Purchase 2007 RX8 with 10, 500 miles on Apil 11, 2009 with extended warranty for $1895 more.

Issues:

1. Warranty they wrote was invalid due to the company they wrote it with does not underwrite rotary engines. Money was returned to Empire from Interstate National Dealer Services, Inc NY on the basis that it did not meet their underwritting guidelines.

2. Violation of RSA 22:59b. OBII Emisions Testing. Empire Automotive and or its assigns, or employee's used a known passible vehicle for the emisions part of the state of NH Emissions test. Whereby they connect the passable car to the State monitored OBII Emissions Computer by comuter port and by exhaust gas monitorring device for the sole purpose of passing the car which they had sold to an unknowing consummer. The technician of Empire then keyed in the VIN number of the car that was sold and continued to test the Ghost Vehicle which was connected to the computer. By doing this the dealer has commited a direct violation of RSA 266 and I would urge you if you purchased a vehicle from Empire that you contact the State to see if your vehicle was properly tested or not.

Violation 1.
Empire never contacted me. I did not find out about the Fraudulent warranty until 4 months later when I came back from out of town business and received a registered letter from the warranty company. Empire refused to give me my money back though I had financed it through a local bank not Empire. They did offer to write a new warranty with another company and provide me a copy of a new contract. I never received the new contract as of Feb 2010.

Violation 2.
Feb 10, 2010 I was notified by the State of NH Department of Safety Division of State Police that the vehicle I purchased was never tested by Empire Atutomotive Group prior to them selling me that vehicle. Further, I have no gauruntee that it could pass emmisions. I promptly notified Empire of the sittuation and once they got back to me, 3 days latter, I informed them I had already been in touch with the States Attorney Generals Office and I was seeking to prosecute unless they refunded my money. RSA 266 is very clear that if any seller fails to disclose to any purchaser, prior to the purchase of the vehicle, that a vehicle can not or did not pass the Emissions part of the state vehicle inspection the Seller must REFUND all of the proceeds from the purchaser. This would include any title and doc fees. I worked with Empire through March 12th 2010 negotiating out the refund and return of the RX8 to them. I did allow them to retain the Title and Registration costs since I used the vehicle for 6 months, I keep it garaged in the winter, and would have had to pay that on any vehicle. Prior to the refund taking place I renewed the RX8's registration so I could have a 3rd party test the emmisions and I would later transfer the plates to a new vehicle that would replace the RX8. The vehicle passed once the 3rd party tested the vehicle.

I still wanted a refund for issues outlined in complaint 1, and 2. The matter of the exteded warranty, which was a direct breach of contract and invalidated the total contract on that issue allone. Rather then go to court I chose to leverage the more serious violation of OBII Testing and the fact that they Ghosted a test vehicle for mine. In fact, according to the State of NH they Ghosted 147 vehicles in this same manner. According to Empire some of the vehicles may have had their battery disconected and then reatached... This would render a test that would pass invalid until such time as the vehicle had multiple cold starts... for many vehicles this is 3 cold starts and about 40 or 50 miles driving total to reset the individual emissions system for each vehicle. Empire went on to inform me that they only did this for the benefit of the customer. Sorry I did not see any benefit in dealing with Empire Automotive Group. They turned a purchase of what was suppose to be a fun car for me to a nighmare... I did receive a full refund but I had to know the law and leverage it to my success. I had to contact the AG's office in NH and get in touch with a Mediation Group to begin the process, then I had to submit all sales docs and my complaint in writting and my requested resolution.

Out of all the bad things I can say about Empire and their business practices I can say that they did take my written complaint seriously and they did provide the requested resolution. However, since I deal with businesses based on quality of product and trust and they seriously violated the trust I could have ever had in them I felt I could not, would not, feel comfortable doing business with them ever again. I would urge you if you are thinking of purchasing a used car do not go through Empire Automotive Group. People can be allowed second chances but after my experience I started looking online about them and I see the complaints outnumber the congratualtion with them by a mile and a half... Unless you just like dealing with a lot of poor business practices and fixing a lot of issues that you are certain to have because of them and their poor business practices I would not go there for the time of day. I would be happy to speak with anyone regarding the matter or suggest possible was to resolve your matter with them. Please feel free to contact me at 603-548-3909 Cell.

Thanks,
Chris Andrews

Yes, I am not afraid to sign my name to build credibility with this complaint. I also have all the doccumentation to back everything I said here up. Empire should not be in business, but should they remain I would strongly urge them to change their business practices and greatly work on putting the customer first.