New Ripoff: AutoNation windshield inscription

[Ioi Lam]

I bought an Accord recently from Anderson Honda in Palo Alto, CA. The
dealership was bought by the same company that operates AutoNation
superstores. They advertised the Accord LX for $17,238, which was very
good. However, they tried to sell all kinds of ripoff's to me.

One thing was this inscription on the windshield that's supposed to
protect the car --- like car burglarers will say "hey, this car has the
little inscription on the windshield, so I'd better steal the next car
that has an actual alarm" or "well, I'm gonna remove the VIN sticker,
but I think I'll leave that lovely inscription alone".

And the price? $178 of my hard-earned dollars. Of course they didn't get
it. In the course of bargaining, I also learned that the floormat costs
$99.

[Celtic 99]

that little inscription that you are talking about is put on every
window on the car, it's registration of sorts or all cars in that
dealers inventor. They have no right to charge you for it, they should
have had it on the new cars as they come in off the truck. It's supposed
to be free. DON"T PAY FOR IT!

[Andrew Rogers]

In article <369C4EFB...@eng.sun.NOSPAM.com> Ioi Lam <i...@eng.sun.NOSPAM.com> writes:
>One thing was this inscription on the windshield that's supposed to
>protect the car

Etching the VIN on the glass? Yes, the chop shops are reluctant to reuse a
windshield that already has some other car's VIN on it, although I'm not
sure that most car thieves have the time to look for it.

>And the price? $178 of my hard-earned dollars.

You can buy a kit for about $15 to do that yourself, and in some areas the
cops will do it for free.

>In the course of bargaining, I also learned that the floormat costs $99.

My ex found a set of Accord mats at K-mart for about $25. Better fit and
color match than the ones at the dealership.

Andrew

[slacker808]

seems like a lot of dealerships are inscribing the VIN numbers on the
windows on all their cars; like as soon as they unload the cars from the
truck. i went to this one dealership and *every* car i looked at had the
inscription on all six windows. kinda ugly and kinda expensive. i think
they call it a security/theft package. lame.

---
rich

Ioi Lam wrote:
>
> I bought an Accord recently from Anderson Honda in Palo Alto, CA. The
> dealership was bought by the same company that operates AutoNation
> superstores. They advertised the Accord LX for $17,238, which was very
> good. However, they tried to sell all kinds of ripoff's to me.
>

> One thing was this inscription on the windshield that's supposed to

> protect the car --- like car burglarers will say "hey, this car has the
> little inscription on the windshield, so I'd better steal the next car
> that has an actual alarm" or "well, I'm gonna remove the VIN sticker,
> but I think I'll leave that lovely inscription alone".
>
> And the price? $178 of my hard-earned dollars. Of course they didn't get

> it. In the course of bargaining, I also learned that the floormat costs
> $99.