Valvoline Instant Oil Change — Local services in Germantown

Beware! I took my 2020 Nissan Murano to Valvoine Instance Oil Change in Germantown, TN for an oil change. When I pulled out of the garage and turned onto the road, my oil light came on. As I pulled into a parking space my car began to shake and the motor cut off. I immediately called the VIOC location and the manager came to look at my car. He said “They forgot to put oil in your car.” That evening, we requested and received an email from the manager admitting their fault. After a period, we started to notice a very faint knocking sound that would get better after the motor warmed up. After a few months, it began to get worse. After taking the car to a mechanic and telling them about my experience with VIOC, he said that was likely the cause of the knocking. A second mechanic repeated the same. For a third opinion, I took my car to the Nissan dealership in Germantown, TN. This time for an unbiased opinion, I did not tell the mechanic about my incident at VIOC. The final diagnosis was “….lack of maintenance….noise is coming from rods in motor” necessitating the engine assembly be replaced. It’s not until this point that I told the mechanic what had happened at VIOC. His response was “Well, that’s absolutely what caused this. We don’t see these problems with a 2020 Nissan motor. Valvoline is notorious for not putting enough oil in cars they service. We see this often.” We presented these facts to the VIOC location manager. Final response was “We are not responsible…..” and after reaching out to the main office, we were told “This case has been closed.” It is not possible for any reasonable person to think they should not be responsible for this damage and are not at fault. I have my maintenance records that show I have kept my vehicle well serviced. I used VIOC often because of its convenience, rather than always driving a farther distance to the dealer. Very poor decision. Convenience does not always pay off. In hindsight, I realize that having multiple staff working on your car at the same time is not efficiency…..it creates distraction and lack of accountability. What I don’t need from VIOC is their go to reply “Our team would like to address it….” They know who I am and how...

I have been using Valvoline for over 20+ years. My recent visit was definitely not as normal as I’ve experienced over the years and I left with an uneasy feeling questioning whether I truly got the service I came in for… For starters moral and integrity of this company has been quite consistent since I’ve first used them. However this visit was different!! There was no line no wait… My concern sat in the moment one of the workers was guiding me out by way of his hand gesture. I then say can you reset my oil change indicator light?, while still noticing my tire indicator light was on as well but i didn’t say anything because I assumed they checked my tires and that the light may be delayed, again I’ve been using them for over 20 plus years so I wasn’t paying attention as I usually do I had my daughter and granddaughter in the car and we were talking and laughing so I didn’t pay much attention to the broken “routine” (Valvoline Mission Statement) As I’m driving home it hit me…. I say to my daughter my tire light still on, they didn’t check my windshield wipers, no one ever showed me the oil stick after the oil change, at that very moment I say to my daughter wait I never heard them do the shout outs for services from the top and bottom workers 🤔 I’m now questioning if i actually got the service I came in for.

I guess I’ll have to get a second look.

P..S~ once the mission doesn’t match your mission statement you fail to keep the integrity of the company and risk losing long time...

Sadly I had to change my review to 1 star in early 2023. I previously rated this location 5 stars but it has gone way down. A few months ago an employee negligently put weight on a piece in my engine and broke it, it cost me $150 to fix and they offered no compensation. Today, I tried to give them another chance but the wait time was over 30 minutes when they told me it would be less than 10 minutes. Not sure if they’ve changed managers or just employees but sadly I no longer recommend this location.

At the time of writing (1/27/22) the Poplar Valvoline in Germantown is by far my favorite place to take my car for oil changes. Take 5 and Firestone have provided horrendous service recently. The staff at this Valvoline are polite, courteous, and knowledgeable. Today I watched the manager train a new employee, he was a informative and patient without being condescending, which is a hard quality to find in a good manager. Best of all, he was doing this while servicing my vehicle and another customer and it didn’t diminish any of his efficiency. These skills are evident in the other employees at...