Buying a new vehicle is a major decision, and when you do it, you expect things to go smoothly.

What would you do if you signed a contract for a new car, but when you went to pick it up, they didn’t have it and tried to sell you one that was much more expensive?

That is what happened to the buyer in this story, so he sued them for his deposit back and proceeded to leave them hundreds of bad reviews, tanking their rankings.

Check it out.

Dealership pulled Bait and Switch – It cost them over $50k

The city I live in has extremely inflated vehicle values compared to the surrounding areas.

If you buy the same car from a neighboring state, you can often save $3-4k without really trying.

When I buy a new vehicle (which happens every 3-4 years), I always look in the surrounding states to compare pricing.

This story happened about 5 years ago – and the malicious compliance is still ongoing to this day.

That savings is worth a little traveling.

I was shopping for a new car (brand new) – and found one that matched my specs about 12 hours away in a neighboring state.

It was priced about $5,000 below comps.

After looking up flights, there was a 1 way direct flight that took me to their local airport for around $175.

Plus the gas to drive back – I was looking at a total of maybe $275 to save $5,000.

Absolutely worth it in this situation.

That’s easy enough.

I reached out to the dealership – negotiated a bit – and agreed on a price.

I let them know that I would be flying in to pick up the car – and offered to pay in full in advance of the flight.

They told me that all they needed was a $1k deposit – and that the car was considered mine.

We signed a contract and I paid the deposit.

And then I booked the flight (for 3 days from then).

Things can never go easy.

First sign of things gone awry:

When I showed up at the airport, the dealership was supposed to pick me up.

This had been arranged in advance.

A quick phone call later – and I grabbed an uber to take me the 20 miles to the dealership with the promise of them covering that cost.

No big deal either way.

Second sign of things gone awry:

When I showed up at the dealership, the salesman I had been speaking with asked me if I wanted to walk the lot with him to look at a few cars.

Yes, cars. Plural.

Questioning what he meant by that, we walked into the lot to see these “cars” that he was talking about.

Were these some special type of gold inlaid, full self driving, full self flying, amaze-mobiles?

No. They were not.

How can it not be available?

When I point blank asked to see the car that I was buying – the one with VIN XYZ listed in this signed contract with a deposit on it – I was told it was no longer available.

The salesman offered to show me similar cars – which would have been fine were we able to come to similar terms on pricing – but all of these cars outrageously priced (think 2k over MSRP – instead of $5k under MSRP).

(Important note for later: There was never a mention (or any paperwork, signage, etc) of any incentives for giving 5 star reviews.)

Fast forward 2-3 hours.

Yeah, this is a scam for sure.

I am now convinced this dealership never had this specific car on the lot – and that this was 100% a bait and switch gone wrong.

The dealership was unwilling to sell me a similar vehicle at a similar price to our negotiated one (we were over $5k apart) – and were unwilling to pay the flight costs for this bait and switch scenario.

A heated discussion ensued between myself and the GM – where he told me to “go ahead and leave a bad review” – but that I wasn’t getting any “free” money from him.

I took an uber to a nearby hotel and booked a flight back home for the next day.

Total cost? Around $750.

Cue malicious compliance:

This dealership had an average Google rating of right around 4.5 stars and around 400 total reviews.

Pretty solid for a dealership.

Don’t mess with a guy who has time on his hands.

That night, while I was sitting in the hotel room, I had some time to burn.

I spent a couple of hours creating new email accounts just so that I could leave multiple reviews for this dealership.

All said and done, I had left around twenty 1 star reviews over the course of that night – and then sort of stopped caring about the reviews.

At this point my focus shifted to recovering my lost travel expenses.

A few days after getting back, I sent the dealership a demand letter for $750, which they promptly ignored.

Since we had done the original contract (with the deposit) in both states, I was allowed to file a small claims suit in my state – which I did.

That was easy.

The dealership never showed up to court – and I received a default judgement for $750. (I did collect that, by the way. It took a few certified letters – a few phone calls – and about a year – but I did get a check for $750.)

As you can imagine, I was still not a happy camper.

What they had done was wrong on so many levels.

Those are some good friends.

All of my friends knew the story of how I was bait and switched – and the fact that I flew to the dealership on a one way ticket only made it that much worse.

They had all left a bad review or two – but nothing more than a normal mad customer.

Cue malicious compliance (long term):

I don’t know how it started – or how it ended up lasting as long as it has – but at some point I had some time on my hands and left a bad review for this dealership.

Just one. Not two. Not three. One.

You have to spread those out.

In doing so, I noticed that all of the reviews I had left right after leaving the dealership were gone.

Probably taken down for being “fake” or because I had left so many at the same time and the dealership reported them.

I wanted to make sure this dealership wouldn’t do this to someone else.

So the next day, I checked to make sure that one bad review I had just left was still there.

It was – and since I was thinking about it, I went ahead and created another account – and left another 1 star review.

Fast forward 2-3 years.

Persistence pays off.

It has now become a habit.

Every time I have a few minutes to spare, I create a new account and leave a 1-star review for this dealership.

Their current rating? 1.9 stars with nearly 3.5k total reviews.

I am personally responsible for at least half of those reviews.

They are trying to fight back.

When you open the dealer’s website, one of the large banners that flashes across the screen advertises $50 for a 5-star review – something about showing the review to your salesman to get a $50 visa gift card.

It has been this way since about a year after this bait and switch occurred – right around the time the 1 star reviews began to accumulate.

They should have just given him the car!

Assuming I am responsible for half of their reviews – and the fact that the dealership only has 3.5k total reviews – they have paid $50 per review for at least 1,000 reviews (likely more than that).

Meaning, they have implemented a policy to pay for reviews – have spent $50k doing so – and have still seen their average rating drop consistently since telling me to “go ahead and leave a bad review.”

They really got what they asked for! Great job sticking it to the scammers.

Let’s see what the people in the comments think of this.

This is a good idea.

It wouldn’t be legal in America either.

Those services take cash incentives seriously.

This is a great idea.

Keeping old email addresses is smart.

I’m surprised that this car company thought they could get away with it, but I bet they never expected the revenge to last this long.

Never mess with a guy who has too much time on his hands.

If you liked that post, check out this post about a woman who tracked down a contractor who tried to vanish without a trace.