Hartford Toyota Superstore — Attraction in Hartford

Summary: Take your car to any other dealership for service.

Recently, someone attempted to take all 4 of my wheels. Whomever the thieves were, they must have been scared off, because all of my lug nuts were on the ground and the wheels were barely underneath the car. Luckily, I still had all of my wheels and something to kind of laugh at because the thieves did such a bad job.

I had AAA put the wheels back on my car and went to Hartford Toyota Superstore, since it was close by and it should be an easy and relatively inexpensive fix. I called the service department before I arrived letting them know what the problem was.

I arrived at the service department and explained what happened in detail. I explained that someone attempted to steal my wheels and the car was sitting on them in a way where I was afraid there was damage. I highlighted my two main concerns on the passenger side. The front passenger side with the two damaged studs, the lug nuts could no longer be screwed on, and the back passenger side where there was probably damage because there was a sound coming from it.

The communication was poor at best. At other dealerships they send you updates with texts and videos, not here. I had to call them and ask for the status, twice. Also, there was no video of the service, that should have been the first warning.

I went to the dealership paid and hoped that would be that. I drove for about 30 secs when I heard a scarping sound from the back passenger side, I turned around and went back. I spoke with the service advisor and said the car was making a noise. He even said he heard the noise when I drove off! He was completely okay with me driving in a vehicle that was not fixed! He went back and reviewed the video of the tech and it looked like only the front wheel was looked at.

They took the car and looked at it again and said they were able to take a look and the router was bent on the passenger side in the back. So, they never looked at the passenger side back wheel.... They said it was all set. I went on my way. The car was still making noise! I was absolutely pissed. I turned around AGAIN and went back and said the car wasn't fixed. I said I might just have the car towed somewhere else because the car was still not fixed. The service advisor said that he could have a tech ride with me and I could speak with the manager and he didn't know what else to do. No apologies, just excuses. He pointed in a general direction and said the manager was there. I asked specifically who the manager was.

I went over to the manager and stood there and was not addressed. I walked up to him and said hello. His attitude was nonchalant at best. No apologies, no guarantee to make the situation better. He just asked who I was working with as a service advisor and said a tech could go with me on a ride to see what the problem is. I said okay. If the car was still making noise, I was ready to make a fuss and and ask for a partial refund.

After taking the car back a SECOND time, I finally didn't hear any noise when I went on a ride with the tech.

The fact I had to take my car back 2x is absolute inexcusable. I will ABSOLUTELY never take my car back here again. Do yourself a favor and go to any other Toyota dealership in the area for service. Simsbury, Manchester take it anywhere else!

If they can't get the wheels on your car without problems, I can't imagine the disservice they do to people with more complex mechanical issues.

It's sad that they probably get away with treating people in this manner because they are dealing with a lot of Hartford residents and hope they won't complain. These guys are absolutely taking advantage of that fact. Save yourself a headache and take your hard earned money somewhere else.

Now, I have to take my car to Simsbury and have it looked over because I absolutely do not trust their work. What a shame, they could have had a loyal customer. Now I won't even order my parts from there.

Update: Reached out to them and so did Toyota Corporate and they never...

Hartford Toyota replied to my original review telling me to reach out, I did and left a voicemail with my contact information and haven’t heard back in over a week.

This is a review for my experience with the finance department.

Once I heard from finance, they tried to tell me about how I didn’t need a co-buyer. But I do in fact need my co-buyer on the title for insurance purposes and Toyota sales told me that anyone on registration needs to also be on the loan. Finance said it’s not true, I had to again be politely firm and they agreed to keep the info as is. It’s confusing why that even mattered, unless there was motive to charge me higher interest without my co-buyer.

I sent finance my info, told them I am transferring my plates and gave the number. They confirmed they received the messages. I was told by the salesman that I needed everything ready 24 hours in advance of the appointment to pick up, and at two days prior, I had to reach out again and ask for lien holder info they were supposed to send.

The appointment day came, I got out of work earlier than expected, I let the team know if theres an earlier time that day, I was available. They told me to come in early, gave me a specific time.

My co-buyer and I showed up on time, were sat at a desk, and then endured 45 minutes of “just one moment” back and forth from the salesman and finance business manager. Eventually finance came and said they never got my co-buyers application. I had confirmation that it was received. They found it and let us know at least a half hour later.

More waiting and we were called into the financial office to sit and wait some more. I asked some questions about the packages and the price difference and was totally ignored. We got to signing some of the contracts when finance told me its more expensive to transfer my plates than to get new ones. Told me this in the office, after I had already sent my plate info days prior and was sitting there with my updated insurance so I could drive the car off. It was a $30 difference, and they were making it seem like a big issue. They ignored and later aggressively contested my questions about not wanting to pay a couple hundred for things I didn’t want, but felt so strongly $30 would be the big hit to my bank account? I paid it, and then had to re-sign all those contracts again to add it to the loan.

Our time actually being spoken with (spoken at) in the finance office felt rushed, our info was being loudly read with the door wide open to the lobby, the business manager took calls and tended to multiple other people in front of us. I understand being busy, but they had told us a time to come in, had none of our paperwork ready, had us waiting for extended periods of time, and spoke to us with such irritation in their voice that I couldn’t believe this was a professional business at all.

About three hours after arriving for the appointment, I left with my car. This week my co-buyer and I received scam postal mail dated the day I purchased the car, claiming to be Bank of America, through Toyota. Whether it was from letting our information be heard by the lobby, a data breach in the Toyota app or online services, or someone working at this location, I do not know.

I would never recommend this location for financing. The salesmen I spoke to were decent and friendly. I have not had any experience with service department yet.

This location might benefit from having a by-appointment-only model, and scheduling walk-ins for the slots they...

This should have been an easy internet cash purchase. No financing, no rebates, no special deals - a dealership’s dream. Unfortunately it was anything but. When we were informed our car had arrived, we gave the dealership a specific date for us to take delivery. After that, we had limited input from the dealer as to how the deal would proceed, evenl though we specifically asked what would be required. They requested proof of insurance which we provided a day ahead of our delivery date. We had to ask about how to pay & we were told a wire transfer was acceptable but not the bottom line of how much to pay or the details for the transfer. On delivery day we had to drive two & a half hours to reach the dealership. Enroute, we were first advised we needed an appointment with the business manager & we didn’t have one. In our minds - we advised you we were coming why don’t we already have an appointment? Isn’t that the salesperson’s job to set that up? Next we were told our address on our proof of insurance was unacceptable - which proved to be wrong. We also were then told we needed to have our passports! Again this was all after we were already on our way. Once we arrived, the person in charge of our purchase had the day off. The substitute told us we needed a cashiers check & that we couldn’t wire transfer payment - once again this proved to be wrong. We then proceeded to send the wire transfer- which took 2 hours to complete. If we had simply been advised of what was required the previous day when we specifically asked, we could have had everything prepared. We then had to wait an additional 30 mins just to get our temporary tag. Does it really take that long ? We are military and have purchased vehicles via the internet numerous times. This is absolutely the worst experience we’ve ever had. Internet sales are normally handled by the fleet manager. This dealership gave us to a very inexperienced salesman, well meaning but severely inexperienced. Likewise, they told us the business manager in charge of delivery was also new. Maybe that explains why he was on his day off and failed to brief anyone else when we arranged 2 weeks prior we would be taking delivery on that same day. Does anyone talk to anyone else at this dealership? Delivery took 5 hours & that’s a record for us . Prior to this it took about an hour.. Honestly, we would never do business with this dealership again - and wouldn’t have this time except for the fact they were the only one that had the car we wanted within a 250 mile radius. For some reason, the northeastern dealerships don’t do dealer trades - at least not that we could find.. Hartford Toyota does not know how to do business with military people or how to properly process purchases over...