Pep Boys

Although I haven’t done business with these crooks for years, I still categorize them as a company that sucks.

They did some work on my wife’s car in 1988. She was 8 months pregnant. She called me from a gas station one dark, winter evening after picking the car up to tell me that it was making some strange noises. I arrived a short time later and, after taking off the front-right tire, I found that the wheel was very nearly ready to fall off. The dumbasses hadn’t tightened the big nut that holds the whole wheel on.

I made the mistake of frequenting them again in 1989 to have my car checked out before a cross-country drive from NJ to TX. They were really the only gig in the small town where I lived at the time. One of the things I specifically requested they do was to change the fan belts; “the fan belts.” Remember that.

When the car was ready, a friend drove me to pick it up. I paid and we headed back to his place for a few drinks. It was two days before the drive, and I worked the next morning at 5:30am. Then I the thermostat on the dash shot up to stupid hot. I pulled over, popped the hood, and saw that two of the three fan belts were torn to shreds. Only two of the three belts were new. So I had my car towed to my friends house where I stayed the night, worked a 12-hour shift the next day, and then went to visit the Pep Boys idiots. Their excuse for not changing all the fan belts was that I didn’t specifically say to change all the fan belts. I explained to monkey boy that changing the fan belts means all of them, and besides, I didn’t say change only two of them. I had some choice words for monkey boy and his manager, and got my belts replaced for free.

I’ve never been to Pep Boys again, and never will.