Toyota dealer key fob cost versus Tesla key fob cost. Somehow, Brian H involved.

Hi, folks,

Over at teslamotors.com, I stumbled onto a thread started by @be-jouled about a multi-month cross-country trip she is making in her S85. I also took a peek at her blog about this journey. Many fun entries!

Thread:
http://www.teslamotors.com/forum/forums/multimonth-cross-country-trip

Blog:
http://be-jouled2014.blogspot.com


One entry particularly stood out for me because I have recently had a similar experience: @be-jouled lost her key fob and had it replaced at a service center. Here is what they charged her:

This time, Brian H., you will be happy to hear that I got charged, (and rightfully so). Here's what my love of dance cost me:

Total Labor & Miscellaneous
Items
37.50
Total Parts 113.00
Shipping 0.00
Discount 0.00
Subtotal 150.50
Sales Tax 8.61
TOTAL AMOUNT 159.11

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In my case, about two years ago, we lost one of the key fobs for a 2010 Prius. When we went to sell the Prius, I inquired of the Toyota dealership where we had purchased the vehicle what it would cost to replace the fob, thinking that a future owner might well like to have two fobs instead of one. The cost was "estimated" to me as $450-$500.

So far, I've only experienced zero-cost Tesla service. Every single thing, no matter how large or how small, has come under warranty. OK, OK, there was ONE thing: I rammed the car into a snowbank and dug a significant groove into the nose cone. The local service center charged me for a new nose cone and even after I argued with them for 5 minutes simply refused to charge me anything for labor.

Nice to see what looks to me like an entirely *reasonable* charge for parts and labor, compared to what Toyota would have charged me for a replacement key fob.

Here's hoping @be-jouled has a wonderful trip!


Alan

LOL!!

zro ltr said:

I hate everything about that fob. I didn't think a picture of a key fob would ever make me angry.

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Hi, @tga,

IMHO, the level of transparency in the new car market is actually unusual. It's not reflected in most other markets. Finding out what TJ Maxx paid for the clothes it sells; what Best Buy pays for its wares; what rug merchants paid for their rugs; what Bed, Bath and Beyond pays for its housewares; these and others are good examples where customers have little or no sense of the original cost of their purchases. For that matter, in addition to these middlemen, there may be other points in the supply chain where products are bought and re-sold. I don't know how much profit any of these middlemen make on the items I buy and in most cases I don't care.

That said, the savvy customer comparison shops; waits for sales; has a sense of what the products *should* cost a customer. And the seller usually provides something beyond just the product itself. For example, the seller's brand connotes a level of quality and/or integrity that has value to the customer. Many sellers accept returns with little or no hassle.

This is where I despise the used car dealers. And, for that matter, the new car dealers, too. I really *don't* see what value they provide me in 2014. I no longer need protection from the automobile manufacturers in the same way that I might have in, say, 1925. And whether used or new, the dealers tend to have a screw-the-customer-for-every-dollar attitude that hardly engenders loyalty.

Realizing that I could have done a do-it-yourself Prius key fob replacement at a fraction of the cost that the dealer would charge me is yet another example why I leap at the opportunity to do business with Tesla instead of an auto dealer.

Alan

tga said:

They also make a ton o' cash on used cars. There is a lot less transparency in the used car market. Edmunds, et al. have made it fairly easy to determine what a dealer paid for a new car, but no such tool exists for used cars - there's no way to know how much that dealer paid for the used car they are selling, and how much profit they stand to make on it. They use that information asymmetry to their advantage.

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Exactly why the dealers are afraid of a direct-mfg-to-customer sales model. They don't add value that the customer can readily perceive. Why do some customers go to Best Buy instead of Apple when purchasing an iPhone? Because they can comparison shop against non-Apple phones, and that has value to them. Perhaps also because they are buying several different kinds of items on one trip. Perhaps also because....? At any rate, even though I almost never shop at Best Buy, it seems that lots of people see a value in using that particular middleman.

Rare indeed is the story of the happy auto dealer customer. I think I'm going to start a thread about that.

Alan

skboston said:

I can't stand these people even a tiny bit. I bought a brand new vehicle with custom made body (sort of) for my company couple of years ago and while the sales person was nice and polite until I wrote the deposit check, he completely screwed me off from that point on, let alone it took 8 weeks beyond the promised delivery date. He was the biggest sleaze ball I've dealt in a long time, despite the fact that I'm a loyal customer to that dealership since 2006, especially their service department, which made quite a bit money off me.

There was not a single apology from this guy and nobody else to escalate the issue to, the owner didn't care and the vehicle is sold to me by the Sales Manager, who else is there? Both of them not giving a damn about my business and the losses I'm suffering, because the delivery is full 8 weeks, each day I'm being assured it's tomorrow, it's holiday (4th of July) and so on. I have no choice to either wait or loose my deposit.

I see no real reason for these guys to be there, I can deal directly with the manufacturer of both the truck and the body and will probably do a better job in that, why do I need some middle man to talk non-sense and make things worst?

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