Kia Mall of Georgia — Attraction in Buford

I don’t know whether the problem lies with this service center or with Kia as a company, but my experience with this service center has been extremely disappointing — they are irresponsible and show absolutely no concern for customer service. They are friendly only when selling the car, constantly emphasizing the 5-year/60,000-mile warranty, but once problems arise, Kia ignore you and act like it’s your responsibility to deal with. I would like to share this unpleasant experience with this Kia service center.

My 2022 Kia Telluride started developing rust on all the chrome trims around the front of the car and the doors earlier this year. I visited the Kia service center in February and reported the issue, and they told me they would replace the parts if it was covered under warranty. At the end of May, they contacted me, and on June 12th, they performed the chrome trim replacement service. However, the job was not completed because some parts were damaged during shipping, and they said they had to order new ones and would complete the replacement of remains after get new parts. Up until this point, although it took time, I had no complaints about how they handled the issue.

When the new parts arrived, I was contacted again and went in for the second replacement service on July 8th. This time, however, the process took even longer than the first. I dropped off my car at 8:10 a.m., but didn’t receive a call to pick it up until almost 4:30 p.m. When I inspected the car, I found that one of the trims still had not been replaced. I took photos and texted them to the service center and the service advisor, but received no response. Upon reviewing the work order, I saw that just only one trim had been replaced. I could not understand how such limited work could take all day, nor why they told me the job was “complete” without any explanation when it clearly wasn’t.

On July 10th, I visited the service center again to raise this issue, and they promised to get back to me within five business days. However, I heard nothing for an entire month. When I called on August 11th, they told me I would receive a recall notice within one or two weeks, and that once I got it, I could schedule another service appointment. But by September 3rd, I still hadn’t received any notice, so I called again. This time, they told me they could not do anything about recall notices and simply gave me the phone number for Kia Consumer Affairs, telling me to contact them myself.

I have no idea why this has suddenly become a “recall issue.” From the beginning, they were replacing the trims under warranty, and even though I repeatedly raised the issue of the one trim that had not been replaced, they have failed to take care of it promptly. I also commented this complaint in the customer satisfaction survey I received by email after the service, but there has been no follow-up whatsoever. What’s the point of sending out surveys if they’re going to ignore the feedback and no follow up?

To make matters worse, this service center does not provide transportation, so I have to take a day off work whenever my car is being serviced. Despite going through this process twice, the job is still incomplete, which makes me upset. My family and I will never buy another Kia again. After experiencing the way they responded once problems arose, I am completely fed up.

I have always driven Japanese cars in the past and used their service centers several times, but I have never experienced this kind of neglect and disrespect. No matter how good the car is, if the service is this terrible, I will never do business with Kia...

I was very upset with the service provided at this location. Leo came out and greeted me on the lot. I explained there was a car I saw online that I liked and I urgently needed to trade my car in. He took me inside and said he would be getting the key to test drive. Once inside the vehicle, he was very thorough with telling me about all about the features it has and then said I wouldn't be able to test drive it and gave me some excuse about it being sold already and that they had another one on the lot for test driving..

He took me back inside and began to ask for my information to see if I could qualify for the loan. The space inside has no privacy whatsoever so any information you disclose may be heard by other agents and customers around you.. I ended up not qualifying for the vehicle I wanted but Leo did say I qualified for a different one on their lot.. He went out to show me the car, we sat inside and again, he went over all the features and again... I couldn't test drive it for some reason... but I was in badly need of a new vehicle and I liked the inside and all the features enough to purchase it. They took all my info and I waited about 4 hours before I could go in to sign all the paperwork.

Once I was signing the paperwork I kept asking about the interest rate on my loan and the TOTAL amount.. Well she gave me the loan amount WITHOUT the interest rate, I kept asking to make sure I would not be surprised with additional charges.. She didn't bother to explain that the interest rate would be ADDED onto the loan amount and that the total loan amount did not include the interest charge.. A seller that cares about their customers makes sure they are very well informed of the purchase they are making especially when its a purchase THIS BIG.

On top of me waiting 4+ hours to finally sign paperwork.. the lady that deals with the paperwork seemed very rushed for my cosigner & I to sign and didn't explain anything in detail to me or my cosigner with the questions we asked and now I'm paying DOUBLE what the vehicle is worth... I could've went somewhere else with better service. Carmax at mall of georgia gives better service than this.. I bought my first vehicle with them and never had this issue with added charges.. everything was explained to me thoroughly which is why I didn't expect this coming.

I'm highly disappointed and I will not be recommending this dealership to anyone... not to mention Leo kept pressuring me to leave a great review for him regardless of his service. Per Leo "Even if there's stuff I didn't explain to you, please give me a 5 star rating".. Might have done it if what wasn't explained was something minor but to add 10k to a total loan amount is absurd when it could have been explained beforehand.... Clearly Leo wanted a quick sale and the finance lady wanted to go home that night... So now I'm stuck with a loan that is worth double the vehicle's worth.. DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME HERE. I can bet most of their good reviews are fake...

I give this place absolutely zero stars in regards to servicing their vehicles, and thats me being nice. I only clicked 1 star just so i could post this. I have owned this vehicle for a little 2 years and the issues displayed via pictures aren't too major. However, the constant lack of response deserves to be highlighted. I met with a service tech there ( will not state names to avoid any privacy concerns) about 3-4 weeks ago regarding a check engine light that appeared which caused the vehicle to barely be able to accelerate. A couple hours later, I am told that the part is not in stock and that they will have to follow up with said company to make sure that it was in fact covered. I understood, and left, with the information given to me that they should hear something back within 48 hours. I follow up after the time frame to speak with the same rep, and they still tell me they haven't heard anything back. So I understand, and I wait even more. I forgot to mention that Kia mechanics said it was ok to drive the vehicle until the part arrives, and they cleared the code. This turned out to be a bad idea, as now, almost a month later, the code has resurfaced and will not go away. I even had someone else clear it yesterday (12/8/19) so that we could use the vehicle, however it just returned this morning without me even operating the vehicle. To follow up with this, the vehicle was very sluggish and not as quick to respond as usual. To cut more to the point, kia said that the "Throttle Actuator Control" would need to be replace back when I had the initial appointment. I've been patient for almost a month, and this issue has now prevented my wife from going to work along with personal safety concerns of her driving it with our two kids, I told her to just call out of work today. She initially tried to drive to work today but didn't even have enough power to get up the hill. So now we are faced with no vehicle and the possibility of having to tow it to the dealership at our own expense. I've left several voicemail messages today, and spoke with a supervisor who insisted he will call me back, which is what they all say. I will continue to follow up and reach out to them because this isn't right and customers should not be treated this way. The headrest pictures are obviously not my biggest concern, however, the lack of customer service for things relating to the actual functions of the vehicle is my concern. I take safety very seriously, and for them to seem like they don't care about the safe operation of their vehicles says a lot about the situation. The codes that are attached to this review were captured 12/8/19. Thank you kia for your excellence service and your unwavering support to your customers. You are sincerely the best...