RNajarian

My Dad has a low mileage (35,000 mi) E350, he’s pretty good about maintenance and for some reason gets it done at the dealer.

A month ago he had Service A done and after he picked it up he called me from the car to say he was getting the AUXILLARY BATTERY MALFUNCTION message. He asked if he should turn around and have the dealer look at it. Having just replaced my wife’s Auxillary Battery in her 2010 E350 I told him, probably just a coincidence and that the Auxillary Battery goes bad between 5-7 years, and that I would replace the battery myself.

Here is where it gets weird/unusual. Swapping the battery was a breeze, 15 minutes from start to finish, but while doing it I noticed the 5 amp fuse which is attached to the Auxillary Battery was MISSING. I started the engine and within 15 seconds the AUXILLARY BATTERY MALFUNCTION warning message returned. I then put a 5 amp fuse in the receptacle, started the car, let it run for 5 minutes then drove it around for 5 minutes. There was NO AUXILLARY BATTERY MALFUNCTION warning. I searched around the footwell and dash area and did not see a loose fuse.

This fuse is easily accessible by removing the 3 size 10 Torx screws from the panel located under the steering column. The cynic in me thinks the dealer removed the fuse to sell my dad a $120 Battery with 1 hour of book time at $175.

This particular dealer’s service department has rubbed me the wrong way in the past, so admittedly I'm thinking some hijinks occurred.

The Moral of the Story is . . .

. . . yea, I got nothing.

Monksterman

Yeah, that's why they oftentimes are referred to as "stealers ...

lightfytr

That's some shady stuff!

Ive done all maintenance myself over the past 3 years and zero issues. I really dont trust them.

dbldpr

I would contact MBUSA and tell them your story. If they have similar stories the dealer is in deep S--t.

kajtek1

DIY, DIY, DIY
For years I have been tempted with those $39 oil changes, but reading all the stories about stripped bolts, cut engine covers, I rather get my hands dirty.
Typical sample - our original 1998 ML320.
Being break-thru technology, lot of owners were spending $2000-3000 every single year to have them serviced at dealers.
Our car 13 years in family generated slightly over $300 in failed parts, or $25 a year. Battery replaced on year 13. But beside some warranty jobs, no mechanic touched it ever.

dbldpr

At my age I do not have the agility to work on the car anymore. I wish I could but my body will not let me. I have to have it serviced. I can do minor tinkering but that is it. I miss working on cars and restoring them. You are lucky.

kajtek1

Age is not good excuse as this is reversible to some degree.
My father at 92 still works on garden projects. Cut tip of his finger last month on table saw, but that's becouse he is 80% blind.
I am getting stiffer with age as well, but that is why I have lot of tools and am shopping around for garage lift.

dbldpr

Agent orange eating at body. titanium Knees cannot kneel anymore. Arthritis all over body. can go on but this give you an idea why I cannot do it anymore.

rickchitown

these types of stories make me crazy, if even REMOTELY any truth to it. and even worse, from what I understand is MB is making it increasingly more and more difficult for even independent shops to work on the newer generations of these cars. My local guy won't take them, but has worked on my BMW's for years. Had to have brakes all the way around put on my kids C300, $1600 at the stealer... $500-600 oil changes, etc. makes a guy NOT want to buy a used Benz. And I too am not really able to do my own repairs... kind of stuck in a bad spot.

kajtek1

I wonder what is happening with MB, or MBUSA politics.
For older models you can buy Oxygen sensor for $40-100, MAF go in the range of $100 as well.
I had 2 of them fail on W212 and my local part dept would take about $1000.
Even Add Blue tank is design that way, that you should buy only MB fluid in small bottles. For my Ford, I fill up at track stops, where special pump doze it for +- $2 a gallon.

cetialpha5

I do what I can like oil changes, but sometimes I just prefer to have an indy do it as they can do it faster and it's easier. I have mine do basic maintenance, brakes, cv joints, thermostats, pulleys etc., he doesn't care that it's an MB, does work on all sorts of cars, pricing is about the same.

mellonc

I'm So Cal myself. Please post which dealer this is.

mnje350

Stories like this always concern me. Like many, I am also beyond the age where I can do a lot of these kind of maintenance items myself. Therefore I am forced to trust the dealer. So far I believe that I have a reputable one. I also made it known to them that if I ever catch them in a cheat, it will cost them my business. Even if I get what I perceive as a good deal on a new or used car, I see the service department far more than I see the salesman that sold me the car.

Years ago when Goodyear still had service centers around the country, I had a car in to them for some simple service that I could not do because I lived in an apartment at the time. They came back and told me I had a tear in two of my CV U-joint boots that I knew was fresh. It was total BS and typical of the practice of s theses stores at the time. I had a friend who worked at one and confirmed the dishonest practices of the chain. Needless to say, I have never purchased a Goodyear tire. That happened to me in 1985. I have purchased a lot of tires since then, none of them GY tires.

I have dropped two car brands because of cheating service shops, usually when they try and pull a fast one on my wife. Toyota was the last one when they told my wife the breaks were shot on her 35,000 mile Solar convertible. I challenged them and told them if I got the car home and found otherwise, they or the brand would never see a dollar from me again. That was 15 years ago. I told the same story to my MB dealership and they nodded and said that would never happen there. So far so good but I am always on the lookout.

These cars are very complex. It would be easy to pull a fast one like the OP is suggesting. I am not a wealthy man but in the past 42 years, I have probably dropped $750,000 on cars, service, and the like. The dealer that is concerned about that spend will get my business and keep my business.

cetialpha5

Goodyear still has those shops out there. I've heard worse stories about Firestone. Anyway, they have a 3 year alignment warranty, I have both my cars aligned there. There's not much adjustment on them anyway, basically just toe. Anyway, if there's anything wrong, they're always trying to upsell, but I always decline. Their prices are almost the same as the dealer and I use an indy that's much cheaper than them or the dealer. I just go to them for alignment and tires on my previous car, but for the Mercedes I just have them do the alignments. I think it was $159 for the 3 year warranty which is way better than going to the dealer who will probably charge you that for just one. The potholes around here are pretty bad, hit one once and I knew instantly that the alignment was off as the steering wheel was no longer straight afterwards.

Darel

There's always that segment of the population that thinks everyone is out to get them, and everything's a conspiracy.

This, on the other hand, seems pretty cut-and-dry. Fuses just don't fall out of their holders right after a visit to the dealer, who well knows the car will be fully operable (and thus briefly leave their dealership, only to be able to return under its' own power). Especially a special "hidden" one, that will cause a fault, but a not-too-serious one.

Here's what I would do if I were you. Put the old battery back in. Mark it in some way, maybe on the bottom. Take pics of the missing fuse and all. Maybe clean it up so it looks new.

Take the car back in for service. See if it's returned to you with the fault cleared, and the fuse installed. Again take pics, maybe right there in the lot before you drive away.

Check the aux battery. Look for your mark. It could go one way or another. They could be trying to sell you a battery you don't need which is bad. They could also be trying to charge your dad for a battery they never installed at all, and just pop the fuse back in and call it good. That's way worse.

Then, either way, call MB USA and pass on the information. For every knowledgeable guy like you out there, there are 50 other people getting ripped off out there. I'm not saying you need to go through everything I outlined above (I just think it would be fun), but it's kind of your duty to report it to help out all the other people getting taken. It's theft, plain and simple. Same thing as knocking an old lady down and stealing her purse, only there's way more money in this scam.

Good luck. Please keep us in the loop.

D
.

JALLEN4

Anybody who has actually worked in a dealer's shop would find this entire discussion pure B.S. A dealer ship tech is paid flat rate in 99% of the cases. He is paid for what he actually does labor wise and not for the price of parts installed. The tech is not going to have time for removing panels and then fuses so he might possibly get the car back and be paid to replace a battery. He has more good results from moving a job along and then getting another job that is guaranteed to pay for his efforts. Most Mercedes shops today have all the work they need for the techs without resorting to this type scenario,

Owning and operating a Mercedes dealership is extremely expensive and can be very lucrative. It is simply ludicrous to assume a Mercedes dealer would go to these lengths hoping to make maybe a 100 bucks on the sale of an auxiliary battery. If they wanted to sabotage the car for extra work, there are a lot more efficient ways to accomplish that and collect far more money.

Darel

Ordinarily I agree. But how do you explain this? Having done an A service myself, by the book, there's no reason to pull that fuse or even open that panel. Fuses don't just fall out on their own.

JALLEN4

I don't have an answer as to what happened. I would suggest you ask the dealership service manager for an explanation. But, I am saying, I spent forty years owning and operating dealerships and was a Service Director at one time. This just does not sound like a reasonable on purpose kind of scam, and believe me, I have seen a few!

MBNUT1

I'm inclined to agree with this.

kajtek1

When I agree that technicians don't have much incentive to pull such things, you still have shift managers and SA that fool around most of the day.
I go to dealer on average once in decade.
Couple years go took W211 wagon 4M for wheel alignment. The flat quote was $170 but after keeping the car for whole day, they let it go just before closing. I had to insist to get the correction sheet. Reading it at home I noticed about 15 measurement still in red.
Called SC following day to bring the car back.
SA took the correction sheet to shift manager and spend 1 hr trying to figure out what is wrong. Seem they had hard time to covert decimal numbers to degrees and minutes.
So they kept my car for another 2 days.
Making total 3 days and 4 shuttles for mere $170. That in Oakland, CA what is highly MB populated area.
To top it in final inspection they still left 5 measurements in red, giving me BS about corroded bolts. Car had no rust.

RNajarian

As I stated in the title of the Thread “I’m not Accusing Anybody but . . . “

The fuse was missing. I checked the area pretty thoroughly and found nothing. I have changed auxiliary batteries before so I am pretty comfortable stating the fuse was missing when I removed the bottom panel. My dad reported first seeing the AUXILLARY BATTERY MALFUNCTION message immediately after leaving the dealer.

i have been asked what dealership this is and am reluctant to share for obvious reasons. This dealer has in the past had the factory intervene for service issues. Having dealt with the Service Dept Head Honcho before, I can tell you he will deny any wrongdoing . Yes I can set the trap as described above, but too much time has passed since my dad had service A done.

It infurates me to think there may have been shenanigans done at the dealer.

kajtek1

Well... whoever pulled the stunt, most likely will keep repeating till he gets fired.
Than he opens indy shop and advertise "MB technician with XX years experience at dealership"

ItalianJoe1

As a tech, I agree above that this seems like a silly thing to try and scam, but it's hard to argue with a missing fuse if the car had no errors when brought in.

This kind of stuff makes me sad, I take a great deal of pride in my work and in being honest, but if I tell people I'm a mechanic, I get this sideways look like I rip people off all day. It sucks that the industry has come down to this and the few "good ones" left get lumped in with the scam artists that are sadly all too prevalent in this business.

RNajarian

i hear you Pal. I don’t want to unfairly accuse anyone, as for getting an unfair rap. . . Try being a DENTIST ☠️

Arrie

Man,

I 100% believe what you say and I know like everyone who knows anything about cars that fuses just don't fall off by themselves.

But the bigger question for you is if this dealer did the service at all??? Have anybody looked at the oil after service? Does it look like it was changed?

If I had this happen to me as a minimum I would change the engine oil again and as it is so simple to do by sucking it out thru the dip stick tube I would do it myself. But that is just me.

B.S. can happen at the "reputable" MB dealer service. A few months back my car did not start, it cranked just fine but did jot fire up. I called the dealer I have been using and as it looked like it may be a fuel pump issue he quoted changing that for around $1000. I called another dealer and they quoted $490. Then when the car was fixed there was no need for fuel pump change. They told me the engine flooded and I needed a software update to fix that. This was done costing around $260 and when I again asked if I should have the fuel pump replaced just in case they told me NO. There is absolutely nothing wrong with the fuel pump.

The latter dealer now has my business.