I got here,
and they let me know the day before that that
was actually my first available dates. But this was not
listed on the bill of lading that I signed with
the carrier, and so on their contract they have twenty

(22:16):
one days to deliver it to me, but I had
still not gotten my thinks. And in addition to that,
they tried to tell me that they would need a
shuttle to bring it to my apartment, which was never communicated.
They already had the address back in April. It's now May,

(22:38):
and now they're telling me because they sent me a
cy saying that they had general liability and workers' compensation coverage,
they would not give me the policy number or the
insurance information.

Speaker 14 (22:53):
And I was told by the.

Speaker 17 (22:54):
Broker representative that they actually did not have any active
workers company, so my property management wouldn't allow them to
bring my things, which I told them back in April
that they needed this, and so now I had to
hire a separate moving company with actual insurance to pick.

Speaker 18 (23:14):
Up my things.

Speaker 17 (23:15):
They said they were going to put it in a
storage unit, which they didn't end up doing, so now
I'm having today having to have a reputable company pick
up my things from the truck.

Speaker 3 (23:28):
Are you at least going to get your stuff. I
mean that's the next chapter. I'm just waiting for you
to say that your stuff was missing.

Speaker 17 (23:35):
Yeah, and the driver themselves actually reached out to me
and said if they come after two pm, we will
not be here. So I don't even know how to
handle this situation, but I know that I'm going to
speak with attorney about fraudulent claims of insurance gut Bridge because.

Speaker 18 (23:56):
This is ridiculous.

Speaker 5 (23:58):
Zoe, How can we help you today?

Speaker 4 (24:00):
One quick question was a brokelyn Florida.

Speaker 3 (24:02):
Yes, they are a broker was in Florida.

Speaker 15 (24:04):
You just look them up there in Florida.

Speaker 4 (24:06):
Yes, we said this just to all the people listening.

Speaker 14 (24:09):
Anytime you get somebody that's a broken Florida, do not pasco,
do not collect hundred dollars.

Speaker 4 (24:15):
You hang up and find somebody else.

Speaker 14 (24:17):
Every time we've heard a story like this for the
past i know how many years, it's always a broker
in Florida.

Speaker 17 (24:25):
Yeah, and there I filed acclaim with the f MC
or s CSA, and I've been in contact with the
owner of the brokereen company saying he's going to try
and figure it out and get me a deal. So
I filed a complaint on both of the companies.

Speaker 3 (24:42):
Well, I mean, I'm glad that you're sharing the story
with us. How can we help you today?

Speaker 17 (24:48):
I just want to know if I have a case
to push forward for fraudulent insurance.

Speaker 5 (24:53):
Well, and if there's any.

Speaker 17 (24:54):
Way that I could positively because I paid almost five
grand for this.

Speaker 5 (24:58):
Yeah, and so here's kind of my take on it.

Speaker 3 (25:01):
Number One, get your furniture back before you go filing
all these complaints and stuff. I mean, yeah, you know,
let's not put the cart before the horse here. You
need to do what you need to do to protect
yourself and mitigate your damages and get your darned furniture back.
Once you've got your furniture, you can file complaints till

(25:21):
the cows come home. But there's no way that your
furniture is going to disappear or the truck's gonna miraculously
break down in a bad neighborhood and they're going to
forget to lock it and mysteriously everything disappears and stuff
like that.

Speaker 5 (25:37):
Dmitri, you had a thought.

Speaker 15 (25:38):
Hey Zoe, A couple of quick questions for you. Did
you pay for this movie with a credit card or
some other way.

Speaker 17 (25:45):
So I paid the broker. My first payment was with
the credit card, and then the carrier. It was twenty
three up front, and then and then when they came
to pick it up, I didn't know that I was
supposed to pay the carrier. I thought I was paying
the broker, which would make sense to me, but they

(26:08):
wanted only a Zell payment.

Speaker 15 (26:10):
Yeah. Yeah, So what was the total contract price that
you had planned on?

Speaker 17 (26:15):
So initially my quote was around thirty five hundred because
I was trying to beat a pod price. But then
once they had all my stuff, they said, oh, it's
more cubic feet. I'm like, okay, I understand that, huh.
And then it ended up being like fifty five hundred.

Speaker 15 (26:31):
And so you paid it. Sounds like you paid about
twenty three hundred on a credit card to the broker,
and then the balance and Zell to the actual moving company.

Speaker 17 (26:39):
And yeah, so I paid them.

Speaker 15 (26:41):
How much more?

Speaker 17 (26:41):
I paid them fifty?

Speaker 15 (26:43):
Yeah, I understand, And roughly speaking, how much more is
this going to cost you to actually get your stuff back?

Speaker 17 (26:48):
To get my stuff it's going to pay It's going
to cost me another sixteen hundred and eighty dollars.

Speaker 15 (26:54):
That's not bad, John, What do you think of this? Uh,
there's no chance she's going to get any money back
from the actual moving company. That's why it was a
Zell payment instead of a credit card. How about how
about if Zoe's after she gets her stuff back, her
first step is just to dispute the charge on her
credit card because she paid for service that turned out

(27:14):
not to have been provided. That at least she's not
going to get made whole, but at least they'll help
mitigate her damages to the extent of two even for.

Speaker 9 (27:21):
Fraud, she's got sixty days from statement date when she
paid that.

Speaker 15 (27:25):
Okay, well, yeah, you're right, Jeff. Now, in my experience,
some credit cards allow you. So in my case, I
have a credit card that allows a year for me
to dispute something. It's it's, it's, it's. It really depends
on who issued the credit card. Is kind of what
it looks like, and I think it doesn't sound like
it was very long ago anyway. So, John, I mean,

(27:48):
does she have any downside to disputing this thing on
the credit card and documenting all of these losses.

Speaker 3 (27:54):
I mean, the only downside is that they potentially deny
it I mean there's no there's no real there's no
real really for asking.

Speaker 4 (28:02):
No, but the broker.

Speaker 14 (28:03):
Provider service, the broker fixed got her set up with
a moving company. They're gonna tell the credit card company. Look,
she paid us to find a mover. We found a mover.
If there was a problem with a mover, then she
needs to deal with that. They they you know, that's
their out.

Speaker 15 (28:21):
So did you sign any kind of a contract with
the with the with.

Speaker 17 (28:24):
Minari, I find two separate bill of Ladys. So the
first one was my.

Speaker 15 (28:28):
Estimate, not the bill of and then I find not
the bill Then I was there an actual contract.

Speaker 17 (28:35):
It's it's not even a full contract. It's just an estimate,
a binding estimate which ended up not being binding, if
that makes sense.

Speaker 15 (28:43):
And that's the estimate from Minard. Okay, well that's I
mean that turned into a contract, right John, after she
made a payment that that estimate became a contract.

Speaker 7 (28:54):
Yeah, I mean it seems like the only real issue
there was the sixteen hundred additional right she's having to
pay for the lack of insurance.

Speaker 8 (29:02):
The rest of it, they can argue.

Speaker 3 (29:04):
I'm going to just speak straight with you, Zoe. If
you get out of this and you get your stuff back,
and at the end of the day you only got
fleeced to the tune of sixteen hundred. You're not doing
too bad. I would file the fraud claim with your
credit card and see what happens. Throw it against the wall.
Who knows. You may get lucky on that and get

(29:24):
some of that back, or at least open a you know,
a dialogue about that. But if you only come out
of the sixteen hundred down, you're not doing bad compared
to some of the horror stories that we've had here.

Speaker 15 (29:35):
I just way ahead. Yeah, I think that.

Speaker 3 (29:37):
You're doing really good in the sense that you know
what these documents are and you really kept really good
records of what's going on. But listen, before you go
crazy on the complaints and stuff, get your property back, Okay,
that's got to just be the absolute priority. Do not file,
do not dog cuss anybody, don't do it. Do what
you have to do to get your property back first,

(29:59):
and then, you know, explore all the different options that
you have.

Speaker 19 (30:03):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (30:03):
Best of luck, let us know how it works out.
Appreciate the call today, Zodie, have a good day. We're
gonna go to a break. We'll be right back. Today's
car Day. Give us a call seven one three eight
two five five.

Speaker 5 (30:13):
We're here to help.

Speaker 11 (30:14):
You go with a sure thing Denver's best roofer Excel
Roofing dot com. You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Time for an insurance checkup free, no obligation. In comparison,
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three all three seven

(30:35):
seven to one help. You'll think you're his only customer
when you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot
com to list your home with Remax Alliance three all
three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (30:58):
All right, good afternoon, John Fuller here on the Troubleshooter Network.
We are here on car Day and we have some
callers lined up. We're going to go directly to the phone.
But if we can help you, this is an opportunity
to get in without a whole lot of people in
front of you. Just give us a call at three
h three seven one three eight two five five. We
have in the studio Jeffick and Kevin Coulkin, who are

(31:21):
veritable experts on all things automotive and so give us
a call. We are here to help you with your issues. First,
we're going to go to Priscilla, who it says here
is having an issue with breaking your release. What is
going on, Priscilla.

Speaker 18 (31:35):
Hi, So I have a previous landlord. I'm currently paying
two rents because I had to get out of my
old space for my mental health, and I have now
cleaned out all my belongings from there. So kind of

(31:58):
just a s anoposit of what the land or was doing.
They were restricting any guests in the house. They did
not allow me to have guests to visit overnight anything
like that.

Speaker 3 (32:09):
They are in this house basically just.

Speaker 18 (32:13):
A single room being the rest of the house very
much there, and they put up cameras in the house
without telling the tenants. It was myself another person that
we're living in the basement of basically this house with
a couple as living upstairs as the landlords, and so

(32:42):
realizing that it wasn't going to be a place that
I could safely exist.

Speaker 5 (32:48):
Did you know they.

Speaker 3 (32:49):
Put in the place or were they secret?

Speaker 18 (32:52):
They did not tell me beforehand?

Speaker 5 (32:54):
No, okay, but it did.

Speaker 3 (32:56):
It just show up on the coffee table. I mean
it did you know they were there or did they
secretly record you for a period of time?

Speaker 18 (33:05):
It wasn't secret they did. They put them up in
like the like the living room, in the kitchen and
the dining room.

Speaker 5 (33:17):
Okay.

Speaker 18 (33:17):
So, and I did some research yesterday into consent party
laws in Colorado, and because basically it said that, like,
if you have reasonable expectation of privacy, it's not illegal.
But also you're inside your own house, Like would that
be a reasonable expectation of privacy, especially if you don't

(33:41):
have access to the recordings or were so knowledge that
it's happening.

Speaker 3 (33:46):
So you ended up moving out of this place, you
said for mental health reasons and what into another place?
Is that why you have two rents going on?

Speaker 18 (33:55):
Yes? So currently in a bay situation, I'm living with
my partners, so I've it's definitely not an immediate situation
that I need to be around these people. But and
I recently went back and cleaned out the rest of

(34:17):
my like I moved through the majority of my things
a few months ago, but haven't been able to build
up the gumption to go back to finish out everything.

Speaker 5 (34:32):
So how can we help you today? Forca so I.

Speaker 18 (34:37):
Was hoping that I could get any suggestions on ways
to move forward last night. Oh, they also when I
went to clean up my stuff, they had ripped out
the floor in my room and are doing a full
construction project in the space that I'm paying for. They

(34:57):
also refused any attempts to into replacement tenant. There were
several times that I tried to bring somebody or get
somebody that wanted to pay over Lite.

Speaker 3 (35:08):
Priscilla hang on, we'll be right back after this break.
We've got some ideas for you. Jason and Dennis hang
On will be with you as well.

Speaker 5 (35:13):
We've got to go to this break. Thanks you listen.

Speaker 11 (35:23):
Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com.

Speaker 12 (35:27):
You don't pay a cent until you're content.

Speaker 11 (35:31):
Plea of time for an insurance check up free no
obligation comparison call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage
at dozens of insurance companies find out now three O
three seven to seven to one help. You'll think you're
his only customer when you choose Frank durand the real
estate Man dot com to list your home with Remax
Alliance three three nine two zero, sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 1 (36:02):
You need advice so you don't have Camaruning's just as
fast as we can. Shooter's gonna help come man.

Speaker 2 (36:13):
This is the Troubleshooter Show. Now, Tom Martinez, Hey, good afternoon.

Speaker 3 (36:21):
John Fuller here filling in for Tom Martino on The
Troubleshooter Show. We are rocking and rolling here today in
the studio. We have Jeff Vick and Kevin Colkin. It
is card day. We are here to help you out.
We've got a number of callers lined up. We're gonna
go right to the call lines, starting with Priscilla, who
we are finishing up with. Priscilla was a tenant and
a home. She rented a room. It sounds like things

(36:44):
have kind of gone south and she moved out for
mental health reasons, according to Priscilla, and the landlord was
doing crazy things like installing cameras and lemiting visitors and
all this kind of stuff. Let me ask you this, Priscilla,
how much time did you have on your lease with them? Priscilla,

(37:04):
are you still there all right?

Speaker 5 (37:07):
Looks like, oh she's there, okay.

Speaker 3 (37:09):
How much time did you have?

Speaker 17 (37:11):
Myself?

Speaker 18 (37:14):
The lease is over July thirty, first and I sent
an official notice yesterday to to my landlord saying like, hey,
I'm out everything, and he responded with Okay, still basically
still expecting right for the rest of the term, even
though I'm completely moved out. They started a construction project
in my room, so like, it's not livable. Even the
room that I'm paying for isn't currently inhabitable.

Speaker 5 (37:39):
Okay. How much were you paying a month?

Speaker 20 (37:42):
Seven hundred?

Speaker 3 (37:46):
Okay, So you know, here's the thing I mean, I think,
and you guys chime in if you have a different
opinion here. I think creating conditions that make the unit
uninhabitable and particularly starting a construction project, would amount to
a constructive eviction under most people's eyes. It's one of

(38:13):
those things where, according to the real estate attorney that
was here yesterday, you almost have to put this in
the landlord's lap and let them begin formal eviction proceedings
against you.

Speaker 5 (38:26):
If you don't.

Speaker 3 (38:27):
Show up and you don't pay the rent, all he
can really do is begin formal eviction proceedings. But you've
already moved out, and you gave him that in writing,
so that's really kind of a moot point. And then
to try to sue you to collect that money. And
I think that a defense to the collectibility of the
rent is going to be the habitability of the unit
that you were living in. And so I hope you

(38:48):
have photographs of the cameras and the construction project and
stuff that began, because that's going to be the way
you defend this if the guy ever pursues it. Now,
if you have that security to posit with him, you
could probably count on that's gonna be forfeited, but it'll
be forfeited with you know, a credit towards the unpaid

(39:08):
rent at least, So you've got that going for you.
But I think in your circumstance, you've got a good story.
But you just really don't have a lot of, you know,
a lot of power on your side other than just
to move on in your life and wait for the
landlord to make the next move and kind of see
what happens from there. Do you guys have a different
take on it?

Speaker 7 (39:26):
No, I think you're absolutely done on with that. Yeah,
I wouldn't pay another nickel, no way. Let him come
after you, that's all he can do, I mean, and
then then deal with it.

Speaker 4 (39:34):
But was you security deposit.

Speaker 18 (39:39):
I believe it was. It was one month, so it
was about seven hundred, all.

Speaker 14 (39:43):
Right, So basically he's gonna he's not gonna come after
you for fourteen hundred bucks if you have photographs of
the construction going on.

Speaker 5 (39:52):
Yeah, I tend to agree with you.

Speaker 3 (39:54):
And in the future. Listen, a landlord can put all
these conditions on you, but they can't just spring them
on you kind of midstream. That's where the landlord gets
into kind of a breech situation on their side. But
your strength is in documenting everything and communicating in writing.
So it's not enough to say I couldn't help. But
notice you put seventeen cameras in my unit overnight. You

(40:16):
knows it needs to be an email or something written
that documents today you installed all these cameras. We didn't
discuss this. The lease says nothing about it. You know,
today you inform me that I can't have visitors. There's
nothing in my lease that says I can't have visitors,
and I consider that to be a breach of the agreement,
and on and on. So that's my advice to you
is to document everything and create a pay per trail.

(40:38):
That way, when something like this happens, you are that
much stronger of a position, and he's that much less
likely to actually want to go pursue this and air
all this dirty laundry in court.

Speaker 9 (40:48):
Well, getting back to that security deposit, though he still
has an obligation to inform her why he's holding me.
That's absolutely right a security deposit, and he has to
do that in writing.

Speaker 5 (40:57):
He's got thirty days to do that, and it's got less.

Speaker 9 (41:00):
Yeah, unless your lease actually says, you know, sixty days,
which can be done with the lease, but it's by
Colorado law, it's thirty and if he fails to do
that within the thirty then you need to put him
on notice that you're going to sue him for trouble
damages without right. So you just are quick to hand
that money out.

Speaker 3 (41:18):
You got a lot more power than you think you
have in this position. So I would sit back and
wait see what he does at the end of the
thirty days, or look at your lease about the timeframe
for the security deposit, and if he doesn't send that
back to you or itemize it, give us a shout back.
We can help guide you on exactly how to go
down that road, and we'll deal with it then all right, Priscilla.

Speaker 18 (41:37):
Okay, that'd be awesome. And do you guys think it
is it best? The best position for me, just as
little community who as him as possible from here on.

Speaker 5 (41:46):
Out to sit tight. Anything you do should be in writing.

Speaker 3 (41:48):
Okay, all right, all right, good luck to you, Priscilla,
appreciate the call. We're going to go next to Jason.
Jason has an issue with a front end.

Speaker 21 (41:56):
Here.

Speaker 3 (41:56):
What's going on on your ford? F three fifty there?

Speaker 5 (41:59):
Jason?

Speaker 3 (42:00):
How are you doing good?

Speaker 6 (42:02):
Hey?

Speaker 7 (42:03):
So my tires are wearing wearing really funny.

Speaker 22 (42:09):
Towards the outside.

Speaker 3 (42:11):
I think it's something wrong.

Speaker 22 (42:12):
With the front end of my truck, but I don't
know for sure.

Speaker 23 (42:16):
And I was just wondering who I could take it
to the have it diagnosed, and how much of what
cost to have something like that diagnosed?

Speaker 8 (42:24):
What kind of vehicle is it?

Speaker 23 (42:28):
It's a dually so it's a big it's a big boy.

Speaker 8 (42:31):
Is it a crew cab? I mean? Is it long long?

Speaker 23 (42:36):
No, it's.

Speaker 22 (42:38):
Extended so have the half doors.

Speaker 7 (42:41):
Yeah, it's something we could I mean, it could be
ball joints, could be a lot of things.

Speaker 8 (42:45):
How many miles are on it?

Speaker 23 (42:49):
So one hundred and fifteen thousand, one hundred and sixteen thousand,
but not a ton, but they're all my miles.

Speaker 7 (42:57):
Good good, yeah, first thing that comes to line his
ball joints, you know, the wheels are leaning.

Speaker 8 (43:02):
You know, you gotta find.

Speaker 5 (43:02):
Out why you can get weight on the front end
of that.

Speaker 8 (43:06):
Oh yeah, that's a big truck. That's a heavy truck.

Speaker 23 (43:08):
So yeah, yeah, she's.

Speaker 3 (43:10):
A big girl. Where could I take it to go
get a diagnosed?

Speaker 23 (43:14):
And how much was something like that run?

Speaker 7 (43:16):
Well, what it would basically be would be an alignment
or an alignment checks, so whatever somebody charges for an alignment,
that's what they would charge you to check it out,
and they should be able to give you an estimate
based on that. But I wouldn't, you know, I wouldn't
ask for a diagnosis. I would ask for an alignment
and let them tell you what they find, right, because
a good alignment shop is can to find loose components.

(43:36):
They're going to find damaged components and things that need
to be replaced, all right, And Kevin the guys can
do that alignment there ye oh okay, yeah, yeah, Jason,
give Kevin call it at the shop. We're Colfax and
Wadsworth basically two blocks west to Wadsworth and Lakewood.

Speaker 3 (43:52):
You can look him up at Sheridan Auto Tech dot
com or call him at three oh three four five
five seven two four to two. All right, Jason, perfect,
thank ry, good luck to Thanks for the call. We're
gonna take another quick break here. When we come back,
we're going to talk to Dennis about his F one
fifty and we'll be able to take your calls as well,
So hang on just a second.

Speaker 11 (44:18):
Go with a sure thing Denver's best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com.

Speaker 12 (44:22):
You don't pay a cent until you're content than.

Speaker 11 (44:27):
Time for an insurance check up free no obligation comparison
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three o three seven
to seven to one.

Speaker 3 (44:37):
Help.

Speaker 11 (44:38):
You'll think you're his only customer when you choose Frank
Durand the real estate Man dot com to list your
home with Remax Alliance three oh three nine two zero
sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (44:55):
All right, Good afternoon, John Fuller here on the Troubleshooter Network.
We are talking with Chasing right now. I think we
finished up with Jason. We're talking with Dennis. Now, Dennis,
you've got something going on with your F one fifty.
What is happening in Dennis?

Speaker 24 (45:12):
Well, I.

Speaker 22 (45:14):
Took my truck to SAAL's Auto Tech last year and
had a motor put in it twenty one thousand dollars
and it hasn't stopped leaking since I've taken it back
seven times. If I take it back again, this will
be the eight time. It cost me probably ten thousand
dollars almost in rental fees. And I've just cook it

(45:38):
to a Sheridan Auto Tech and Isaiah looked at it
and he showed me it's spitting oil all over the place.
And I don't know about taking it back to the guy.
I don't have no confidence in him. Can I get
my money back for anything? For a shoddy job? And
I mean, it's just cost me more money every time
I take it back there because I got to pay

(46:00):
for the rental car. They said it was going to
split the rental fee with me. When I called to
see why that charged me three thousand dollars for a
rental car. That rick was one hundred and ninety nine
dollars a day. I mean dude, that's crazy.

Speaker 8 (46:17):
Did you rent it from Sawsy.

Speaker 22 (46:19):
That every time?

Speaker 25 (46:21):
Excuse me?

Speaker 8 (46:21):
Are you renting that car from Saul's Auto Tech?

Speaker 22 (46:26):
No, it's from Going Rentals who they recommended, and that
they recommended me to have. I had it towed up
and they recommended the toe they did. You know they
will reimburse you never reimburse me for that. And then
I want to talk to Saul because you know, this
is just shot at work and his guy says, oh,
he had knee surgery and he's really he can't what

(46:49):
knee surgery has nothing to do with you nailing or talk.

Speaker 5 (46:52):
Let's try to unpack this then.

Speaker 3 (46:54):
Is is it the same issue every time that you
go back to Saul's Auto Tech?

Speaker 5 (46:57):
Or is it something different each time?

Speaker 22 (47:01):
Well, it's been there's been something. It's been something with
the warranty of the motor. Last time I took it back,
they said it would be I took it back because
the check engine light.

Speaker 24 (47:10):
Again.

Speaker 22 (47:10):
The fourth time they said it was the intercooler and
the inter cooler wasn't under warranty. Cost me twenty eight
hundred dollars. And when I took it now to Kevin Shop,
there shardan AutoZone. Isaiah showed me they used silicone in
probably like ten places where it should have been gaskets,
all right, and that's why it's spitting oil all over

(47:32):
the place.

Speaker 3 (47:33):
Let's turn it over to Kevin here. What is going
on with Dennis's truck?

Speaker 7 (47:38):
Well, from what they told me, I didn't see it.
Obviously is there today, but it is. They're not doing
it properly because some areas you cannot use silicone because
of heat. It has to have a gasket, right, you know,
an oil feed tube on a turbo. You can't put
silicon on. It's not going to hold up right. Well,
it's not so it's it's leaking. It's just it's just
shoddy work.

Speaker 13 (47:58):
You know.

Speaker 7 (47:58):
The motor probably you know, may need to come out,
may need to come out to be resealed properly. You know,
a lot of times it's easier to pull the motor
than that. Do you know you said you got a warranty.
Did Saul's rebuild it or did they buy it from
somebody and install it?

Speaker 22 (48:14):
They were supposed to be bought, But I almost think
that they tried rebuilding it because it's never it's never
run like a rebuilt engine. It ran like you know,
it just there was always something wrong with it.

Speaker 7 (48:28):
Because the warranty should you should if they did purchase it,
because we buy motors all the time, you know, to install,
and they have nationwide warranties. So we supply the customer
with Jasper for examples one or LKQ, and they'll have
a three year, four year warranty that they can go anywhere.
They don't have to come back to us, you know,
if they're traveling what have you. So if you can

(48:48):
find out who they purchased it from and who the
warranty is, we may be able to help you with that.

Speaker 22 (48:55):
Yeah, what they did is I guess it's once they
put the motor in and I took it back because
it was still leaking oil. Then supposedly they had to
get back with the manufacturer and get another one, another
motor supposedly.

Speaker 5 (49:11):
So you think they're on the you're on the third
motor in this truck.

Speaker 22 (49:17):
Does I think I'm on the second placement motor from
salce right, would see, I'm not getting I'm not getting
any information. Like I took it back one time, I'd
lost I had no power. I took it back and
I started driving in over there, and next thing you know,
it's just blowing black smoke out to the exhaust. They
have no throttle, So they had it for ten weeks.

Speaker 23 (49:39):
They never told me what they.

Speaker 5 (49:40):
Did to it ten weeks, and.

Speaker 22 (49:42):
When I asked them ten weeks, I mean they've had
it for eight weeks, ten weeks, four weeks, you know,
after this motor installation. That's what I'm saying. They're killing
me on rents.

Speaker 5 (49:55):
So let me make sure I understand this, Dennis.

Speaker 3 (49:57):
Are they are they blaming this on the WA warranty
company for why it takes ten weeks to get you
something done? Or I mean, why is it taking so
long every time for you to get your truck back out?

Speaker 22 (50:10):
Well, I notice when I go to his shop, there's
probably fifty cars around that shop.

Speaker 23 (50:16):
And I did notice.

Speaker 22 (50:17):
I did read the reviews the other day, and there's
a lot of no good reviews. So I probably should
have done that in the beginning.

Speaker 23 (50:24):
But you know, I.

Speaker 3 (50:27):
Know, but I'm trying to figure out. Is the issue
a dispute between essentially you and the warranty company, or
is it that Sauls keeps doing crappy work, and the
warranty company it just keeps paying for it.

Speaker 8 (50:43):
Well, they're.

Speaker 22 (50:45):
Taking it back for the leaks, and they're doing whatever
they're doing, putting more silicon, but they're not stopping the leak.
A day later, I get my truck back after ten
weeks is still leaking oil. And then I have to
call them and thw them hey, you know, and they're like, well,
you know, we bring you back. And then I told
I texted all because, like I said, he won't call me.

(51:07):
I texted him and said, who do I need to call?
Tom Martino, a lawyer, see say crue and he goes.
He responded, you can text whoever you want to get
a little feeling satisfied or your mind satisfied.

Speaker 23 (51:20):
But I stand by my work, and I'm like, okay,
so what.

Speaker 5 (51:23):
Do we do here, Kevin? I mean, is this really
a warranty company issue?

Speaker 7 (51:27):
It can be because Dimitri and I have been working.
It took us a month to get there, but we
took it from another shop, didn't take the customer, brought
it to us. We found out who they purchased the
motor from, and we follow the claim. Well, we finally
got it approved. They're going to send us a new
motor to take care of this for this guy. So
that's why I'm asking if he can find out who
they bought.

Speaker 8 (51:46):
The motor from.

Speaker 7 (51:47):
Where is the warranty? Is it with the Jasper, is
it with LKQ? Who is There's only a couple big manufacturers,
So find that out.

Speaker 4 (51:56):
Yeah, I can.

Speaker 23 (51:56):
I can call I'm sorry, Kevin, I can call.

Speaker 22 (51:59):
Him and tell him. But he did tell me I
had a three year, thirty thousand my warranty.

Speaker 7 (52:04):
Yeah, that's standard, right, find out who it's with and
we can transfer to us and we'll get we'll see
if we can get you taken care of that way.
You know you're not getting it from him obviously, so
I wouldn't go back way.

Speaker 22 (52:16):
Yeah, And I mean when I've seen he showed me
silicone on the valve cover gaskets.

Speaker 8 (52:21):
Yep, that's that's.

Speaker 23 (52:23):
Like something an apprentice mechanic might try.

Speaker 22 (52:27):
You know.

Speaker 8 (52:28):
I agree.

Speaker 3 (52:29):
So so all right, well, Dennis, get us that information.
We need to know who the manufacturer of the motor
was or where they got the motor from and the
warranty company.

Speaker 5 (52:38):
That's that's going on here.

Speaker 3 (52:40):
If you get that information and get back to us
or get it to Kevin at the shop since that's
where your your vehicle is and and we'll try to
help you. We'll try to work through and get a
solution for you.

Speaker 22 (52:49):
Okay, all right, all right, I didn't leave my truck
at the shop because I got to work.

Speaker 5 (52:57):
Yeah, but you know where it is in the information.

Speaker 3 (52:59):
I'll call.

Speaker 23 (53:00):
I'll call the I'll call Isaiah with the information just
as soon as I can.

Speaker 3 (53:03):
Get it good, He'll take care of it, all right, perfect, perfect,
all right, Thanks for the call, Dennis. We appreciate it
so as you can hear. This is car day to day.
We're trying to work through your issues. So give us
a call. We've got open lines right now. The phone
number is three three seven one three eight two five five.
When we come back in just a moment, we're going
to revisit an issue from yesterday. We had a caller

(53:24):
that had a warranty issue with a Sharpest Rides vehicle
that we're gonna we're going to talk to Dimitri Vale
and then we're still going to discuss that that nasty
arbitration provision and the warranty provision that mister Endurance warranty
contract is setting out there.

Speaker 5 (53:42):
So we'll be right back after this break.

Speaker 11 (53:49):
Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com. You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Time for an insurance check up free, no obligation. In comparison,
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three all three seven
seven one help. You'll think you're his only customer when

(54:11):
you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot com
to list your home with Remax Alliance three all three
nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (54:29):
All right, good afternoon, John Fuller here on the Troubleshooter Network.
We are right in the middle of car day and
so that means we're here. We've got experts in the house.
We have Jeffick and Kevin Colkin that are here to
help answer your questions all things cars, maintenance, fixing, buying,
selling value. Anything you have on your mind that you
want to talk about. Give us a call. The number

(54:51):
is seven one three eight two five five. That's Aeracode
three O three seven one three eight two fivey five.
You can also get a hold of us at help
at troubleshooter dot com. If you'd like to reach out
to us, we're glad to help you out. So one
of the things we like to do on the show
is follow up on previous callers and kind of give
the rest of the story and what the outcome of
things are. And we had a young lady call us

(55:12):
the other day. I think her name was Lissa or
Lisa was it is?

Speaker 15 (55:16):
Well, Lisa was with an apartment full of cockroa. Oh yeah, yeah,
that was You might be thinking of Marie, her by
car from the Sharpest Ride.

Speaker 3 (55:24):
He did, and she called us and expressed that she
was having transmission problems and was getting no luck on
getting the transmission fixed under the warranty that she had
bought from the Sharpest Rides. And so Deputy Dimitri was
kind enough to step in. I'll let him pick up
the story where I left off.

Speaker 15 (55:41):
Well, the story gets even more interesting. So a couple
of days ago, the Sharpest Rides actually traded her out
of that car what into a different used car, and
so at no additional costs, but they just transferred the
financing and the deposit into this new Infinity used Infinity
that she just got.

Speaker 3 (56:00):
Okay, so I asked Marie, my.

Speaker 15 (56:03):
First question was did you get the car inspected before
you signed the paperwork? And she said, well, the Sharpest
Rides did an inspection. H My reaction exactly John, and
that day, Yeah, it passed. Well, it passed because what
she then followed up with saying, well, it was a
safety inspection. So that passed, and they declined to do

(56:28):
like the type of mechanical inspection that we typically recommend,
the pre purchase inspection, because they said, well, there's no
trouble codes that are available and so there's no need
to do a mechanical inspection. So I'm paraphrasing what Marie
told us. So that was a couple of days ago. Now,
not surprisingly, the car now has a check engine light
and it's got some unknown mechanical problems. So I did

(56:51):
invite Marie and she agreed to call us to call
us again to kind of update us on what these
latest problems are and whether or not she would like
us to help in one of two ways. One is
to see if we can get Sharpest Rides to cover
these repairs under their warranty. I did get a copy
of the sales contract and so warranty is in there,
and it appears to be an in house warranty, and

(57:15):
it also appears to be in house financing.

Speaker 3 (57:17):
Which how much money are these cars costing her that
they're trading her in and out of?

Speaker 15 (57:22):
Yeah, so their value priced vehicles, as you can imagine,
And she had five thousand dollars down with a total
purchase price of sixteen something. And that includes a whole
bunch of there's like a gap insurance, which I was
very surprised to see on such an old, low value car.

(57:43):
It includes electronic filing fee, doc fee, stuff like that.
So it came to a little over sixteen thousand. So
the two, you know, the two solutions that I can
imagine are we either help her get sharpest rides to
repair this vehicle and bring it back up to normal standards.
Or and this would be my preferred way, just to
get them to agree, just to undo the whole deal,

(58:05):
give her all her money back, take the car back,
and just everybody goes their own ways and she can
go look for a car somewhere else.

Speaker 3 (58:12):
Now, are you gonna you're gonna broach that proposal to them?

Speaker 5 (58:17):
Or are you gonna help her?

Speaker 4 (58:18):
Yeah?

Speaker 15 (58:18):
I wanted to see I was hoping that we'd have
her on the air right now, Killy, if you get
a chance, give her a shout. She did agree to
come on the air and get her to leave. The
potential solution the choice of these two solutions to Marie.

Speaker 3 (58:32):
Before let's say, if we can get Marie on the line,
I want to talk to experts here about Yeah, just
a second, what exactly? I mean, what do you do
in a car inspection? What do people need to be
worried about? Like they can't they just reset like check
engine lights and a lot of times they'll just stay
off for a couple of days.

Speaker 7 (58:52):
I mean, but what they call the monitors inside the
system need to reset, and that's by driving after you've
cleared the light.

Speaker 5 (58:59):
Okay.

Speaker 7 (59:00):
So if we get in and there's no codes, but
the monitors are not set, well we know they cleared
the codes, okay, and that's just the red flag. So
it's not like there you don't clear codes for no reason, right,
So I mean talk to us.

Speaker 3 (59:13):
About what what is what does an inspection entail? Like,
what do you do? What are you looking for? What
can a buyer rely upon after they've had a car
inspected that they wouldn't get just yeah.

Speaker 8 (59:25):
It's it's very thorough.

Speaker 7 (59:26):
I mean, we first off as safety, you know, we
look front end brakes, you know, things like that, lights,
check to make sure it's not been wrecked. You can
tell from the underside if it's been in a wreck
or most of the time you can of course, electronics.
You pluck scanners in, run all the all the modules.
You know, some cars have up to fifteen modules, and

(59:47):
then leaks leaks are notorious in a lot of cars,
transmission leaks, engine leaks.

Speaker 3 (59:52):
It's it's very very thorough.

Speaker 5 (59:54):
How how does it work?

Speaker 3 (59:56):
I mean, do these dealerships let the potential buyer bring
it to you or you go there?

Speaker 7 (01:00:02):
They come to us, they come down and most of
them the dealers are yeah, you'll go get it checked.
They're they're open to it, you know, and if they're not,
I tell that people don't buy it.

Speaker 3 (01:00:10):
Well, yeah, that's your first red flag. Yeah, sure, that's
the biggest. So how much can somebody anticipate spending to
get a good comprehensive inspection, and I know it probably varies.

Speaker 8 (01:00:18):
Does we cap it at one twenty?

Speaker 3 (01:00:20):
Really?

Speaker 8 (01:00:21):
Yeah, it's reasonable, get it done.

Speaker 7 (01:00:22):
Wow, that's super anticipation in the hope that they'll appreciate
the service and come back and have some of the
work done. I'll be honest, we're you know, we're just
trying to put our sticker on the car and get
our face in front of new customers. And you know,
but one twenty is a bargain.

Speaker 5 (01:00:36):
I think so too, Jeff, do you ever do those?

Speaker 9 (01:00:38):
Well, you know, since we're transmission specialists, we typically focus
only on the drive train, right, you know, if we
do see some other red flags pop up or something
like that, you know, but the customer knows that when
you're coming in, we're not going to be popping wheels.
We're not checking brakes like Kevin does. That's just outside
of our wheelhouse. So yeah, we'll focus on the transmission.
Like he says, we're going to be looking for codes,
We're going to be looking at the fluid, the fluid quality,

(01:01:00):
not there's any evidence of any contaminant in it. The
same thing with the transfercation to differentials.

Speaker 3 (01:01:06):
I mean, I'm guessing the answer is all cars. But
I mean, is there a threshold where it just becomes
almost imperative that you get one checked out? Like it's
it just when it's getting to the end of the
warranty and you're fixing to be solo on this that
it becomes critical or what are your thoughts on that.
There's some things.

Speaker 7 (01:01:23):
I mean, people give car dealers credit for knowing how
cars even work, and they don't. I'll be honest. They're
salespeople and that's what they do, and they're not trying
to deceive people. I think most of the time they
don't even know what's wrong with the cars. So but
I would be I would expect every single I mean,
the more expensive, the more you want to serve. You know, well,

(01:01:45):
and we're getting into a used vehicle, and I don't
care if you go a seemingly low mileage. You know
it's only got thirty five thousand miles on it. Well
that's great, but you don't have any idea how the
last guy actually treated this car, how we maintained the car.
There's a lot of things that can go wrong with time.

Speaker 8 (01:02:00):
We talked about earlier too. Is run a car fax.

Speaker 7 (01:02:03):
It sounds so simple, but I was trying to shop
for a cheaper car from my girlfriend's granddaughter and three
out of five cars had the odos changed.

Speaker 3 (01:02:12):
Does that really happen.

Speaker 7 (01:02:14):
I didn't think it did, but we ran into three
of them where the miles was as much as one
hundred thousand miles.

Speaker 3 (01:02:19):
Les h, How did they change that these days? I
thought that was all so computerized out that.

Speaker 7 (01:02:24):
They just changed the cluster. Really, yeah, you can do it,
so certain guys can program it. But yeah, three out
of five cars, the odometers will rolled back from over
two hundred thousand to just over one hundred.

Speaker 3 (01:02:37):
Wow.

Speaker 7 (01:02:37):
And they're private, They're not car dealers doing this. I'm
not ac choosing dealers, but I mean, if you're looking
at a car, get the VN, pay the thirty five
bucks and run a.

Speaker 5 (01:02:45):
Car fact and car facts.

Speaker 3 (01:02:47):
I mean, for whatever it's worth, they at least have
milestones where stuff was done to that car, so you
know if an oil change was done. You don't care
so much that the oil change was done. You just
care that it's in chronological sequence to the miles going up,
and then all of a sudden something shows up. You're
like bingo.

Speaker 7 (01:03:04):
We now know westwards in Utah in June with two
hundred thousand ounced in Colorado and September with one hundred
and five, how many owners were leave that's how many wrecks.
You know, how many accidents has it had.

Speaker 3 (01:03:16):
I can tell stories. I've got an old case many
moons ago where the Russians in Denver were taking cars
and disassembling them and then you know, doing these insurance
scams and claiming that they were stolen, and they would
take the chassis out, just park them in the middle

(01:03:37):
of the street on some subdivision Denver. Would eventually find them,
take the chassis to Clodes or co Parts or something.
They'd go and buy the damn chassis back at the auction,
put the same car back together, same exact car, with
the same parts, and then they had figured out how
they could take it. I think, if I remember correctly,
that if you took it and reregistered in like I ho,

(01:04:01):
and then brought it back to New Mexico and then
back to Colorado, it got a clean title target, they
could get rid of the salvage designation, and they would
sell it as a brand new car all over again.

Speaker 5 (01:04:11):
That's brilliant coming from our resident.

Speaker 4 (01:04:18):
To be sure to have a question.

Speaker 14 (01:04:20):
Did did Marie find out what the color of that
check engine light?

Speaker 4 (01:04:26):
Or she hasn't done that yet.

Speaker 15 (01:04:28):
Uh, well, we're waiting for Marie to call us. Both
Kelly and the Ice Center messages, so we'll find out
in a few minutes.

Speaker 3 (01:04:34):
Let's find out that we're gonna go to another break here.
We've got pat lined up on the next side and
we'll be right back.

Speaker 11 (01:04:42):
Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com. You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Time for an insurance checkup free, no obligation. In comparison,
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three all three seven
seven to one help. You'll think you're his only customer

(01:05:04):
when you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot
com to list your home with Remax Alliance three all
three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (01:05:17):
I'd just love to do that. Good afternoon, John Fuller,
here for the Troubleshooter Network. We are back rounding out
the second hour, if you can believe that, and we
are here to help you. On the Troubleshooter Network, we
solve problems, say complaints, answer questions, give us a call.
Three oh three seven one three eight two five five
is the number. We have, uh Pat on the line.

(01:05:39):
We're going to go to right now and after that
we are here waiting for your call.

Speaker 5 (01:05:43):
So give us a call. What is going on?

Speaker 3 (01:05:44):
Pat?

Speaker 13 (01:05:46):
Good morning, mister Fuller. I've got a neighbor owns a duplex.
He doesn't live in it, but uh he has a
tenant that won't up the dog dow. It's been a
year's worth and I'm not having real good luck with

(01:06:09):
Colorado Springs code enforcement. But when I called about it
originally a couple of weeks ago and talked to Tom,
Mark had mentioned third party action. What exactly is he saying?

Speaker 3 (01:06:27):
Well, I think what he's trying to say, and I
can't speak for what is in Mark's mind, that.

Speaker 5 (01:06:32):
That is a big ask a buck.

Speaker 3 (01:06:38):
I would presume that Mark is is thinking of some
nuisance action or something against him. For the problem you're
going to have is that the damages are hard to
quantify in that you know, you're not incurring expenses economic
type losses that you could say, look, I've had to
hire a dog, you know, poof removal service or something
like that. So it's purely just like the aesthetics of

(01:07:01):
seeing this dog, you know, this dog mess and in
the neighbor's hort. Is he letting the dogs come over
into your property as well?

Speaker 13 (01:07:10):
No, but he threw some over the other day when
the city made him do something.

Speaker 5 (01:07:18):
But well, he threw it over the fence.

Speaker 3 (01:07:23):
Oh yeah, yeah, as like a thank you for calling
it in.

Speaker 13 (01:07:27):
Yeah, for for reporting him.

Speaker 3 (01:07:29):
You know, I think I'd be setting up a video
camera for that, and that would that would definitely cross
the line there, you know. I mean, listen, I think
you have the right to to go after the guy
that The challenge you're going to find is that, you know,
principally you're absolutely right, but there's just not a lot

(01:07:51):
of damages that flow from that. I mean, I think
the real teeth of the matter is going to be
with code enforcement, and if you can document and show
that this is going on, I mean, that's got to
rise to the level that they would do something. And
I was working with Pat by the way, yeah, and
I sent an email to UH to the Neighborhood Services

(01:08:12):
Coded Force, Man, what'd you find out?

Speaker 20 (01:08:14):
Way?

Speaker 4 (01:08:14):
I did it two days ago.

Speaker 14 (01:08:16):
So I'm giving him seven to ten days to see
if they can follow up on it. Just because it's
the bureaucracy. Yeah, you responded.

Speaker 9 (01:08:25):
I wonder too if you can make a complaint that
you know that the animal's not being taken care of.
I mean, obviously that's an unhealthy situation. So it's just
some sort of neglect or abuse type.

Speaker 3 (01:08:34):
It's almost a welfare you know, report on the dog man.
How bad is it?

Speaker 5 (01:08:39):
I mean, is it is it?

Speaker 3 (01:08:40):
But yours worth of feces is a lot?

Speaker 5 (01:08:42):
It is.

Speaker 13 (01:08:42):
But it's sayings John, especially in the morning, in the
moisture in the last couple of weeks. Yeah, you uh,
it radiates through the neighbors on each side.

Speaker 9 (01:08:54):
Are we talking like a great Dane here or chihuahua?
I was wondering how big.

Speaker 13 (01:08:59):
It's a pretty small dog. But like you said, once, uh,
once you do, you don't do anything for a year.

Speaker 5 (01:09:06):
It's uh a little.

Speaker 23 (01:09:09):
There.

Speaker 4 (01:09:10):
Do you blober it away?

Speaker 13 (01:09:14):
No, we're not in an I was solved.

Speaker 4 (01:09:16):
It's too bad.

Speaker 5 (01:09:17):
Hey the other ted, have you reached out to your
little girl? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:09:21):
Pat, what what does the I mean? You you've got
a tenant there, that's one part of the problem, but
you've also got the owner. I mean, have you talked
to the tenant themselves about it is that just not
going anywhere or what.

Speaker 13 (01:09:34):
I did talk to him initially and he went ballistic,
So it's, uh, it was not a good situation on
a day to day basis, but uh yeah, And the
owner was notified seven weeks ago and his management company
according to code enforcement girl and nobody's nobody's done anything.

(01:10:00):
There are other tenants in the other build on the
other side of their building that's the duplex, has two
little girls that don't have much of a yard. They
don't have any yard because the dog keeps moving forward
because he's trying to get out of it too.

Speaker 5 (01:10:18):
There is there not a fence between the two units, No,
there is not.

Speaker 13 (01:10:23):
They share the backyard together.

Speaker 3 (01:10:27):
Well, I mean, here's my thought on it. Pat. I mean,
I'm pretty pragmatic about this kind of stuff, and I
think at some point, you know, even if you have
the right to bring an action in court, sometimes you're
just throwing good money after bad because the reality is
it's it's not likely to truly it's not likely to
truly change the behavior that's going on here, and it

(01:10:48):
it very easily could escalate things. But I think your
answer is going to be the paper trail, the heck
out of it, and doctor just started that with the
first you know, outreach and and everything you can do
in the way of emails and let's and photographs and
stuff like that is going to be the secret to
getting this thing resolved. So the squeaky wheel gets the
gets the oil, and let's see what happens with Dot's

(01:11:09):
intervention and we'll go from there. Okay, Pat, thanks for
the call. We'll be back after this break.

Speaker 11 (01:11:17):
Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com.

Speaker 12 (01:11:21):
You don't pay a cent until you're content.

Speaker 11 (01:11:26):
Time for an insurance checkup free, no obligation in comparison
call Compass Insurance. Pay too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three all three seven
seven to one help. You'll think you're his only customer
when you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot
com to list your home with Remax Alliance three oh
three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 12 (01:11:52):
Rip News.

Speaker 5 (01:11:57):
You don't have.

Speaker 1 (01:12:00):
Cam running is just as fast as we can. Shooter's
gonna help come.

Speaker 2 (01:12:07):
He is the Troubleshooter Show. Now, Tom Martinez.

Speaker 3 (01:12:13):
Good afternoon, This is John Fuller for the Troubleshooter Network.
We are in the third hour of the show today
on Friday, which is car Day, and to that end,
we have Jeff Vic and Kevin Colchin in the house.

Speaker 4 (01:12:28):
Jeff is with.

Speaker 3 (01:12:30):
Camera Transmissine Kimmer Transmissions, he is a transmission expert, and
we also have Kevin Culchin. We shared an auto tech
so we got both ends of the car covered and
we are here to answer your question. So give us
a call at three O three seven one three eight
two five five. That's three oh three seven one three
eight two five five. So earlier in the show today,

(01:12:50):
we talked to a gentleman that that bought an old
F one fifty and bought a service contract, and the
service contract was with a company called Endurance. But it's
really not important that it's Endurance that we're talking about.
What's important is that as part of this contract, which

(01:13:11):
was a horrible deal because its maximum value was limited
to only really the trade in value of the vehicle
at the time the incident happened. So because this vehicle
had almost two hundred thousand miles on it at the
beginning of the contract, the value of that thing went
down practically with every mile that was driven by a
calculable amount that pretty quickly would have made the maximum

(01:13:35):
payout on the contract less than what it cost him
to actually buy the contract, which is just crazy to
get your mind around, but that's what they do. And
so if you're in the market for an after market warranty,
I just got to tell you got to read the
fine print in these contracts. This contract, which the main

(01:13:56):
terms of which were set forth in one page on
the front, requires thirty six more pages of the fine
print to make up the full contract. So you know,
when you sit down and a guy's just throwing a
bunch of papers in front of you and stuff, you
got to just say stop the day, you know, car,
We've got to read some of this stuff and figure
it out. But one of the things that is near

(01:14:18):
and dear to my heart. I'm a personal injury attorney.
I deal with contracts, mostly insurance contracts, all day long,
and I always tell people, you've got to read the contracts.
You've got to read the policy. You've got to read
the words that they use to set forth what their
duties are and what your duties are, and what they
have to cover and what they're not going to cover.
But in most of these consumer type contracts they have

(01:14:44):
arbitration provisions. Now there are efforts to change the law
and limit the ability that these companies have to unilaterally
impose arbitration. And what that means is they put it
in the contract. It's not freely negotiable, even though they
put words like, you've considered the fact that you could
go to a jury trial, and you've considered the fact
that you could have a judge decide this, but you've

(01:15:05):
decided that it would be more cost efficient and timely
to submit this matter to arbitration. And so you're voluntarily
waiving all those rights as a part of this contract,
even though you've done no such thing. You've not considered it,
read it, thought about it, made a decision to put

(01:15:26):
the arbitration provision in effact. But nonetheless it's there and
it's binding. And let me tell you, these courts will
routinely enforce these arbitration provisions and hold you to them.
So if this gentleman decides he wants to pursue this
matter by challenging them, I don't want to use the
words by going to court, because he can't go to
court he's already waived the ability to go to court,

(01:15:47):
and so what he's got to do is invoke arbitration. Okay,
So what that means is you have to follow this
procedure and make a written demand to the other party.
And it says right here that you're going to get
a single arbitrator and it's going to be in accordance
with all these setout rules under the American Arbitration Association,

(01:16:07):
and they'll even advance the cost of it, which is
really kind of nice of them because a lot of
times it makes both parties split the costs up front
and you'll get to pay out, you know, from five
hundred to a few thousand dollars to get this arbitration going.
But here's the crazy thing. Arbitration's going to take place
in not Denver, Colorado, not Centennial, not Greeley, not Evans

(01:16:33):
where this gentleman live. It's going to take place in Lynchburg, Virginia.

Speaker 5 (01:16:39):
Okay.

Speaker 3 (01:16:40):
So your car that's broken, that has a shelled out
engine and is sitting out in the backyard, that you're
still making payments on your only source of recourse. If
you really want to challenge these guys saying we're not
paying for your repair is to somehow travel by train, plane,
or hitchhike to Lynchburg, Virginia wherever the heck that is.

Speaker 15 (01:17:03):
I'm going to be able to drive there. And you're
broken down. The your car's broke.

Speaker 3 (01:17:07):
Down, so you can't drive. You got a hitchhike or
catch a ride with somebody or something, and you're not
going to court. So you go to this arbitration provision
and you know, and so here's the deal.

Speaker 5 (01:17:21):
Guess what, It's not even binding, So you have to go.

Speaker 3 (01:17:25):
Through all this arbitration to get to a decision, and
if they don't like it, they can challenge it in court.
You want to talk about a stack deck. There's some
arbitrator in Lynchburg, Virginia that gets about ten cases a
week out of this whatever warranty company. That's all he does.

(01:17:46):
He knows his contract like the back of his hand.
And you're going to roll in there and tell them
that you know, Bubba misprinted the mileage on the application
and you told them the right number on the phone call.

Speaker 5 (01:17:58):
And I mean, there's no chance in the world that
you're going to win. But there's also no chance in
the world that.

Speaker 3 (01:18:04):
You're going to go to Lynchburg to actually have this
case heard in front of this arbitrator to give you
a non binding decision that you then have to go
try to litigate in Lynchburg, Virginia as well to get
a decision that you lose, and then when you lose,
you get to pay all of their fees and expenses
as well. So, I mean the reality of these contracts,

(01:18:24):
and this is why they're so bad. I mean, some
people really tell you, oh, yeah, arbitration's good.

Speaker 5 (01:18:29):
We want to enforce this. We don't want to encourage lawsuits.

Speaker 3 (01:18:33):
And I'm a lawyer. I do lawsuits. I'm not an
anti lawsuit kind of guy. I'm an anti you know,
fraudulent claim. I'm an anti you know, in any sort
of BS lawsuits. Nobody wants those and those I have
never filed one in my entire career, don't plan on

(01:18:53):
filing one at any time in the future. And those
are bad and I don't like them, and we should
get rid of them to whatever extent we can't. But
this is not the answer. This does not make you
a more powerful consumer. This just weakens it to the
point that if you don't like something in here and
you don't like what this company is doing. After they've
taken all your money, tough, there's not a darn thing

(01:19:17):
you can do about it. And that's why they're bad,
and that's why you should never agree to these things. Now,
the alternative is you don't buy it because it's not
a freely negotiated, you know, negotiating contract. You can't go
in and say, I like this, I really don't like
the arbitration. I'd like to do that in Denver. If
it's all the same to you, they're not negotiable, just

(01:19:38):
take it or leave it. So when you get an
option of dealing with something like this, unless it's just
a smoking deal that just absolutely makes sense and it's
a top flight company, you know, maybe you consent to it.
But for something like this, where the maximum payout on
it is so small compared to the cost, the length
of time that you're going to be paying for this,

(01:19:59):
saying and paying interest on it is so long, your
power in the transaction is so minimal that you can't
do anything to force them to the table. It's just
one of the worst decisions that you can ever make
to go in and buy something like this. I'm not
saying all warranties are bad. I'm not saying that even

(01:20:19):
this company is the only one that's really a.

Speaker 5 (01:20:21):
Bad guy out there.

Speaker 3 (01:20:23):
But this provision in this contract is one of the
most anti consumer provisions that I've ever read in one
of these. It wouldn't be that much stronger if it
said go to Pluto to arbitrate this and to use
Mickey Mouse as your arbitrator. I mean, you'd have that
much less of a chance of invoking that than you
do to invoke these terms in this contract. So that's

(01:20:45):
my two cents on this. We've got a couple of
cars lined up, or a couple of callers lined up
about cars. We will be right back to take those calls.

Speaker 11 (01:20:53):
Hang on just a second, go with a sure thing
Denver's Best roofer Excel roofing dot com. You don't pay
a cent until you're content. Time for an insurance checkup free,
no obligation. In comparison, call Compass Insurance paying too much

(01:21:15):
your coverage at dozens of insurance companies find out now
three O three, seven to seven to one help. You'll
think you're his only customer When you choose Frank durand
the Real Estate man dot com to list your home
with Remax Alliance three three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (01:21:41):
All right, good afternoon, John Puller here on the Troubleshooter Network.

Speaker 5 (01:21:46):
We are moving forward.

Speaker 3 (01:21:47):
Here. We have a caller Tim on the line. Tims
calling us about a warranty issue. Tim, What is going
on with your warranty?

Speaker 24 (01:21:56):
Oh, I'm just seeing if this sounds right. So last
week I took my car to the shop, to the
deller that I got her from and purchased the warranty from,
which was a three year so many miles. But I'm
still within the time period and everything.

Speaker 3 (01:22:14):
Now ten is a new car that you're talking about
or a used car?

Speaker 24 (01:22:18):
Yeah, it's used twenty thirteen Yukon Denali.

Speaker 5 (01:22:22):
Okay, so so okay.

Speaker 24 (01:22:26):
So yesterday finally I get like the verdict on whether
the warranty people are going to cover it or not.

Speaker 5 (01:22:32):
What happened to your car?

Speaker 24 (01:22:33):
So they say, oh, it's been running good for long.
It's almost three years. That warranty is almost stuck. Matter
of fact, in June it will be up. So I
was driving then it started making a loud o noise
and then it stopped, and then I continued driving and everything.

(01:22:53):
I just got that because it was like when it
snowed real good, like two weeks ago or so, so
I thought maybe it was dragging heights or something like that,
like that was weird. So then I drove about five
more minutes. Then that noise came on again. So then
I pulled over and everything, shut it down, looked around
the vehicle, didn't see anything or nothing, turned the car

(01:23:14):
off and stuff, turned it back on, put it into
like reverse neutral, nothing, nothing. Then then to drive. Then
it started making a loud, old grinding noise, so I
turned it off and then I got it told home.
And then it was on a Saturday, so I wasn't
able to get a hold of the warranty people because
they're clothes on Saturday and Sunday. So Monday I called

(01:23:35):
that advised me to get it told back to the
fillership or whatever and then they could go from there.
So the dealership says that is having complications internally with
the transmission and stuff. So the warranty people finally and
all that, I was able to talk to them and

(01:23:58):
the dealership to where they said that that yes, they're
proving the claim and that they're only going to be
able to do thirty five hundred though, because that's the
value of the vehicle. Okay, Oh, and they said it
in your contract and everything.

Speaker 5 (01:24:17):
Yep.

Speaker 24 (01:24:17):
So I went and got the contract and looked into it,
and what it says in the contract is they're willing
to cover actual cash value or NADA value of the vehicle.

Speaker 3 (01:24:31):
Right.

Speaker 24 (01:24:31):
So then I called up to the warranty people and
told them like, yeah, well it's saying that you guys
will cover this or this. So I when I looked
it up on that NADA, it's like eight thousand dollars.
And then when I strolled down then I seen where
it says thirty five hundred is the trade in value.

(01:24:54):
So I said, I see where you're getting the thirty
five hundred from the trade in value and trade in
value and the actual value is not the same. So
then they like, hold on. I was like, but yeah,
if you can point me to where it says in
the contract, then yeah, I could take a look at
it real quick and all that. And then he was like,
oh hold on, so wait on holding everything. Then when

(01:25:15):
he came back to the phone, he was like, yeah,
we're having complications. We can't look up the NADA right
now and all that. So we'll call you back tomorrow,
which is today, But I haven't spoke to them yet,
so I'm about to call him in a little while
to see exactly what's going on. So I'm just seeing
that that sounds right to you.

Speaker 3 (01:25:36):
Well, here's what I can tell you, Tim, And I
don't know what company that you're dealing with. Do you
remember the company name of the warranty.

Speaker 24 (01:25:46):
I don't remember the name. I just know that they'red
in New Mexico, the people that I'm talking to.

Speaker 3 (01:25:52):
So listen, I don't know who you're dealing with, but
I just happened to have this contract that we've been
dealing with all day, and so I'm not suggesting that
it's the same one that you're dealing with, but it's
but they're all very similar, and they have a lot
of you know, crossovers and stuff that, and so this
particular contract, and you're right, that's exactly why I was saying,

(01:26:14):
this one's such a bad idea, because the guy has
a truck that has a true trade in value that's
just barely above at the beginning of the contract, the
total value of the warranty.

Speaker 5 (01:26:27):
But as it gets driven.

Speaker 3 (01:26:29):
And as the months go by and he gets more
and more miles on it, the value that truck keeps
going down, and at some point it becomes controlling, so
that the maximum the warranty would pay out is even
less than you know, it's even less than what it
cost him to buy the warranty in the first place,
which just means it's an absolutely ridiculous thing to buy

(01:26:50):
for anybody. Why would you pay more money for a
warranty that guarantees to not ever pay you more than
less than that amount. Right, So here's what I can
tell you in this particular contract, and with every contract,
you got to go pull the contract out yourself and
print it off and read it from cover to cover.
This one defines actual cash value in it. And under

(01:27:12):
this contract it says actual cash value means the NADA
published wholesale trade in value. And so they make those
terms exactly the same. So whether they talk about NADA
at one point in the contract, which they do, and
then in another part of the contract they talk about
actual cash value because it's a defined term in the contract,

(01:27:33):
those two mean exactly the same thing. And so it's
not that when you say actual cash value in your mind,
I know what you mean. It means actual amount of
cash if somebody would give you for the vehicle. But
in this contract sense, what it means is the NADA
wholesale trade in value. And so if that's thirty five
hundred in your contract, or if alternatively they cap the

(01:27:57):
value of the service contract at thirty five, that's the
maximum they're going to pay. So, now here's what I
think is the good news. You don't probably have to
use that dealership to repair your transmission, do they?

Speaker 9 (01:28:11):
So you know, yeah, you could go to an independent
like myself for somebody who's reputable, which is going to
come in under the actual cost of you know what
you're going to be looking at at a dealership.

Speaker 3 (01:28:22):
Right, So I think you'd be wise to have, you know,
somebody else look at this vehicle when you're considering what
your options are. And the other benefit of that that
a lot of people don't think about, is it These
guys like Jeff and Kevin, they deal with these warranting
companies all the time, and so they're actively on the
phone with them describing what's going on, you know, getting
the authorizations for you. I mean they really take that

(01:28:43):
burden off of you and get the agreement that you
need to go ahead and get your car fixed and
back on the road. So A, I think that they're
right in having the same number for actual cash value
in the NADA. But B you might just want to
think of about having somebody else look at the vehicle
and try to get that covered so that you can

(01:29:05):
get it fixed and back on the road. Does that
sound like a plan for you.

Speaker 24 (01:29:08):
Tim, Yeah, sir, because yeah, they said thirty five hundreds
and all have to pay twenty seven out of.

Speaker 21 (01:29:15):
My pocket.

Speaker 3 (01:29:17):
Expensive TRANSMITSI oh, yeah, that's what they came up with.

Speaker 24 (01:29:21):
And yeah they said for rebuild or refurbst or something
like that. Hey, and they said that includes the two
hundred and fifty dollars deductibull and all that.

Speaker 5 (01:29:32):
Yeah, Hey, write this career.

Speaker 24 (01:29:35):
Down, confuse to where I didn't see it.

Speaker 3 (01:29:37):
Hey, Tim, write this number down for jeffiic at camera transmission.
It's three or three six ninety three, fourteen hundred. Give
them a call, see what kind of options you've got
to have them take a look at it and just
see what your options are.

Speaker 24 (01:29:51):
Okay, okay, yep, Well, thank you for the help. I
appreciate it, all right, good.

Speaker 9 (01:29:57):
Luck to you, my friend. You know what he touched
on on something we were talking about off air. Don't
be the first to make contact with the warranty company.
You are your own worst enemy. Trust the guy you're
handing your keys to to deal with the warranty company.
If they were looking for zing words, they're looking for
anything to get out from underneath these things. Bring it in,

(01:30:17):
let us take a look at it. Let us deal
with your warranty company. They may make contact with you
to make sure that you know you're okay with this deal,
or whatever the case may be. Or if you've got
a problem with them later on down the right road
because of a denial or something like that, then contact them.
But if you contact them first, you're usually muddying the
waters for us before we even get a chance to start.

Speaker 3 (01:30:36):
On the car.

Speaker 6 (01:30:36):
Right.

Speaker 3 (01:30:37):
I think that's great advice. It's almost the same advice
I give people in the context of accidents and stuff,
which is, don't give a statement to the insurance company.
You have to understand. And it's the same thing we
dealt with yesterday with the attorney that was here in
the deal that said at the hospital where his wife
was getting treated following an accident. They had a video
thing set up where they were asking questions about how

(01:30:58):
to build and everything in that video conference call was
geared towards having him make the wrong decisions and building
out inappropriately in the way that benefited the hospital the most.
So listen, guys, when you have the opportunity to get
a professional on your side to deal with these contracts
and stuff, almost ninety nine times out of one hundred,
you're gonna be better off doing that. Get the people

(01:31:20):
that deal with them every day on your side, and
I think you'll come out better. We're going to take
a quick break here right now. We'll be right back.
We've got a couple of calls on the phone, but
give us a shout if we can help you.

Speaker 1 (01:31:30):
Thanks.

Speaker 11 (01:31:35):
Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com. You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Time for an insurance check up free, no obligation. In comparison,
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies. Find out now three oh three, seven
to seven to one.

Speaker 3 (01:31:55):
Help.

Speaker 11 (01:31:55):
You'll think you're his only customer when you choose Frank
durand the real estate man dot Com to list your
home with Remax Alliance three all three nine two zero
sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (01:32:11):
All right, good afternoon, John Fuller back with the Troubleshooter
Network and joining me in the studio. Here is Jeff
Vick and Kevin Culkin, and it is car Day and
we are here to help you with all of your problems.
We solve problems, state complaints, answer questions. We're here for
just about anything. It doesn't have to be limited to cars.
But while we have these experts in the house, it's
a great time to call with the car issues. But

(01:32:33):
we have Joanna on the line with a not car issue. Joanna,
how can we help you today?

Speaker 10 (01:32:41):
I just want to see if I can get some
help for a friend of mine. She's seventy seven years
old and she's lived in her town home for forty years.
She does have some serious mental health problems. Okay, but
I just found out that she got a notice from
the sheriff that they are going to come take her
home May eighth for what because of h HOA dues

(01:33:07):
that she did not pay. Now, I'm sure she's gotten
quite a few notices and everything else, and she thinks
it's all a big scam, so she has ignored everything
that she has gotten from the courts, from the HOA.
This was I went online and it was filed in
July thirtieth, twenty twenty four.

Speaker 5 (01:33:28):
So it's so the ha, sorry Joanna.

Speaker 3 (01:33:31):
So they actually sued her in foreclosure for this lean
against their against the condo?

Speaker 5 (01:33:36):
Is that or the town home?

Speaker 3 (01:33:38):
Is that?

Speaker 5 (01:33:38):
What's going on?

Speaker 14 (01:33:39):
Right?

Speaker 10 (01:33:41):
She owed twenty one thousand dollars in HOA fees and
dues is what they were suing her for.

Speaker 3 (01:33:52):
Has she wandered?

Speaker 5 (01:33:55):
I mean, has she been paying anything? I mean, surely
she's not.

Speaker 3 (01:33:58):
So, is she's so gone that she doesn't recognize the
obligation to pay them or what's going on with the
lack of payment?

Speaker 10 (01:34:07):
I'm not sure where that is. She claims that she
has paid it, but I don't know. Like I said,
she she does have some some serious mental health problems,
so I don't know if she has or hasn't.

Speaker 5 (01:34:19):
But does she have any family?

Speaker 10 (01:34:25):
No, she has no family.

Speaker 24 (01:34:28):
And so.

Speaker 10 (01:34:30):
I'm just trying to see if there's something that can
be done to delay this or stop this. You know,
I know, May next week.

Speaker 15 (01:34:41):
Yeah, John, I just sent Kelly a message to try
to get Bride O'Brien on the phone. But just from
your basic general knowledge, don't you think that severely handicapped
people and very elderly people such as her friend might
have some special special protections in this.

Speaker 5 (01:34:56):
Kind of I mean, here's what I know.

Speaker 3 (01:34:57):
She's definitely an at risk adult, okay, by virtue of
both her age and her capacity, and you know, and
those are both issues that would have been in effect
last year when they initiated this deal. And so I think,
you know, there may be some salvation in the lack
of process or what she didn't participate, But it sounds like,

(01:35:19):
you know, this is the kind of thing that happens
when an HOA finally files a lawsuit and then the
person doesn't show up and they get a judgment, and
then finally they decide to foreclose that judgment. And she's
she's been there for forty years. She likely owns it
frete and clear, so there's no leans on the property,
so they're in first position, and so it's just a she.

Speaker 10 (01:35:36):
Does she does have a reverse mortgage.

Speaker 15 (01:35:40):
I know that, Oh, wouldn't the reverse mortgage company have
paid off this judgment, or they.

Speaker 3 (01:35:46):
Should have, and they should have verified every year that
both the insurance and all the obligations were being paid
on it. Have you, Joanna, do you have any sort
of power of attorney or do you have the ability
to actually contact to any of these people on her behalf?

Speaker 10 (01:36:03):
No, I don't, like I say, she's more of an acquaintance.
We get together a couple times a year for dinner,
and we had just gotten together and she mentioned all this,
and I was just terribly worried about her. And I
know she has no family, and so that's why I'm
trying to find some help for her.

Speaker 15 (01:36:20):
Does she have the means of satisfying this judgment?

Speaker 10 (01:36:26):
She says she does.

Speaker 5 (01:36:28):
Well, it's down.

Speaker 3 (01:36:29):
To the really, the oh my god stage of I mean,
I don't know if she even still has a right
to cure. I am interested in getting Brad O'Brien on
the phone here. Brad one of our real estate attorneys.
He was in studio yesterday, and I think that would
really be smart of us to get his take on this, Joanna.
Can I put you back on hold for just a
little bit while we get Brad on the phone just

(01:36:51):
to get some really good advice straight from a guy
that does this every day. Yes, all right, just go
back on hold. We won't forget about you, and as
soon as we get bread on the line, we'll be
back to talk about this some more. Okay, Joanna, all right,
so hang on there, Joanna. Hey, you guys were talking about,
you know, the the concept of don't call these warranty

(01:37:13):
companies on your own and your experiences with them, just
to help people kind of understand why we say that
and the horror stories that come from people trying to
do it on their own. Can you share with the
listeners some experience.

Speaker 7 (01:37:28):
Yeah, I think most people are just trying to be helpful,
you know, by by trying to lay everything out. But
you know, it's a term we used earlier. You know,
less is more, you know, the less you tell them.
I never candone lying, don't lie to them, but don't answer.
You know, is today Tuesday with a story just to
answer the questions that you know, and you shouldn't even
have talks to your own warranty company.

Speaker 8 (01:37:48):
We do it.

Speaker 7 (01:37:49):
You get you bring your car and tell me what's
going on. Here's my warranty. Let me know what you
find out and that's the end of it, right, and
you never hear back from anybody until we get an answer.
And this is what we need to do. Warranty never
contacts customers very very rarely, so don't get involved. It
just muddies everything up and it makes it harder for us,
you know, to make a claim for you, you know,

(01:38:10):
and other little tidbits we talked about, don't don't use it,
don't buy a car with an extended word. Are you
thinking that that is like a service contract? You know,
there's something wrong with the car, and you buy the
car with the warranty and the next day you call
the warranty company. No, No, they're gonna they're gonna decline
that every single time.

Speaker 8 (01:38:27):
They're going to consider that pre existing exactly.

Speaker 3 (01:38:30):
So yeah, and that kind of gets closer to that
fraud market we are we talking about. You know, we
talked earlier about whether the mileage that was reported for
the guy that was on the line with us was
was a material misrepresentation. I mean, I think when you
can say, look, it's zero point two percent of the
overall mileage, and and you know, this guy was trying

(01:38:51):
to do the honest thing and stuff. There's clearly no
fraud going on in that case. But if you you know, if,
on the other hand, you were work the thing the
next day and that's when you're ten thousand mile discrepancy
comes up or something that's a little different story that
begins to look like it just doesn't pass the smell test, yep,
And the smell test is the you know is the

(01:39:15):
is is really what it comes down to. And the
same is true in my line of work. I mean,
if you get a new policy of insurance and the
car gets stolen the next day, you can bet that
they're going to open a special investigation on that and
they're gonna look really, really, really hard at every circumstance.
Not saying it doesn't happen, and it doesn't happen legitimately,

(01:39:39):
but an awful lot of times, when it smells like
a rat and it looks like a rat, it probably
is a rat. And these insurance companies are not dumb.
They look at those dates too, and it sets off
a big red flag and they're like, yeah.

Speaker 9 (01:39:53):
Well, you have to live in preparation too for that
day of failure, right, you know, everything you do from
the time you buy that car and you get that failure,
they're going to scrutinize. So if you're scheduled inside your
your owner's manual for a transmission service at thirty six
thousand miles, it better be before thirty six thousand miles. You
better be able to document it.

Speaker 3 (01:40:12):
So how that's a great question, are a great point
because it is in this contract here that you have
to meet all of the the manufacturers recommended maintenance intervals.
So and I know I don't do that in my
personal vehicles. It may be plus or over by a
little bit or maybe even a lot, and you know,
I'll see.

Speaker 9 (01:40:31):
Them where if if it's one mile over this regular
rescheduled maintenance where they have declined it just off of that.
So if you're doing your own oil changes, you know,
save the dates, save the receipts so that you can
prove that I bought the oil and the oil filter.
You can check the part number. This fits my car right,
and this was the date I did it, and this
was the mileage I did it on. But they are

(01:40:53):
looking for a reason to duck out, and maintenance is
probably the number one.

Speaker 3 (01:40:57):
Of the last one, and that that carries the day
for him that holds water, even the one mile failure
to get the recommended whatever.

Speaker 7 (01:41:07):
I saw a warranty once in big Bow letters on
the first page. If you don't change your oil within
fifteen hundred miles of this sale, this warranty is void.

Speaker 3 (01:41:16):
Holy moly. All right, guys, hang on, we'll be right
back after this break.

Speaker 11 (01:41:27):
Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com.

Speaker 12 (01:41:31):
You don't pay a cent until you're content.

Speaker 11 (01:41:36):
Time for an insurance checkup free no obligation comparison call
Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens of
insurance companies find out now three O three seven seven
to one help. You'll think you're his only customer when
you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot com
to list your home with Remax Alliance three three nine
two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (01:42:04):
All right, good afternoon, John Fuller, coming back with the
Troubleshooter Network. We are getting rapidly close to the end
of the show today. We've got one more hour to go.
This is card day. You can reach us at three
O three seven one three eight two five five with
all of your problems. We have Mike Wink and Jeffick
and are Jeffick and Kevin Colkan in the studio and
on the line, we have Mike Wink who's going to

(01:42:25):
be joining us today as an expert, and Joanna has
called in Mike. Joanna is calling on behalf of her friend,
which is an elderly and somewhat mentally challenged lady who's
been living in a town home for the last forty
years and apparently has gotten sideways with her hoa it

(01:42:46):
looks like, and has reported that she's losing her home
in the next six or seven days. And we're kind
of trying to figure out what's going on. It looks
like she was sued and that some sort of a
judgment has entered, and we're not one hundred percent sure,
but either they're going to a foreclosure auction next week,

(01:43:08):
or perhaps they've already had the auction and she's coming
down to the date where the sheriff is going to
take possession of the of the town home. And and
so two things then came up in the conversation. One
is that she has a reverse mortgage on the on
the property, and then second, the idea that there is

(01:43:29):
a you know, a homestead exemption that her age over
seventy and certainly being you know, at risk from a
from a mental standpoint, would would kick in. And we thought,
you know, perhaps you can shed some light, Mike on
how that works. How does the homestead exemption work? You know,
what would happen in a case like this if all
of a sudden this lady, you know, retained a bankruptcy

(01:43:53):
attorney or or or did something along those lines. We're
just looking at options to save this this this lady
home and her you know, her rights are at least
trying to preserve her rights, Mike.

Speaker 15 (01:44:06):
The other thing that the thought that I had in
mind was kind of a shortcut. Is there anything you
can do to freeze whatever is going to happen next
week and clean up the mess later, just to ensure
that this very elderly and mentally incapable lady doesn't get
kicked out into the street on Thursday.

Speaker 12 (01:44:24):
Sure.

Speaker 20 (01:44:25):
Sure.

Speaker 10 (01:44:25):
So.

Speaker 21 (01:44:26):
A couple of points there. Number One, the homestead exemption
does not applied to an HOA. The HOA could have
a six months of assessments through what they call a
statutory mean, and the home set exemption would not would
not protect equity against that lean, but it would to

(01:44:53):
the extent that there was more assessments do when they
got a judgment and they filed the judgment lead, which
they often do, so that's a little complicated. But the
HOA has kind of two types of leans that can get.
One which is a statutory lean and the home set
exemption doesn't fly. The other, which is a judgment lean
and the homestead would apply. The biggest issue though, right
now is has the home and sold in foreclosure or not?

(01:45:15):
Because if it's been sold in foreclosure, there's nothing we
can do now stop it because it's already happened. And
if it hasn't, then she can file a bankruptcy before
the foreclosure sale date that will effectively stop the sale
and then we'll have to work out, you know, paying
paying HOA or you know, or avoiding some of the

(01:45:35):
lien and maybe paying the other part.

Speaker 3 (01:45:37):
That that kind of thing, right, So, Joanna, do you
know any more about this? Has there actually been a
sale that went down? I mean, what what is she
expecting to happen next week? Is it the eviction or
the actual sale that's that's coming up on her?

Speaker 10 (01:45:57):
They said at ten o'clock on May eighth is when
the sheriff was coming. The letter said, so, is there
any way we could find out if it's been sold
in foreclosure?

Speaker 23 (01:46:07):
Or how do we does the letters.

Speaker 15 (01:46:10):
Say what the sheriff is going to do at ten o'clock?

Speaker 10 (01:46:14):
I mean no, Unfortunately I haven't seen the letter, and
I guess I need to get more information.

Speaker 15 (01:46:21):
Get that letter to Mike Wink right now.

Speaker 21 (01:46:24):
I mean, I think, and if you give me a
call offline, we can do. We can do some searching
to try to figure out if it's It could be
a sheriff's sale, which would be an enforcement of a
judgment lead and the homestead exemption could potentially stop it,
but it's probably more efficient to file bankruptcy anyways to
definitively stop that sale.

Speaker 3 (01:46:46):
Right So, Joanna, these are emergency procedures. This is not
something that she can sit back and wait until the end.
This is not a scam. This is very real and
if she doesn't take these steps, she does stand to
lose her home and be forcibly evicted from the home
if if she does nothing, and that's you know, that's
a horrible outcome, but it could easily actually happen. So

(01:47:07):
here's what I want to do. I want to give
you Mike Winks phone number. Okay, and you and you
need to get with your friend and the two of
you need to call it. Seven to two oh five
two three zero six to zero. Okay, seven to two
oh five two three zero six to zero.

Speaker 5 (01:47:24):
Thank you, Mike. We appreciate your help.

Speaker 21 (01:47:26):
Thank you.

Speaker 5 (01:47:27):
We're going to go to a break.

Speaker 19 (01:47:28):
We'll see on the other side.

Speaker 11 (01:47:41):
Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com.

Speaker 12 (01:47:45):
You don't pay a cent until you're content.

Speaker 11 (01:47:50):
Time for an insurance check up free no obligation comparison
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three out three three
seven to seven to one help. You'll think you're his
only customer when you choose Frank durand the real estate
Man dot com to list your home with Remax Alliance
three all three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (01:48:11):
Yeah, ripped.

Speaker 19 (01:48:18):
News.

Speaker 23 (01:48:21):
So you don't have.

Speaker 1 (01:48:24):
Come running as fast as we can show Shooter's gonna help.

Speaker 2 (01:48:29):
Come man, This is the Troubleshooter Show.

Speaker 5 (01:48:34):
Now, Tom Martinez.

Speaker 3 (01:48:38):
Good afternoon, This is John Fuller for the Troubleshooter Network.
We are in the final hour of the Troubleshooter Show
on Friday. Here in the studio we have Jeff Vick
and Kevin Colchan. It is card day and we are
here to help you. So we help you solve problems,
take complaints, answer questions, uh, anything that we can do
relating to a car. Today is the day to call.

(01:48:59):
So if you have problems with your vehicle, with repairs,
with warranties, with anything that you have going on, by
all means, give us a call. But we're not limited
to that, so we would open the door to just
about any questions that you have. The lines are wide open.
It's three oh three seven one three eight two five five.
So we were talking of the break a little bit

(01:49:20):
about you know, a lot of things going on in
the world these days with with you know, tariffs and
all this stuff, and and one of the industries that's
getting hit pretty hard is the car industry. And so
I think that there's some you know, predictions that you
could make that you know, we might be entering an
error where people are going to be hanging onto their

(01:49:41):
cars a little bit longer than not. And that's going
to make you know, repair and maintenance all the more
important than maybe it already is. But it also brings
up an issue of challenges that you guys have in
this environment for things like getting the parts to do
your repairs and and how do you navigate eight through
that and tell us about some of the challenges you

(01:50:02):
have in that in that field and what your predictions
are about. You know that that markets going forward.

Speaker 9 (01:50:07):
Some of it's almost old hat at this point, you know,
because we've been dealing with it ever since the COVID epidemic,
when you know a lot of manufacturing went down. I
mean they had enough stockpiled you know, you had enough
steamed roll for a while. But then once those those
supplies diminished, well, the cost of parts went up, the
rarity of them went up. You know, you'd have to
reatroll around the country. We're still doing that now. You know,

(01:50:29):
it was only speculation on our behalf that. You know,
they've realized that they don't have to stalk everything in
one place and pay taxes on that inventory. So you're
commonly reaching out to Okay, well this is available in Cleveland,
or this is available in Dallas and they're reducing their
footprint inside certain areas, and a.

Speaker 7 (01:50:45):
Lot of times they're holding back production until they have
enough to run a full production run. So in other words,
that run maybe twenty five hundred, and they'll just pile
all the back orders till they have twenty five hundred
and then then flip the switch.

Speaker 3 (01:50:58):
I remember we had a deal a few years ago,
and maybe it's still a factor today. But like people
couldn't get their cars fixed in the body shops because
they couldn't get body parts because of the tsunamis and
stuff in Japan and other natural disasters. I mean months
and month and months, and the collateral effects of that
are you know, the rental car agencies were backed up

(01:51:20):
because the cars were gone from month.

Speaker 9 (01:51:22):
To You have dealerships that had brand new vehicles on
the lots that they you know, that didn't have chips
on them exactly, they weren't able to sell them, yep, Field,
I mean certain ships would show up and now the
vehicle was driveable. So they actually ended up selling these
vehicles with we owe notices to the consumer so that
they when when our HVAC chip comes in, you can
come in. We can turn that back on for you.

(01:51:43):
We owe it to you. But that way they could
at least get these things off their lots.

Speaker 3 (01:51:47):
Yeah, it's nice this time of the year. You won't
need your air conditioning that much. You know, that's what
the windows are made for. You know that, the old
manual air conditioning and stuff.

Speaker 9 (01:51:55):
So you know, but we've already started. You mean, you
mentioned the tariffs, and we've seen any of the dealerships.
It's most likely a manufacturer wide, but you know, the
in preparation for the tariffs, have started raising the prices
on certain parts, certain parts. I've had an example of
a part that you know, I was paying one hundred
and eight dollars for US now over five hundred and
sixty And that happened literally inside a ten days time span.

(01:52:17):
When I bought it ten days prior, it cost me
one hundred and eighty bucks. When I had to get
it the next time ten days after that, five hundred
and sixty three dollars.

Speaker 3 (01:52:25):
Holy cow.

Speaker 7 (01:52:26):
And sometimes you're not ready for that when you're doing
quotes and estimates and everything else. That's because we use
common so we know what parts cost and you can
put an estimate together, right, but you can't be off by,
you know, two hundred percent on.

Speaker 5 (01:52:37):
A party count.

Speaker 3 (01:52:39):
We've got to caller Peter on the line here with
a transmission issue. What's going on, Peter?

Speaker 23 (01:52:45):
Hi?

Speaker 10 (01:52:45):
Hello?

Speaker 26 (01:52:47):
I have a twenty twenty three Toyota Camry. Okay, And well,
I was in the dealing dealership the other day and
they said it's a good idea to get the transmission
and fluid changed. Okay, and I have a CVC transmission
and I looked online about it. It says that it
holds eight and a half courts, but when they do
the transmission fluid change, it only releases three and a

(01:53:09):
half courts support. I'm wondering what the heck is the
purpose of that. Supposedly you're not supposed to change these things.

Speaker 9 (01:53:19):
Well, no, I disagree entirely that you're not supposed to
change these things. I mean they talk about sealed transmissions
and lifetime fluids and lifetime units. I mean, yeah, it's
the lifetime of it until it breaks down. The most
cost effective means you can keep to keep that vehicle
on the road is to do that preventative maintenance. And
kudos to your dealership for recommending it at such an
early age. On this vehicle. I'm just sure that they're

(01:53:41):
going off of the mileage as well. But the most
cost effective means you can what's that you said? Absolutely,
the most cost effective means you can use of keeping
that vehicle on the road is your preventive maintenance. It
doesn't guarantee that you're not going to have a failure,
but it maximizes the longevity of that car.

Speaker 3 (01:53:58):
How many miles do you have.

Speaker 26 (01:53:59):
On it here, Jim, I have forty thousand?

Speaker 3 (01:54:04):
Yeah, you do.

Speaker 9 (01:54:05):
I recommend about every three years of thirty six thousand miles.
And what you're doing is you're replenishing the attitudes that
breakdown and that fluid over time.

Speaker 3 (01:54:12):
And use.

Speaker 26 (01:54:14):
Oh I see, so if they only removed three and
a half court and then the ad three and a
half courts, it's actually helping you transmit.

Speaker 8 (01:54:21):
Yeah, it's kind of boosting it.

Speaker 5 (01:54:23):
Yep. Absolutely. Okay, good idea, Peter. Let's get that done. Okay,
thanks for the call. Next, we're gonna hear from John.
John's got an issue about a head gasket.

Speaker 3 (01:54:33):
What is going on?

Speaker 5 (01:54:34):
John?

Speaker 3 (01:54:34):
You've got a seventy six U Is that a Ford
Van E two fifty? Yeah, that would be it.

Speaker 20 (01:54:40):
She's a club wagon. I had some head gasket issues.
I was getting oil in my cooling, so you know,
the thing sat for twenty years in a field. So
I started breaking the engine down them all the way
down to the heads. I was just wondering what you
guys would recommend. I've already got everything cleaned and prepped
for the head gaskets, But do you recommend adding anything
to help seal the head gaskets on base got back together?

Speaker 7 (01:55:01):
Are there just a little copper coat spray or something
like that. We don't use any additives. Just helps it
stick on there a little bit. But uh, you make
sure the heads were flat? Did you put a straight
edge to them?

Speaker 20 (01:55:11):
Check them?

Speaker 24 (01:55:12):
Oh?

Speaker 20 (01:55:12):
Yeah, they're nice and straight flat. The engine only has
fifty four thousand miles on it first.

Speaker 3 (01:55:16):
Twenty six nice.

Speaker 8 (01:55:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 7 (01:55:18):
Other than just a little copper coat to help the
state the gas gets stay in place in that slip.

Speaker 8 (01:55:21):
When you're putting the head on. I don't use any ceiling.

Speaker 20 (01:55:24):
No, perfect, that was super easy.

Speaker 4 (01:55:26):
Thanks.

Speaker 8 (01:55:27):
Yeah, noise.

Speaker 5 (01:55:27):
What are you going to do with that van when
you get it rebuilt?

Speaker 2 (01:55:31):
Oh?

Speaker 20 (01:55:31):
So, my wife and I want to turn it in
a little like camper van. Take the dogs up to
the mountains with So we're we got the three roads
of seats, we're going to ripples out. Just turn into two,
build a little bed some cabins back there and just
use it for excursion.

Speaker 8 (01:55:42):
It's big enough. That's a good little bit.

Speaker 5 (01:55:43):
Sure.

Speaker 8 (01:55:44):
Yeah, that's a big band.

Speaker 5 (01:55:45):
You and the kids and the dogs and the neighbors.

Speaker 9 (01:55:47):
And he's not painting free candy on the side or
anything like that right into the neighborhood.

Speaker 5 (01:55:52):
Yeah, taking out the window a fish.

Speaker 3 (01:55:56):
Bowl right nice. Hey, thanks for the call, John, Good
luck with that. So before before the callers and stuff,
we're just kind of talking about these parts and stuff
and we're going to go to a break real quick.
But when we come back, I'm just curious, how in
the world do you do you bid a job when
you've got that. I mean, do you actually have to
go out and secure the parts before you do a

(01:56:18):
commitment to a price on a job or is it
just a risk that you run. So we're going to
do that right after this break, and we'll be here
for your calls as well.

Speaker 11 (01:56:26):
So go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel
roofing dot com. You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Time for an insurance checkup free, no obligation. Comparison call
Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens of

(01:56:49):
insurance companies. Find out now three oh three seven to
seven to one.

Speaker 3 (01:56:52):
Help.

Speaker 11 (01:56:53):
You'll think you're his only customer when you choose Frank
durand the real estate Man dot com to list your
home with Remax Alliance three oh three nine two zero
sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (01:57:12):
All right, good afternoon, John Fuller here in the Troubleshooter Network. Hey,
you know Doc has a tendency to try to sneak
out on these shows sometimes, so before the show gets over,
I just wanted to point out Denver beon alert. It
is National Naked Gardening Day on the third of May,
which I think is tomorrow. So Doc, I'm sure you're

(01:57:36):
gonna be celebrated.

Speaker 14 (01:57:38):
I will tell you I consider gardening to be manual labor,
and I gave that up about thirty five years ago.
So people, I can't understand why people like the garden.
You're out in the hot sun much less naked. Right,
So I will not be naked gardening or any kind
of gardening.

Speaker 3 (01:57:55):
All right, Well, if you know, he didn't say he
wouldn't be naked.

Speaker 5 (01:57:57):
He would naked, He just not gotta be gardener.

Speaker 4 (01:58:00):
I will be out with my camera documenting it.

Speaker 3 (01:58:02):
All right, Well, I would say report back, but I'm
afraid of what you'd be taking pictures with the poker
games and everything else happened before John, I'm quite sure
of that.

Speaker 5 (01:58:13):
That's the scary part.

Speaker 3 (01:58:14):
Actually. The interesting thing was that they rated all the
major cities around around the country for you know, to
rank the most favorable cities for naked gardening. Number one
was Miami, which kind of makes sense to a degree
just from a weather standpoint. Denver didn't do so hot though.
Denver was like three hundred and eightieth out of five

(01:58:36):
hundred cities. And I think a good chunk of it
might have been climate. But you know, May it's usually
pretty nice in Denver, so I don't know how how
big of a factor that was. But anyway, that's tomorrow
for those of you that are interested.

Speaker 5 (01:58:50):
You can look that up.

Speaker 3 (01:58:51):
So before the break, we were talking to Jeff and
Kevin about, you know, the challenges of ricing and anticipating
what things are going to cost, and just kind of
some some challenges that you guys have in this day
and age, and it makes total sense of it's been
going on since COVID, But I don't think it's going
to get any better anytime soon. So what are you

(01:59:14):
doing to kind of get ahead of that and to
stay competitive and be you know, be nimble.

Speaker 7 (01:59:19):
Well, most of our estimates and parts searches everything else
are digital, so we do get up to date pricing
when we look up parts and availability, so we don't
we don't get shocked too often. Only if we assume
we know a price on something and quoted kind of
off the cuff is the only time you'd run into trouble.
But yeah, I know, it's all online, it's all digital.

(01:59:40):
It's all you know, click click, click, and the estimate
builds itself basically from what we find.

Speaker 8 (01:59:45):
But you know, sometimes you got to search.

Speaker 7 (01:59:47):
Sometimes they show a part in stock available, you go
to order it and there was a mistake.

Speaker 9 (01:59:54):
Or has been held for internal purposes only. Yep, you know,
you get that a lot of the dealerships where they
know that in low supply of say a lead frame
for a Ford six or eight f one fifty, well yeah,
we've got three of them.

Speaker 8 (02:00:07):
But we need them here for our purposes. We won't sell.

Speaker 15 (02:00:09):
Them, right.

Speaker 3 (02:00:11):
You talked earlier about kind of wheeling and dealing with
some of these dealerships to get them to actually sell
you part. So does that happen a lot?

Speaker 7 (02:00:19):
It's happening more and more because dealers don't want to
work with each other. A Ford dealer in Texas didn't
want to sell the part to Larry Miller Ford. So
I got the number for the Ford dealer in Texas
and called them up and had to pay fifty bucks
more for the part. But it was two in the country.

Speaker 3 (02:00:34):
So you started that conversation by saying that joke. Larry Miller.
You know, I'm going to give him the time of day.
I can appreciate why you'd hate him. So while I
got you on the phone and help. But notice you
got this little part back there in the old computer.

Speaker 7 (02:00:49):
It's it's horse training, it is, I mean sometimes and
sometimes it's a lot of work funding parts. Like I said,
I never thought I'd purchased stuff on eBay, But you
get some oe parts that guys are aling on eBay.
They're still in the toad of box, They're still in
the Chrysler box, they're.

Speaker 9 (02:01:04):
Not the only premium for it. In most cases, those
for them. Same thing with Amazon. The thing you got
to be careful though, is we do run into a
lot of counterfeit parts inside those situations. It was sometimes
even boxed up and so what looks like a manufacturer's
box and you get it out and it's very obvious
that this is not a manufacturer's part.

Speaker 3 (02:01:22):
Now are those where are those coming from? Are those Chinese?

Speaker 9 (02:01:25):
Kind of once again, that's most likely where they're coming from. Yeah,
And it's you know, it's not just for for you know,
like I say, dealership or manufacturer type parts. You know,
we deal with other companies because we actually build the
transmissions in house. So we'll deal with companies like Transco
or sawn x uh, you know, and we'll get parts
to look like it's in a Saunax bag and it
is not a Saunax.

Speaker 3 (02:01:46):
Part, and that part is not reliable.

Speaker 9 (02:01:50):
The hard part is too, you know, even when you
know we've gone through a rash of problems with parts
bad right out of the box coming from manufacturers, not
just dealerships, not just you know, like Dodge or Ford
or anything like that. But you know, the quality control
has gone way down or of course probably the last
three or four years.

Speaker 3 (02:02:07):
But then that's that's going to be across the board
like you and all the other dealerships and everybody else
and everybody those parts are down with those failures. Yeah,
everybody's suffering those failures.

Speaker 7 (02:02:17):
The frustration is when you can't pretest the part right,
not all parts can be pretested, and you got an
eight hour job to put it together to find out
it's now good.

Speaker 9 (02:02:26):
Or you know, I mean I mentioned Dodge that we
talked about this several weeks ago. You know, I had
a particular Dodge pickup. We had to change the food
body on it four times and we would go out,
it would work fine. Customers back on the horn here
about two or three months because it's failed again.

Speaker 5 (02:02:41):
So how does that work?

Speaker 3 (02:02:43):
Like financially, it's a guy buying it four times over?
Want what warranties for you're able to actually go back
and get that covered as a.

Speaker 5 (02:02:52):
What we can get the part covered? The labor you
guys have to eat that or or yes, really yes
that is crazy, but that's why.

Speaker 7 (02:03:02):
You have to have your business model set up to
absorb those charges.

Speaker 9 (02:03:05):
Yeah, comebacks are going to happen. Nobody likes them, that
nobody wants to talk about them. But they're gonna happen.
Whether it's your fault or the part's fault, or whatever
the case may be, they're gonna.

Speaker 8 (02:03:14):
Happen, especially with a good warranty.

Speaker 7 (02:03:16):
We have a three year, thirty six thousand mile nationwide
and the same customers like Teaser. It's like you old boomers,
get rid of these cars. I'm tired of warranting stuff,
you know.

Speaker 3 (02:03:26):
But is that a warranty that you buy on behalf
of your customer? It is on that particular compensated warranty.
We get compensated through NAPA for that warranty. Okay, yeah,
so it's not we don't pay the full boat, but
we pay half of it. But I mean, you're not
you're not you're not actually providing the warranty. You're not
the guaranteur of no, no.

Speaker 7 (02:03:46):
No, no, it's it's a nap out of care warranty. Yeah,
that's exactly the opposite for us. I am the warranty.
So it's all lands.

Speaker 8 (02:03:55):
On my back.

Speaker 5 (02:03:55):
Okay. That's scary, it can be.

Speaker 3 (02:04:00):
I mean, it's scary with with what you're saying that
you know, parts are showing up that work for two
months and then go out, and that could put you
in a buying It.

Speaker 9 (02:04:08):
Can put you in a big bind. It depends on
the part. It could be a very expensive repair.

Speaker 7 (02:04:12):
But depending on your customer and your communication, it could
be very, very uncomfortable. You know, second or third time,
they start doubting what you're doing, and you do yourself.
You know, you start asking, what's the chances of this
thing going out four different times?

Speaker 8 (02:04:25):
What are we missing? What are we not seeing?

Speaker 3 (02:04:27):
It's hard not to not to point the finger at
the guy turning the wrench when you're having that kind
of an outcome.

Speaker 4 (02:04:33):
Well, I can say problem.

Speaker 14 (02:04:34):
I may show my patients signed a release that they
wouldn't give the babies back to me.

Speaker 4 (02:04:39):
They were non refundible.

Speaker 9 (02:04:41):
But the difference between a mechanic and a doctor is
you guys get to bury your comebacks.

Speaker 3 (02:04:48):
Wow, no response on that one, doctor, It's naked gardening day?
Did you know that? All right, So we're gonna go
to a break here in just a second week. We've
got a couple more segments here. There's just enough time
for you to get on the phone and give us
a call at three O three seven one three eight
two fivety five. Rounding out the day, we've got Jeff

(02:05:09):
Vick and Kevin Calkin. We do have one more fraud
alert from Dimitri here coming up before we're done, and
it looks like we've got Chris getting teed up on
the line, so quick break. We'll be right back to
take your calls and help you out.

Speaker 11 (02:05:27):
Go with a sure thing Denver's best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com. You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Time for an insurance check up free, no obligation. In comparison,
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three all three seven
to seven to one help. You'll think you're his only

(02:05:48):
customer when you choose Frank durand the real estate Man
dot com to list your home with Remax Alliance three
oh three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (02:06:05):
All right, welcome back John Fuller here on the Troubleshooter Network,
asking youself receive We have a number of callers lined
up to work through here. Everybody, hang on, we will
get to you. This is John Fuller on the Troubleshooter Network,
and we are here to take your calls on anything
and everything. But we have two experts in the house,
Jeff Vick and Kevin Coulkin, who are our car experts.

(02:06:27):
And so the first call we're going to go to
is Chris with a question about engine parts and warranty.
What's going on? Chris?

Speaker 25 (02:06:34):
Hi, John, how are you doing?

Speaker 3 (02:06:35):
Good? Thanks? What's going on?

Speaker 22 (02:06:37):
Sure?

Speaker 25 (02:06:38):
So, I have a twenty fifteen Chevy Silverado fifteen hundred.
I just put a brand new engine in it, and
I wanted to look at doing a couple of aftermarket
items to try to ensure I don't have the same
problem again that I had. And I was curious to
know if these parts would void the man factor's warranty

(02:07:01):
on the new engine. It came with the GM factory
three year, one hundred thousand mile warranty.

Speaker 5 (02:07:07):
Okay, what parts are you thinking about?

Speaker 9 (02:07:09):
So I was.

Speaker 25 (02:07:10):
I was looking at doing a air oil separator catch
scan and also doing a range module the AFM DFM disabler,
and I didn't know if that would affect the warranty.

Speaker 5 (02:07:26):
Okay, I didn't even know that.

Speaker 8 (02:07:28):
Yeah, the rates might.

Speaker 7 (02:07:31):
I would definitely check with GM specifically on that because
that could be considered a modification and that could fall
within that exclusion. Yes, that would be a costa possibly.
I mean I would definitely get clarification on it for
which one the second one the range modifier, but the
other error, I mean short of a cold air. A
lot of cold airs are will void your warranty. I

(02:07:54):
don't think that one will though.

Speaker 15 (02:07:56):
I think he was talking about a catchcan, which correct
me if I'm wrong. That comes out of the the
PCV valve and it separates the oil from the air
before the air gets reinjected into the intake manifold, and
then once in a while you you never residual oil.
So is that, Chris? Is that Did I get that right?

(02:08:17):
Is that the catch can that you were talking about?

Speaker 25 (02:08:21):
Yeah, it's a product, it's the K and N catch
can separates the water and the sludge that's in the
oil from going back down into the engine.

Speaker 4 (02:08:31):
Yeah.

Speaker 15 (02:08:31):
And I think the idea correct me if I'm wrong, Chris,
But I think the idea is that you keep that
oil from re entering the intake side, and so you
you you've reduced the amount of build up and gunk
and carbon and all that stuff and the intake valves.
Is that? Is that the idea behind the cash can?

Speaker 25 (02:08:48):
Yeah, that's it.

Speaker 3 (02:08:51):
Yeah, I mean I in theory, it doesn't sound like
something that would be considered a modification. But I think
on a new engine, where you've got that valuable warranty
from the factory and stuff, you may want to run
it up the flagpole with that.

Speaker 8 (02:09:04):
I see, I'd ask him.

Speaker 7 (02:09:05):
I would, yeah, because I don't see how that would
but you just never know how they would read it.

Speaker 15 (02:09:09):
Yeah, what did that new engine cost?

Speaker 3 (02:09:11):
Here?

Speaker 25 (02:09:13):
All said and done, it was fifteen thousand, two hundred dollars.

Speaker 15 (02:09:17):
Sounds reasonable for a brand new engine Dutch. You think, well, Reman,
Oh it's Reman not buying you out of the factory, don't.

Speaker 8 (02:09:23):
They don't have new ones anymore.

Speaker 25 (02:09:26):
I kind of saw it as I just bought a
brand new truck for fifteen thousand dollars. Oh it's seventeen
thousand dollars.

Speaker 3 (02:09:33):
So true. Yeah, I mean that that totally makes sense.
I don't see why you wouldn't do that. If you've
got a nice you know, a nice chassis, a nice truck,
and that that's all you need to do. Absolutely, that
makes total sense. So anything else there, Chris.

Speaker 25 (02:09:50):
No, that I should take care of it. I thank
you for the information, all right, good.

Speaker 3 (02:09:53):
Luck to you, partner. So I mean again, I think
that's something we're going to start seeing more and more of,
as you know, as the economy kind of changes around here.
You know, even if this this whole tariff thing gets
undone by the wave of a magic wand I think
the effects of it are going to take a while
to work through the system.

Speaker 8 (02:10:11):
We have been experiencing that already since COVID.

Speaker 7 (02:10:14):
Yeah, people are putting our average ticket price has gone
up probably twenty percent over the last three years. It
has because people are putting more money into the car
to keep it. Like he said, seventy grand to buy
a new truck. It's a lot of money.

Speaker 9 (02:10:29):
Yeah, I mean during COVID, we were seeing vehicles so heck,
some of them didn't know we're even still on the road,
you know, And people were putting good money into these
cars keeping them running because they couldn't go get a
new car between the cost of what you know, people
were paying a premial just to buy a new car.
It was MSRP for thirty thousand dollars, but you're going
to have to pay us thirty six thousand dollars if
you actually want to buy.

Speaker 5 (02:10:49):
The car, if you could actually even find it.

Speaker 9 (02:10:51):
And then financing rates, the interest rates were so high
that that pushed people out, and now we're getting tariffs.
It's just going to continue to perpetuate where people are
relegated to repair as apposed to replace.

Speaker 3 (02:11:01):
Yeah, I think you're absolutely right. We have open lines again.
The phone number here in the studio is three oh
three seven one three eight two five five. If you
were holding just a moment ago, give us a shout back.
We'll get you right on the air. In the meantime,
we're going to shift gears a little bit. We always
try to keep you abreast of news scams that come
online that we're aware of that you can help avoid

(02:11:24):
making those mistakes as well. And Dmitri has one that
we want to share. What's going on, Dmitri.

Speaker 15 (02:11:30):
John, It's probably the most sophisticated scam that I've ever
seen somebody try to pull on me, and it happened
at the beginning of last week. Just a few minutes
after the show ended, I got a text message from
my bank where I have a checking account and a
debit card that's associated with that checking account, and it
warned me of some suspicious transactions on my debit card.

(02:11:52):
Within a few minutes, I also had a voicemail and
an email, And now the voicemail said, hey, we've deactivated
your debit card. Can you call us at this eight
hundred number to verify these transactions? And the email had
a very similar message, but it provided me with a
couple of links to clink to take a look at
my statements. And before I called or clicked and anything,

(02:12:16):
I googled the eight hundred numbers and they did not
come back to my bank. They were just no results
found kind of eight hundred numbers. So instead of responding
to any of these, I simply drove to one of
the branches of my bank and they know me over
there because I go in for my business reasons about
at least once a week of it deposit checks, and

(02:12:39):
they took a look, They listened to the voicemail, they
looked at my account and they said, you know, the
text message is legitimate, that did come from us, And
they checked my account and sure enough, there's a fraud
alert and they deactivated the debit card. They said, but
we did not send you this email, we did not
call you, and we did not leave you this far voicemail.

(02:13:01):
So I looked at the fraudulent charges they and what
really struck me is they it was a series of
three four hundred and eighty three dollars charges to a
PayPal account. And what I think happened is this scammer
didn't set out to rip me off of four hundred

(02:13:22):
eighty three bucks. The scammer specifically targeted or specifically set
up the series of transactions to trigger the fraud alert.
And then when I saw their idea was that when
I saw that my debit card wasn't working anymore, I
would respond either to their voicemail or I would click
on those links and they would get the rest of

(02:13:45):
the bank account information from me that way. So I
thought the sophisticated part was they sacrificed the four hundred
eighty three bucks by charging it three times because they
knew this would trigger. And the scary part was they
you because all of these communications had the name of
my bank, they had the last four digits of my

(02:14:08):
debit card, they had my email address, and they had
my phone number. So the scary part was how sophisticated
and how much information they already had about me, including
my debit card number.

Speaker 3 (02:14:21):
Yeah, I mean that is frightening. And that's no different
than the you know, all these other scam chifts have
an amazing amount of information on you. My question is,
why do you use a debit card anymore? All the
risks associated with that.

Speaker 5 (02:14:35):
I mean, it's just why in the world would you
do that.

Speaker 15 (02:14:38):
I don't use it, but it came with my checking account,
and I used my checking account all the time. And
I mean I can count on one hand or one
finger how many times I've used a debit card for
some internet purchase. I do have credit cards that I
use for for credit card purchases, but so I just
have it because it came with a bank account.

Speaker 3 (02:14:59):
Okay, we're going to go to the phones here real quick.
We've got Patrick waiting. We'll try to get at least
Patrick started here. What's going on? Patrick?

Speaker 5 (02:15:06):
You've got a car about rebuilt or a question about car?

Speaker 25 (02:15:08):
Yeah, I need a generator. I have an old thirty
five forward and I need the six fold generator rebuilt
to you guys know anybody that can do that.

Speaker 7 (02:15:18):
It's I don't enough generator. I don't enough Generator Exchange
is still around. They used to be at forty fourth
and Clay. They did all those old.

Speaker 20 (02:15:27):
Generators Raader Exchange.

Speaker 25 (02:15:32):
I'm looking all right quick, I can't seem to find
anybody that wants to do it.

Speaker 8 (02:15:37):
They still show to be there. Yeah, no, I guarantee
you he'll do it.

Speaker 25 (02:15:41):
Okay, I appreciate it.

Speaker 3 (02:15:43):
Thanks for the time, of course, you bet.

Speaker 5 (02:15:45):
Thanks for the call. Patrick.

Speaker 3 (02:15:46):
We're going to go to a break here real quick
and we'll be right back on the other side. You
still have time to give us a call at three
O three seven one three eight two five five.

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Speaker 3 (02:16:36):
All right, good afternoon. We are close to wrapping things
up here. This is John Fuller for the Troubleshooter Network
and we are here with Jeff Vick and Kevin Cochin
in the in the house finishing up card day. And
so we have open lines if you still have an
issue that we can help you with today. The phone
numbers are three oh three seven one, three eight two
five five. Over the break, we got a couple of

(02:16:58):
text messages saying why OW was talking bad about debit
cards and stuff? And this is an issue that we
really should probably talk about from time to time. A
lot of people use debit cards. They think it's prudent
and sound financial management to never spend anything on credit.
I don't want to borrow any money. I just want
to take it directly out of my checking account. But

(02:17:19):
here's the challenge, or here's the risk that you run.
Number One, there's no buyer protection on a debit card.
If that card gets picked up by some scammer, you
swipe it at the gas station and there's a reader
on there, they can clean you out, and I mean
clean you out in your account to where you are
down to nothing in about thirty seconds and there is

(02:17:42):
absolutely zero recourse for that, and not a lot of
people seem to know that sometimes, and even family members
like my mother in law is notorious for using a
debit card, and we keep telling her do not do that,
We try to take it away from her. She just
is so debt adverse that she just can't fathom. Why
would I borrow money when I've got money in the bank.

(02:18:04):
I don't need to borrow.

Speaker 5 (02:18:05):
I'm just going to pay for it.

Speaker 3 (02:18:07):
But I'm here to tell you that that is one
of the riskiest things in the world that you can use,
and right up there with some of the same scams
that Dimitri was just talking about. You have to be
you have to use those methods that provide you the
most protection. And unfortunately, you know, there's no real cost
to using a credit card and just paying it off
every month.

Speaker 8 (02:18:28):
Yeah, take care of it.

Speaker 3 (02:18:29):
You just pay it off and it doesn't cost you anything.
But it gives you the buyer protection and the only
person that's initiating taking a dime out of your bank
is you when you pay off that credit card every month.
And so have you guys run into that before with
debit cards and stuff I.

Speaker 7 (02:18:46):
Mean, well, the other thing you mentioned in that email
was the link. Don't ever click the link from the
email to make a phone call my bank, because they
guess the right bank. I mean, there's only so many banks.
Mine happen to be Chase, and I got a thing
with Chase, and it was like, I better look that
number up before I click on it.

Speaker 3 (02:19:02):
Yeah, I think you're right.

Speaker 7 (02:19:03):
It's like they it's not that's not the number you're
dialing when you click it.

Speaker 5 (02:19:06):
It's not that they knew you banked at Chase.

Speaker 3 (02:19:09):
Necessarily, they just sent out a million of those emails
and ex percentage of them are going to happen to
be Chase. And whoever you bank with the same thing,
they just know it's a big bank. They don't do
that with you know, Joanes State Bank with eight subscribers
or exactly account holders. Are doing it with your big
guys like Wells Fargo and Chase and all those.

Speaker 8 (02:19:29):
First bank any one of those.

Speaker 3 (02:19:31):
Yeah, and they're gonna hit a number of those and
it's gonna be legit. I was just looking at you
know that and the money transfer deals where they call
up and say, you know, there's been there's been fraud
on your account. We need you to transfer money over
and buy it, you know, by this and that and
and I mean we've heard them all here. If you've
listened to this show for any length of time, you've

(02:19:53):
heard caller after caller after caller call up and say
I was told to go pull money out and go
starting to count at a certain other bank. And you know,
they would get back to me and they would let
it ring three times and then hang up, and you're
just like, how did this make sense? But they sound

(02:20:14):
so good when they call, They look so legit. Emails
look great, or they emails look great, or the text
messages look great. I was talking yesterday about I've now
been put on notice that I'm apparently a warrants going
to issue for me from my express tollurpees into stuff.
I'm not driving in the express lane anymore until they

(02:20:34):
stop sending me those text messages and stuff, because clearly
they are looking for me and stuff. And it's like,
you know, how many times do they have to put
it out on the news and everybody else that says
we will not text you anything ever.

Speaker 14 (02:20:51):
And Giant, It's amazing how many people I talk to
they'll say this is John Richardson from so and so
and have a thick, heavy Indian accent, and you know
it's not John ridgards Because.

Speaker 3 (02:21:04):
Doc, I just have to confirm your identity. Can you
give me your last four of your social and your birthday?
And people do it. I mean, that's the crazy thing.

Speaker 5 (02:21:16):
So you know it's not that we like to make
fun of people here. We don't.

Speaker 3 (02:21:20):
We would rather you never call and say I messed
up and got scammed by one of these systems. And
so you just have to have some rules in place.

Speaker 8 (02:21:27):
But cut up your debit card. I mean, please, just
cut it up. Cut it up.

Speaker 7 (02:21:30):
That's what I do every time I get a new one.
Slice it, stick it in the microwave for a second.
First off, pop that chip inside, pop that chip inside there,
fry it and then cut it up right.

Speaker 8 (02:21:41):
Yeah, but I don't even know where n is. It's
a safe somewhere.

Speaker 3 (02:21:45):
I haven't used a debit card well, I'll tell you this.
The last time I used it was when I learned
that Lesson and I had gone through. And this was
probably fifteen years ago, and I went through a Burger King,
which is probably the last time I went through a
burger King drive through as well. But I went through
a burger King drive through. I was maybe maybe a
mile from my office, and in the time that it

(02:22:07):
took me to get from that burger King back to
my office, I was already getting fraud alerts, legitimate ones
from my bank saying we've got a problem here. But
you know, my bank was saying call us, you know,
we've we've got an issue here, And that really opened
my eyes.

Speaker 8 (02:22:23):
At Taco House on Colfax, I went about the guy's lunch.

Speaker 3 (02:22:26):
Burger King is Colfax. That's the thing. I never use
a credit card of any type on Colvi. Just go
to Kolfax.

Speaker 8 (02:22:34):
Keep the deviit card in your house, don't take it out.

Speaker 3 (02:22:37):
It is just crazy how fast it happens too. I mean,
with me, it was literally a minute, two minutes, and
there were transactions going off at Walmart down on the
other end of town. And then we've had deals in
Florida where it's like seventy five miles away two minutes later,
and it's just crazy. They're set up to take advantage
of you. They work lightning fast. Just beware, listen, guys,

(02:23:01):
we really appreciate it. I've enjoyed the last three days here.
Save all your problems for us. The rest of the
crew will be back next week and we appreciate it
very much. Save all your problems for us.