http://www.i-club.com/forums/showthread ... eadid=9739
Basically the guy didnt know what he was doing, blew his engine, told everyone on the message board, a user informed the dealer and he got his warranty denied!
Warranty denial story, good read
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I've read the whole thread and here is my professional opinion:
Insurance costs are calculated by people called Actuaries. I am currently in the process of becoming one of these. Anyhow, insurance rates are basically a pooling of money that will then cover the cost of all claims, as well as cost of maintenance (such as claims reps, etc.) For profit insurance companies such as auto and casualty insurance companies also collect for profit. Car companies usually try to break even on the manufacturers warranty and then try to profit on extended warranties. If we theorize that the average cost of warranty repair over the 60K mile warranty of a WRX is $1500 with a standard deviation of $200. They may be finding that due to the excessive amount of modding to WRXs as well as how hard they are being driven due to lack of knowledge about driving a turbo car is ending up in reality to cost an average of $2200 with a standard deviation of $700. This unexpected cost could cause SOA to try and deny warranty claims to try to prevent losing money (figure over 10000 cars sold in 2002 with additional costs of 500 per unit to the manufacturer. Adds up). Basically if people like that guy get away with making warranty claims that really aren't a manufacturer defect because of their own fault, SOA is going to be denying even more claims and they will have to charge additional money for the in the future vehicle to make up for this increase in cost.
Fraud is fraud. I just hope the guy doesn't go to jail for this. I think the 6K repair bill on his WRX that he will now never be able to sell for half of what he owes on it will probably be a good enough lesson for him. Some day I might own a car with a warranty.
Insurance costs are calculated by people called Actuaries. I am currently in the process of becoming one of these. Anyhow, insurance rates are basically a pooling of money that will then cover the cost of all claims, as well as cost of maintenance (such as claims reps, etc.) For profit insurance companies such as auto and casualty insurance companies also collect for profit. Car companies usually try to break even on the manufacturers warranty and then try to profit on extended warranties. If we theorize that the average cost of warranty repair over the 60K mile warranty of a WRX is $1500 with a standard deviation of $200. They may be finding that due to the excessive amount of modding to WRXs as well as how hard they are being driven due to lack of knowledge about driving a turbo car is ending up in reality to cost an average of $2200 with a standard deviation of $700. This unexpected cost could cause SOA to try and deny warranty claims to try to prevent losing money (figure over 10000 cars sold in 2002 with additional costs of 500 per unit to the manufacturer. Adds up). Basically if people like that guy get away with making warranty claims that really aren't a manufacturer defect because of their own fault, SOA is going to be denying even more claims and they will have to charge additional money for the in the future vehicle to make up for this increase in cost.
Fraud is fraud. I just hope the guy doesn't go to jail for this. I think the 6K repair bill on his WRX that he will now never be able to sell for half of what he owes on it will probably be a good enough lesson for him. Some day I might own a car with a warranty.
Grant Hughes
Denver, CO
http://www.nocoastmotorsports.net
Denver, CO
http://www.nocoastmotorsports.net
Completely unnecessary for the board member to do that. SOA is a big boy and knows how to look for this kind of garbage that this kid was trying to pull. They did not need help from this guy from a message board. If this kid had done something super stealthy (and stupid) that would have been impossible to detect (like a dry nitrous shot that injected through the intake?...) then he should have approached each dealership personally and informed them of how to detect what super stealthy thing that is. I don't believe that trying to rat out the guy is not his place. And the fact that 85% of the people on that thread would put their cars back to stock for any warranty is quite hypocritical to me.
Every wanna-be modder that can't quite afford to fix a WRX just needs to buy a $4000 Turbo Legacy and try to make it into a fire-breathing monster....
Every wanna-be modder that can't quite afford to fix a WRX just needs to buy a $4000 Turbo Legacy and try to make it into a fire-breathing monster....
1993 WMP BC6 5MT EJ22T 9psi 3.9:1 213k 205/55R16
62.6 m/s @ 0.66 bar. Gotta love boost. :)
62.6 m/s @ 0.66 bar. Gotta love boost. :)
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If I see two people and one person may be trying to cheat the other, I can either leave it alone since it's not my business, or I can approach one or both parties and offer my unsolicited advice or opinion. Neither would be morally right or wrong, although I'd probably err towards the latter.
This is kind of like what happened with the guy selling an EJ22 on eBay that he claimed was a turbo engine (see thread "Legacy Turbo engine on eBay" or something similar). After the auction ended I emailed the winning bidder to warn him about what might be happening. I think I did the right thing.
The main difference here is that one of the parties is Subaru of America, which is a Big Faceless Corporation. In this type of situation I would be more likely to choose to leave well enough alone probably, since it's not the same as this poor guy who doesn't have enough money to rebuild his engine but needs a new one. But in principle it's the same deal. And Grant made a good point -- that Subaru will likely respond to excessive claims that aren't denied by denying other possibly valid claims.
On a tangential point, this is one of the reasons I don't ever plan to buy a new car. Warranties are a big advantage to new cars but they're handled so badly so much of the time. Owners file fraudulent warranty claims because they think they can get away with it. Manufacturers deny valid warranty claims just because they think they can get away with it. It's a big mess, because there are so many cases where justice is never served. The cost savings of buying a used car, to me, are worth not having a warranty.
This is kind of like what happened with the guy selling an EJ22 on eBay that he claimed was a turbo engine (see thread "Legacy Turbo engine on eBay" or something similar). After the auction ended I emailed the winning bidder to warn him about what might be happening. I think I did the right thing.
The main difference here is that one of the parties is Subaru of America, which is a Big Faceless Corporation. In this type of situation I would be more likely to choose to leave well enough alone probably, since it's not the same as this poor guy who doesn't have enough money to rebuild his engine but needs a new one. But in principle it's the same deal. And Grant made a good point -- that Subaru will likely respond to excessive claims that aren't denied by denying other possibly valid claims.
On a tangential point, this is one of the reasons I don't ever plan to buy a new car. Warranties are a big advantage to new cars but they're handled so badly so much of the time. Owners file fraudulent warranty claims because they think they can get away with it. Manufacturers deny valid warranty claims just because they think they can get away with it. It's a big mess, because there are so many cases where justice is never served. The cost savings of buying a used car, to me, are worth not having a warranty.
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Last edited by paf on Tue Jun 10, 2003 10:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.
1990 FWD Legacy Wagon Base
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entirelyturbo
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In response to Brat4by4's statement that SOA is smart enough to figure out what really happened, unfortunately that's not necessarily true.
I work at a Toyota dealership, and remember for a while cars with the 3.0 V6, like the Camry V6, the Highlander V6, the Avalon, and the Sienna, were all having sludge problems. I saw numerous cars come in getting a new engine under warranty. However, it was clear that the customer was largely at fault because of a simple lack of maintenance. I recall a Sienna coming in on a tow truck with a seized engine full of sludge. It had 13,000 miles on it. But the thing was the customer probably never changed the oil. Yet it was still covered under warranty. So Southeast Toyota ate all those $2000 engines when it wasn't their fault.
When I get a new car, I will have all service done at the proper intervals at the dealer, so that if there is a warranty issue, there will be no question or argument. Of course, I would imagine that is all proper maintenance is done, then there probably will be very few problems anyway...
I work at a Toyota dealership, and remember for a while cars with the 3.0 V6, like the Camry V6, the Highlander V6, the Avalon, and the Sienna, were all having sludge problems. I saw numerous cars come in getting a new engine under warranty. However, it was clear that the customer was largely at fault because of a simple lack of maintenance. I recall a Sienna coming in on a tow truck with a seized engine full of sludge. It had 13,000 miles on it. But the thing was the customer probably never changed the oil. Yet it was still covered under warranty. So Southeast Toyota ate all those $2000 engines when it wasn't their fault.
When I get a new car, I will have all service done at the proper intervals at the dealer, so that if there is a warranty issue, there will be no question or argument. Of course, I would imagine that is all proper maintenance is done, then there probably will be very few problems anyway...
2000 Subaru Legacy B4 RSK
"Der Wahnsinn ist nur eine schmale Brücke/die Ufer sind Vernunft und Trieb"
*Formerly DerFahrer*
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"Der Wahnsinn ist nur eine schmale Brücke/die Ufer sind Vernunft und Trieb"
*Formerly DerFahrer*
@entirelyturbo on social media, including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok