I have a 2005 Town and Country Limited Edition. Now, last year when this occurred, Chrysler sent out an investigator for my claim and he came to the conclusion that it was not a manufacturing defect and I ended up paying over $1000 to get the driver's side air bag fixed. Twin City Dodge, the local Chrysler dealer here in Lafayette, Indiana, was floored. Twin City had even got me a rental car and paid for it thinking Chrysler would cover everything. After my vehicle was fixed and I left the dealership, after paying a God awful amount of money, the airbag light came on. SO, I call Twin City and they have me come back in and they replace the passenger side airbag harness and wiring for free. Twin City and the service manager there that I have dealt with have been nothing short of amazing. Chrysler corporate, on the other hand, is a different story.
Since the first airbag deployment, I have had no issue with this vehicle. There was no warning, again. I was driving 25 miles an hour down Greenbush Street in Lafayette, Indiana at little after 1pm. After the airbags deployed deployed, I couldn't see or hear. I couldn't find my hazard lights so I turned on my turn signal and just got over the best I could. If you are from Lafayette and you know Greenbush Street, there really is not anywhere to get over. After I collected myself, I pushed my driver's side airbag in the steering wheel as much as I could and drove back to work, which was about five minutes away. I went and got my boss to explain what was going on because we had a meeting at 1:30 pm that everyone needed to be in. After he helped me get items out of my vehicle that I got for the office and went back inside, I get this extreme pain in my stomach and lift up my shirt to see that I am bleeding. I go back in the building and explain that I think maybe I need to go to urgent care. No hesitation from him. He is eating his lunch. He grabs his keys and we leave to go to urgent care. At this point, I think I have so much adrenaline going on that I don't realize how much pain I really am in.
After waiting for a little over an hour to be seen, I see a doctor at urgent care that dresses my wound, suggests a Tetanus shot (no way!) and tells me to take it easy. They did not prescribe me any pain medications. Thankfully, my best friend came to urgent care to calm me down as my husband was in Indy.
When I get back to my office after being at urgent care so I can get the company car, Twin City has arrange for my van to be picked up. I go to get things I need out of my van and realize the damage these airbags have really caused. I cannot locate my garage door open. The next day I went to Twin City and found it in the back seat of the van. The airbag had knocked it from the passenger side sun visor all the way back there. I also found an odd, square red item that said "push" on it in the back seat. Come to find out, the next day when I could collect my thoughts and figure out where it went to, it was the button you push to release your seat belt. The air bag broke that off of the passenger side seat belt. I am glad I did not have a passenger. I cannot imagine the injuries they could of had when I just walked area with a few cuts and major bruising.
Since Monday, I have been in EXTREME pain. I have not been able to sleep and have massive bruising on my abdomen. I went to see my PCP yesterday who determined I have bruising from my chest to my lower abdomen are on those muscles and tissues. Thankfully, he prescribed me some pain medications to ease the pain and help me sleep.
Tuesday, I called Chrysler Corporate to report all of this. I have not heard back from them. The customer care rep I spoke with was very nice but he does not make the decisions. I made it very clear to the customer care rep that I had been hurt during the airbag deployment and this was the second time this had occurred. I also made it clear that I would NOT be paying for a dime due to this malfunction that a wreck did not cause. I mentioned several times that I had spoke with two attorneys and that I would not hesitate to bring them into this if Chrysler did not handle this situation differently than the situation last year. He noted everything I said to him and informed me that my case would be escalated to a different department and that someone would be contacting me within 48-72 hours. I informed him that if it took that long, they would be hearing from my attorney. Looks like I will be calling my attorney in the morning. Not something I want to deal with but corporate America is not going to screw me again.
No comments:
Post a Comment