After having someone back into our car, we opted to take our 2008 Acura TL to Stirling Pontiac Buick GMC for minor repairs to the front bumper. The job scope included painting the bumper. We brought car to Stirling on September 1st and picked up on September 4th at the end of the day.

Upon picking the car up, I noticed various bumps in the paint due to dirt drying in the paint. When I told the Manager, Bob Page, about the problem, he said to bring it in the following week to be wet sanded.

I gave the insurance check to Stirling and took the car home.

Immediately after leaving the body shop, I noticed a blue pen mark on the console in the interior that was not there when I dropped the car off. I took the car back and Bob was able to remove most of the mark.

After further inspection at home, we found a run in the paint, a small chip out of the corner of the bumper, and a couple other areas on the bumper that were missing paint. We also took notice of a minor scratch to the interior and that the interior was dirty from someone getting in / out of the drivers side of the car.

After speaking with Bob again earlier in the week, I brought the car in on Thursday, Sept 10th as planned. Rather than fix the problem that morning, he said he needed to completely redo the paint job and asked that I bring the car in the following week which I agreed.

My wife took the car in later that day after finding more problems with the car. While I was at work, she had noticed more scratches that showed up in the daylight. Although minor, we believe they were not there prior to taking it to Stirling. My wife was upset at yet another flaw found in the car and made it clear to Bob that we were unhappy with the job that was done.

After having the car looked at by another shop, I took the car back to Bob on Monday, September 21st to discuss the issue once again. I told him that I wanted to take the car to have it fixed at the other shop. The estimate totaled $500 and I asked Bob to pitch in half of the amount. He said he did not expect that to be possible, but would check with the owner.

The next day, September 22nd, Bob called me and told me that Stirling refused to pitch in money to have it fixed at another shop. He again admitted that the work done was of poor quality and that it was his fault. He again said he would fix the car. I then asked Bob if I was to bring the car back in, would he let me talk with the technician that would be working on the car. My intention was to ask the technician to do a better job. Bob refused to let me talk with the technician and said that either I work through him or not at all. I then called and left a message with the owner, but have not yet received a call back.

My position on this matter is that 1. Stirling did a very poor job at repairing our car and that we are worse off than before we brought the car in. 2. I am leary of taking the car back to the shop after finding several other problems with the car. 3. Understanding that the first option is to have Stirling try to fix their work, I am willing to accept half of the cost of having another shop work on it. 4. If I was to take the car back to Stirling, why does Bob refuse to allow me to ask the technician directly whether he can do a better job? In earlier conversations Bob had claimed he wanted us to believe that he was going the extra mile. In our last conversation, he did not appear willing to back up that statement. He also understood up front that the car was very important to us especially since we just bought it a few months before.