Lease return experience - MoT vs, Markham Mazda

[MZR3]

My lease for the 05 Mazda3 Sport GT that I got from Markham Mazda was up yesterday. Although I loved the car and was thinking to buy it off, but the 2010 models are just too tempting. So, I decided to return the 05 and have a change.

Because I can't take the day off to do the return thing, I decided to drive it to MoT and return it there then go to work.

MoT experience
So, thinking the return should be pretty quick and painless, I arrived around 9:10AM, went to the reception and said to the receptionist that I was there to return a car at the end of the lease. She asked me if I had an appointment. Appointment? hmmm, wtf, is this a doctor's office? I said to myself. I told her that I was not aware of an appointment was needed to return the car at the end of the lease. She looked up at me sympathetically and went back to reference a list of names she has and say "oh, the person you need to return the car won't be in until 11:00, but I can give him a call to ask if he can see you"

Nice customer oriented girl, I thought. She was on the phone for a few minutes, then turned to me and said that she was sorry because the return person CAN'T (or won't want to??) meet with me until Monday...holy crap! Monday?! my lease was up and the car had to be returned!!

I politely said to her that I can't wait until Monday, but she said she couldn't help further. Never mind, I said, and walked out of MoT.
I was panicking a bit now...what are my other options, Avante, back to Markham, or drive to Downtown Mazda? and be back to office for an important 11:30 meeting...at the end I decided to go back to Markham Mazda.

Markham Mazda
20 minutes later (and needlessly wasted) I was back at Markham Mazda's showroom, same routine, back to reception, explained that I was there to return a end-of-lease car. The reception asked if I had an appointment...holy crap! I thought, not the same over again!! I again explained I was not aware of the appointment business. She looked at me smiled and said "just one moment, I'll find someone to help you." That's a change, the dark cloud hanging over my head started to clear. She paged some guy, and 2 minutes late a sales guys came, greeted me, introduced himself, and walked me to his desk. He then proceeded to start the pc program... To make the long story short, in less than 15 minutes, the return was done. No fuzz, no sweat.

What a dramatic difference in customer experience!!

Here are my questions:
1. Why you needed an appointment to return a lease-end car. The whole process is less than 15 minutes, and
2. if the process is so simple, why does MoT needed a "specialist" to handle the process. There were other sales people in the showroom doing absolutely nothing when I was there. Totally inefficient use of employee time!

From a customer point of view, I think MoT blew it and Markham Mazda, despite of how bad they are being rated, came through for this customer, me!

Jeff, if you see this post, I also sent a pm to you as I am looking for a 2010 Sport GT. Let me know if you'd prefer to use e-mail to communicate instead.

[Jeff-TheBiz]

Sorry you got the run around, but you need to know how important the drop off is.

The appointment is so you can leave with the assurance that the car is documented to be in the condition that you left it in.

You should never leave a lease return any where without a letter/form showing the exact condition of it as you left it. If someone moves that car and side swipes a fence.. it is your damage, not the clumsy driver.

That is why an appointment is necessary.

If AutoVin has already inspected the car, then the 'specialist' will look at the form and confirm that the car is in the same shape as it was when they inspected a week or 2 earlier.

[wikdslo]

Sorry you got the run around, but you need to know how important the drop off is.

The appointment is so you can leave with the assurance that the car is documented to be in the condition that you left it in.

You should never leave a lease return any where without a letter/form showing the exact condition of it as you left it. If someone moves that car and side swipes a fence.. it is your damage, not the clumsy driver.

That is why an appointment is necessary.

If AutoVin has already inspected the car, then the 'specialist' will look at the form and confirm that the car is in the same shape as it was when they inspected a week or 2 earlier.

Is it such a big deal to have any random tech/salesperson look the car over visually and document the damage found so at least the person can drop off the car?

I would think a digital camera and 5 minutes of a quick look over would be sufficient to at least have both the dealership and the customer satisfied that car has been documented for what it is, until the "specialist" can come in.

[seelsy]

we did a lease return to georgian pontiac in barrie, for a service truck for our company, didnt have an appt. they just called someone down, he filled out the paperwork and gave us a copy, then at a later day the specialist sent us a copy of the sheet again and the cost of any repairs, i understand that it would give you extra knowledge that its done properly by a knowledged person, but it seems a little over the top that only one person can accept lease trade ins when there could be many on any given day

[Aitch]

If there is someone free to do the work, I can understand that in most cases it wouldn't take too long to document the returned condition of a car.

However as a customer, I know how much work is involved in buying/leasing a car in the first place; I would never expect that I could just show up unannounced at whichever Mazda dealership I chose, on the last day of the lease, and that dealer would be 100% prepared to accept the car on the spot. Again, there is a lot of paperwork involved in setting up a lease, and you usually need an appointment when picking up your car; why wouldn't you expect a similar arrangement when returning one?

[seelsy]

If there is someone free to do the work, I can understand that in most cases it wouldn't take too long to document the returned condition of a car.

However as a customer, I know how much work is involved in buying/leasing a car in the first place; I would never expect that I could just show up unannounced at whichever Mazda dealership I chose, on the last day of the lease, and that dealer would be 100% prepared to accept the car on the spot. Again, there is a lot of paperwork involved in setting up a lease, and you usually need an appointment when picking up your car; why wouldn't you expect a similar arrangement when returning one?

point taken :chuckle

[Bean]

Hubby went in with his parents today to MoT to talk about buying out the lease. They were not very helpful at all and thats that. So his parents and he left and then my Hubby went to Dave Wood and they might be able to help. Surprise. Surprise.

[Jeff-TheBiz]

Hubby went in with his parents today to MoT to talk about buying out the lease. They were not very helpful at all and thats that. So his parents and he left and then my Hubby went to Dave Wood and they might be able to help. Surprise. Surprise.

After all, you still didn't ask for me? :bang

[Bean]

Disregard my earlier message

[MZR3]

If there is someone free to do the work, I can understand that in most cases it wouldn't take too long to document the returned condition of a car.

However as a customer, I know how much work is involved in buying/leasing a car in the first place; I would never expect that I could just show up unannounced at whichever Mazda dealership I chose, on the last day of the lease, and that dealer would be 100% prepared to accept the car on the spot. Again, there is a lot of paperwork involved in setting up a lease, and you usually need an appointment when picking up your car; why wouldn't you expect a similar arrangement when returning one?

Not to beat the issue to death, but I disagree with you. I can see that signing a lease one will need to dot the i's and cross the t's, but COME ON, extra paper work on a lease return? Give me a break. Unless the dealer is trying to screw you, like some of the Acura lease returns.

Despite of the bad experiences many of us had with Markham Mazda, this time it was painless. Everything, i.e. the inspection & all the paper work, was done in less than 15 minutes.

Kudo to Markham Mazda.

[SonicBoy]

When you return the vehicle, you are in effect finalizing the transaction and you want all liability to be terminated. As Jeff pointed out, when you drop the car at the dealership, it has to be documented that they or Mazda is now in ownership and any damage aftewards is not your fault.

When I returned my lease with Jeff, I left with the knowledge that it was over and I could rest assured that all liens against me were clear.

[Aitch]

Not to beat the issue to death, but I disagree with you. I can see that signing a lease one will need to dot the i's and cross the t's, but COME ON, extra paper work on a lease return? Give me a break. Unless the dealer is trying to screw you, like some of the Acura lease returns.

Despite of the bad experiences many of us had with Markham Mazda, this time it was painless. Everything, i.e. the inspection & all the paper work, was done in less than 15 minutes.

Kudo to Markham Mazda.

Its great that it can all be done in less than 15 minutes. What I was saying is that considering how much goes into signing/picking up the car in the first place, without any prior knowledge of doing lease returns I would not expect the return to be just "drop off the keys". I've never done a lease return and prior to your post hadn't read about one. So I would have assumed it would be prudent to plan it a bit in advance and/or leave some extra time, just so I wouldn't get screwed by having possession of the car past the lease return date if all didn't go smoothly.

Trust me, I've been burned by assuming things would just work out in other things in life :)

[Krakor]

I took my car to Jeff at MoT to return the leased vehicle and he explained everything to me.

The condition of the car documentation is so important because the lease company sent me a letter a week or so later that the did notice the scratches on th ebumper but they would let that go as part of the wear and tear as Jeff had explained would happen.

Too bad you felt you got the run around, but I went directly to Jeff and he took car of everything.

Jeff is sort of a Swiss Army Knife of the car industry!

And Jeff, you can use that!

:)

[MZR3]

Trust me, I've been burned by assuming things would just work out in other things in life :)

my condolence... ;)

[Kaiserhead]

You can't even drop the keys on the counter and run when you rent a car, what makes you think you can do the same for a multi-year lease?

I have a 2006 Mazda6 that goes back in a year, I expect to spend the morning at the dealer processing the return. I don't want any BS about the condition of the car since I've pampered the thing like it was my own.