Bad Thornton Rd Hyundai - Lithia Springs, GA

[Gunny]

Whenever someone asks me about my car [2015 Genesis 5.0 Ultimate, Black on Black] I tell them I absolutely love it but I also have to add that I absolutely hate the dealership experience. I came to the fold from Lexus. Hyundai is already promoting the Genesis brand and selling the cars here so I don't buy the excuse of needing time to ramp up the dealership experience. If it's not up to par when I visit now then how can they ever expect to retain customers? As it stands I would have to think very carefully about purchasing another Hyundai because of the following persistent issues at the dealer.

1 - Very slow service. Friendly staff for sure but it takes them a minimum of 3 hours to perform the simplest service, even with an appointment.

2 - Constant trade-up pressure. Every time I'm in for service I am ambushed in some corner by a sales person asking if I'm ready to trade in my car [with barely 18K miles] for a new one. This started with my very first visit at about 8K miles and has never let up. I figure it's just a matter of time before one of them approaches me in the restroom.

3 - Lack of a proper work environment for customers - Since I work remotely I often bring my laptop in while I wait for service. Lexus had a private well-equipped room for this sort of thing. Hyundai has everyone out in the open with loud TV's and intercom noise perforating the air. It's simply impossible to concentrate on work, let alone participate in a conference call in this environment.

Again, everyone at Thornton Rd Hyundai is nice and courteous, it's just clearly geared more towards the Elantra crowd. I can see why Hyundai added valet service to the Equus package. If it were available as an option for the Genesis I would have gladly paid extra for it.

 

[Sal Collaziano]

Hell, you better make sure you SNEAK into the bathroom when you go in. Until very recently - at my local Hyundai dealership, you had to ASK for those little coffee k-cups to make yourself some coffee. Some attitudey woman behind a window would get one for you after you asked. That would make sure you didn't ask for another.

Constant trade-up pressure. For God's sake - WTF?!

And those BLASTING intercoms! Lovely, aren't they?! They're LOUD as Hell at my local dealership.

They really need to get to work QUICKLY on customer service issues. It shouldn't be like this at ANY dealership...

Whenever someone asks me about my car [2015 Genesis 5.0 Ultimate, Black on Black] I tell them I absolutely love it but I also have to add that I absolutely hate the dealership experience. I came to the fold from Lexus. Hyundai is already promoting the Genesis brand and selling the cars here so I don't buy the excuse of needing time to ramp up the dealership experience. If it's not up to par when I visit now then how can they ever expect to retain customers? As it stands I would have to think very carefully about purchasing another Hyundai because of the following persistent issues at the dealer.

1 - Very slow service. Friendly staff for sure but it takes them a minimum of 3 hours to perform the simplest service, even with an appointment.

2 - Constant trade-up pressure. Every time I'm in for service I am ambushed in some corner by a sales person asking if I'm ready to trade in my car [with barely 18K miles] for a new one. This started with my very first visit at about 8K miles and has never let up. I figure it's just a matter of time before one of them approaches me in the restroom.

3 - Lack of a proper work environment for customers - Since I work remotely I often bring my laptop in while I wait for service. Lexus had a private well-equipped room for this sort of thing. Hyundai has everyone out in the open with loud TV's and intercom noise perforating the air. It's simply impossible to concentrate on work, let alone participate in a conference call in this environment.

Again, everyone at Thornton Rd Hyundai is nice and courteous, it's just clearly geared more towards the Elantra crowd. I can see why Hyundai added valet service to the Equus package. If it were available as an option for the Genesis I would have gladly paid extra for it.

 

[waz]

I leased my '15 Pamplona Red/Grey Ultimate w/ 1200 miles on the clock from Thornton Road Hyundai (hereafter referred to as TRH), and that was a huge mistake. I urge everyone to stay far, far away from this hellhole.

Here's the details of my wonderful experience after driving 4 hours from Asheville to Atlanta on February 27, 2016:

1) As soon as my wife & I got there at 4 p.m., the salesman comes in w/ a hound-dog face and says, "The detailer got over-zealous w/ the polisher". That was his explanation for the lemon-sized area of removed paint on left corner of rear bumper. He offers to have the bumper resprayed there and then ship the car to me on a pick-up hauled single car trailer. No thanks. I eventually got the bumper re-sprayed by a local Asheville body shop and the $300 bill was paid by TRH.

2) I immediately spotted a fairly large dent in the sheet metal of the hood that was somehow missed by the sales staff. I had it repaired by a local paintless dent repair guy, and the $90 fee was paid by TRH.

3) Despite faxing my insurance form & driver's license to them prior to our arrival, delivery took, and I shit you not, 7 hours. After finally signing the papers w/ the finance manager, I started for home from the far side of Atlanta at 11:30 PM & got home at 3:30 AM. Granted, it was a busy Saturday, but not that busy. I think the internet sales manager was getting pay-back for me beating him to death on the price plus free rubber floor mats.

4) While test-driving the car I noticed the nav system wasn't working. It turned out the sales staff had been playing musical SD cards between different vehicles. Since the SD card is keyed to particular VIN number, the nav system didn't work. It took TRH 5 weeks to send the correct one.

5) The car was delivered w/ no cargo net; after hounding them for 6 weeks, they sent me the wrong net. I sent it back to them & I finally got a cargo net a week later.

6) The car had the wrong lug nut key in the trunk; they sent a new lug nut set after a month and a half.

7) The paperwork for the tag & title was submitted to Raleigh 3 days after the 30 day temp tag had expired. I was unable to drive car for 4 days until they overnighted me a new temp tag, and then only because I raised holy hell. They originally told me that they couldn't issue two temp tags for the same car, but they somehow managed to do it after I got nasty.

8) North Carolina's Department of Motor vehicles sent the title & tag paperwork back to Thornton Road Hyundai because of numerous errors and screw ups. TRH then sent me the paperwork 1 week before 2nd temp tag expired, and told me to get the title and tags at my local DMV office. The question for the ages - why didn't they send me the paperwork in the first place instead of yanking my chain?

9) I take the paperwork to the local DMV office, and after 45 minutes of waiting in line, the snorking, coughing, hacking tubercular lady is incredulous at the errors TRH still made on the variety of forms. She sticky-notes instructions on the papers and I overnight them back to TRH (for $27) on Thursday with instructions for them to send them back to me corrected by Saturday at the latest, so that my tag doesn't expire again.

10) The paperwork shows up on Tuesday and I take it to DMV on Wednesday. After standing in front of snorking lady (what's green & skates? Peggy Phlem) for 75 minutes while she figures out the forms and calculates the tax with about 25 people impatiently waiting in line behind me, I finally got a permanent tag on 5/25/16 - 88 days after I picked up the car!

11) After my repeated requests for TRH to send me 3 missing glove box reference guides are ignored, I called the Hyundai Customer Service line. They then called the dealer and after 3 months of repeated requests from Hyundai, TRH finally sent me.......the wrong pamphlets. At that point I gave up.

So why didn't I just get back in my wife's van and drive back home after getting to Lithia Springs and seeing the abysmal state of the "new" car I was leasing?

Primarily because the Hyundai lease deals on '15s were going to end 2 days later, and if I didn't take that car (in the color combo that I really wanted), I probably would have waited another year until the lease deals on the '16s got juicy. The TRH salesman was counting on me taking the car home because of the time squeeze, and he took full advantage of the situation.

To be fair, TRH did eventually pay to fix all the things wrong with the car, but the egregious level of incompetence, dishonesty, and apathy on their part was staggering. If the management and office staff of TRH ran a railroad, the trains would run a month late and be missing several wheels.

 

[Corpnupe85]

Whenever someone asks me about my car [2015 Genesis 5.0 Ultimate, Black on Black] I tell them I absolutely love it but I also have to add that I absolutely hate the dealership experience. I came to the fold from Lexus. Hyundai is already promoting the Genesis brand and selling the cars here so I don't buy the excuse of needing time to ramp up the dealership experience. If it's not up to par when I visit now then how can they ever expect to retain customers? As it stands I would have to think very carefully about purchasing another Hyundai because of the following persistent issues at the dealer.

1 - Very slow service. Friendly staff for sure but it takes them a minimum of 3 hours to perform the simplest service, even with an appointment.

2 - Constant trade-up pressure. Every time I'm in for service I am ambushed in some corner by a sales person asking if I'm ready to trade in my car [with barely 18K miles] for a new one. This started with my very first visit at about 8K miles and has never let up. I figure it's just a matter of time before one of them approaches me in the restroom.

3 - Lack of a proper work environment for customers - Since I work remotely I often bring my laptop in while I wait for service. Lexus had a private well-equipped room for this sort of thing. Hyundai has everyone out in the open with loud TV's and intercom noise perforating the air. It's simply impossible to concentrate on work, let alone participate in a conference call in this environment.

Again, everyone at Thornton Rd Hyundai is nice and courteous, it's just clearly geared more towards the Elantra crowd. I can see why Hyundai added valet service to the Equus package. If it were available as an option for the Genesis I would have gladly paid extra for it.

I totally agree with you. I also previously owned a Lexus GS 350 and I live in Smyrna. The Lexus dealership has a quiet lounge that a person can actually work in. The Ed Voyles Hyundai dealership does not have a quiet lounge. I had to go into the showroom to work. This is not optimal.

 

[Corpnupe85]

I leased my '15 Pamplona Red/Grey Ultimate w/ 1200 miles on the clock from Thornton Road Hyundai (hereafter referred to as TRH), and that was a huge mistake. I urge everyone to stay far, far away from this hellhole.

Here's the details of my wonderful experience after driving 4 hours from Asheville to Atlanta on February 27, 2016:

1) As soon as my wife & I got there at 4 p.m., the salesman comes in w/ a hound-dog face and says, "The detailer got over-zealous w/ the polisher". That was his explanation for the lemon-sized area of removed paint on left corner of rear bumper. He offers to have the bumper resprayed there and then ship the car to me on a pick-up hauled single car trailer. No thanks. I eventually got the bumper re-sprayed by a local Asheville body shop and the $300 bill was paid by TRH.

2) I immediately spotted a fairly large dent in the sheet metal of the hood that was somehow missed by the sales staff. I had it repaired by a local paintless dent repair guy, and the $90 fee was paid by TRH.

3) Despite faxing my insurance form & driver's license to them prior to our arrival, delivery took, and I shit you not, 7 hours. After finally signing the papers w/ the finance manager, I started for home from the far side of Atlanta at 11:30 PM & got home at 3:30 AM. Granted, it was a busy Saturday, but not that busy. I think the internet sales manager was getting pay-back for me beating him to death on the price plus free rubber floor mats.

4) While test-driving the car I noticed the nav system wasn't working. It turned out the sales staff had been playing musical SD cards between different vehicles. Since the SD card is keyed to particular VIN number, the nav system didn't work. It took TRH 5 weeks to send the correct one.

5) The car was delivered w/ no cargo net; after hounding them for 6 weeks, they sent me the wrong net. I sent it back to them & I finally got a cargo net a week later.

6) The car had the wrong lug nut key in the trunk; they sent a new lug nut set after a month and a half.

7) The paperwork for the tag & title was submitted to Raleigh 3 days after the 30 day temp tag had expired. I was unable to drive car for 4 days until they overnighted me a new temp tag, and then only because I raised holy hell. They originally told me that they couldn't issue two temp tags for the same car, but they somehow managed to do it after I got nasty.

8) North Carolina's Department of Motor vehicles sent the title & tag paperwork back to Thornton Road Hyundai because of numerous errors and screw ups. TRH then sent me the paperwork 1 week before 2nd temp tag expired, and told me to get the title and tags at my local DMV office. The question for the ages - why didn't they send me the paperwork in the first place instead of yanking my chain?

9) I take the paperwork to the local DMV office, and after 45 minutes of waiting in line, the snorking, coughing, hacking tubercular lady is incredulous at the errors TRH still made on the variety of forms. She sticky-notes instructions on the papers and I overnight them back to TRH (for $27) on Thursday with instructions for them to send them back to me corrected by Saturday at the latest, so that my tag doesn't expire again.

10) The paperwork shows up on Tuesday and I take it to DMV on Wednesday. After standing in front of snorking lady (what's green & skates? Peggy Phlem) for 75 minutes while she figures out the forms and calculates the tax with about 25 people impatiently waiting in line behind me, I finally got a permanent tag on 5/25/16 - 88 days after I picked up the car!

11) After my repeated requests for TRH to send me 3 missing glove box reference guides are ignored, I called the Hyundai Customer Service line. They then called the dealer and after 3 months of repeated requests from Hyundai, TRH finally sent me.......the wrong pamphlets. At that point I gave up.

So why didn't I just get back in my wife's van and drive back home after getting to Lithia Springs and seeing the abysmal state of the "new" car I was leasing?

Primarily because the Hyundai lease deals on '15s were going to end 2 days later, and if I didn't take that car (in the color combo that I really wanted), I probably would have waited another year until the lease deals on the '16s got juicy. The TRH salesman was counting on me taking the car home because of the time squeeze, and he took full advantage of the situation.

To be fair, TRH did eventually pay to fix all the things wrong with the car, but the egregious level of incompetence, dishonesty, and apathy on their part was staggering. If the management and office staff of TRH ran a railroad, the trains would run a month late and be missing several wheels.

Wow, you had a crazy experience.

 

[Aquineas]

3) Despite faxing my insurance form & driver's license to them prior to our arrival, delivery took, and I shit you not, 7 hours. After finally signing the papers w/ the finance manager, I started for home from the far side of Atlanta at 11:30 PM & got home at 3:30 AM. Granted, it was a busy Saturday, but not that busy. I think the internet sales manager was getting pay-back for me beating him to death on the price plus free rubber floor mats.

I am convinced that in some cases making people wait prolonged time to take delivery of new vehicles is an intentional tactic. Dealerships want you sitting around waiting as long as possible so that you're raging to leave and will perhaps sign anything to get your keys and go. I made this mistake with one vehicle before my Genesis; and won't make it again, although one Genesis dealer tried their best to play this game with me; they left me in limbo as to whether they were going to honor the Hyundai trade-in certificate on my 2012 Genesis for my 2015 for the better part of 40 minutes. I got up and left and got it honored by another dealer that next morning. Henceforth I'm going to start a count-down timer on my phone, and show the sales manager the timer at the beginning. If the deal isn't done with keys in hand when that timer is up, I'm out of there.

 

[tuckerdog1]

I am convinced that in some cases making people wait prolonged time to take delivery of new vehicles is an intentional tactic. Dealerships want you sitting around waiting as long as possible so that you're raging to leave and will perhaps sign anything to get your keys and go. I made this mistake with one vehicle before my Genesis; and won't make it again, although one Genesis dealer tried their best to play this game with me; they left me in limbo as to whether they were going to honor the Hyundai trade-in certificate on my 2012 Genesis for my 2015 for the better part of 40 minutes. I got up and left and got it honored by another dealer that next morning. Henceforth I'm going to start a count-down timer on my phone, and show the sales manager the timer at the beginning. If the deal isn't done with keys in hand when that timer is up, I'm out of there.

I like that. They should be on the clock, not you.