strut blew out after 1 day......kyb told me to go to hell and they specifically exclude labor reimbursement!!!!

Spoke to a supervisor who made up every excuse in the world as to why the strut went bad (someone must have damaged it...etc.) and was proud they get around paying labor under their warranty.

1 day...yes 1 day........never use kyb!!!!

 

Very sad to hear.. unfortunately, this is the risk we take when we try to save money by buying the part separate from the place of labor.

Hasn't happened to me yet..

 

Just BS......I'm more pissed about the supervisor who was so proud of himself......"we specifically get around paying for any labor under our warranty.....your problem"

 

I've been in that situation before and now the real conundrum appears. What to do next?

Do you get your "free" replacement, install it and cross your fingers?

Do you ask for your money back? But what about the other strut? They aren't going to give you your money back for the other strut!

So do you take it in the shorts and start over with a different brand?

These situations are why I always try to tell myself parts are cheap when compared to cheap parts.

 

That sucks. I will say though that almost no part manufacturer will reimburse labor for a retail customer, they'd be out of business in short order.

Usually the only time there's a labor reimbursement is when the shop buys the part and does the install, some distributors and manufacturers will have some sort of arrangement, but the shop usually takes car of everything and gives the customer a warranty.


It is something to think about when you buy parts and have a shop install. Of course, if shops charged a reasonable price for their parts instead of 300-400% markup people wouldn't feel the need to do this.


Out of curiosity, where were the KYB struts made? Which one blew? Front, rear, driver, passenger, etc?

 

I had a similar experience with Stoptech/Centric and will never buy their parts again. Although I wasn't asking for labor and only wanted replacement rotors for clearly defective products.

 

Thats to bad, but speak for your self, maybe the strurt/s you received was a bad apple out of a bad batch out of a million of other good working kyb struts.I wouldn't name smear the brand as a whole.

 

Yea, almost all auto parts I have come in contact with,same policy. Replacement or refund but not one covers labor costs associated with the install. Only place that does that is the mechanic shop or any installer, as their distributor takes care of them.

Anyways, see if you can get a replacement, and see as to why they are refusing the warranty. IMO only MNCs really have a return policy, depending on the MFG for any after sales support is trying to thread a needle....

 

I've had KYB on a bunch of cars and never had a failure.

One time I blew out a set of Konis in a few days. Turns out I left out the bump stops. That was an expensive lesson.

As mentioned, one of the reasons a shop marks up the parts prices is because they have to eat the labor when a part goes bad, unless possibly they have a really strong relationship with their source and/or the source has enough leverage with the manufacturer or distributor to get some labor money back. And don't forget, they probably pay more for the part than we do after careful internet shopping, as they need to get it from a nearby source who they already have credit with, and get it fast, because they have your car apart and you want it back!

 

If it helps, I had a buddy put in a set of KYBs on his Nissan. After only a few months they were leaking. He moved across the country so he couldn't get them replaced. Maybe it could have been a bad installation, but how hard is it to put in a pair of shocks? I suspect a POS product.

 

Is your demand in wriwriting?

Was the refusal to honor warranty in writing??

If not, compose an e-mail and see what the written response contains.

If necessary, escalate up the chain of command.

 

AND SEEM PROUD OF IT!!!

Called the VP at KYB and was passed to the head of customer relations at KYB......his name is Ricky Torres. He was of no help and in his very BS way (check the warranty) let me know I was stuck paying for the labor (and probably alignment) a second time for a brand new EXCEL G strut with less than 20 miles on it...it lasted 1 whole day!!

I personally will never....EVER.....deal with KYB again! In my humble opinion..............PURE JUNK!

 

What's wrong with your 20-miles-old KYB? What symptoms are you having with it? Is it still on your vehicle and you're asking KYB to cover the replacement cost including material and labor?

 

Seal blew off after a few miles on a brand new strut......oil everywhere down the strut etc. I did ask for some help with the labor as the product never should have left the factory..I personally don't think that is unreasonable...my mechanic said he never saw anything like that before. The head of customer relations said he's never seen anything like that and very unusual....but I'm SOL!!!

 

One quick question I was curious about, does the box say where KYB are made? I have heard they started outsourcing production, just curious. They used to be exclusively Japanese.