The Threat of a Lawsuit--Use It Judiciously

When a firm’s customer service department doesn’t respond to complaints for weeks, or months, it should be a matter of serious concern.

But while no consumer’s patience should be inexhaustible, neither should it be nonexistent. Raising a big stink is hardly justified on the first day, or maybe the first week. And certainly, it is unwise to try to intimidate a businessman on first contact by threatening a lawsuit.

Sometimes, after an appropriate time and repeated frustration, it’s worthwhile to say something like this: “I don’t want to sue. I hate lawsuits. But I would have to consider suing as a last resort, if you continue to stonewall me.”

My own occasional experience shows this works. Happily, I’ve never personally had to file a suit.

My story today is about a Los Angeles trial lawyer, Ronald S. Parker and his dealings with General Motors area reps and Los Angeles Chevrolet dealer Dean Wilkinson.

When a new Corvette that Parker obtained for his wife turned out to have a nonfunctioning headlight system, and the part to fix it wasn’t available, Parker launched a massive campaign for attention.

Unable to get immediate satisfaction at the dealer, La Brea Chevrolet, he went to GM area representatives and even to GM management back East.

With his investigative skills, he obtained the private home number of a GM area service manager, Joel Gorski, and called him.

Parker now acknowledges that dealer Wilkinson is “probably” right when he suggests that had he never called anyone, the car would have been repaired just as fast as the eight days it finally took.

Wilkinson explains that there was a problem with a number of headlight assemblies on new cars and 200 replacement parts General Motors sent to Southern California proved defective, too. Until new parts could arrive, there was, indeed, a delay, he acknowledged.

Parker, however, lost little time threatening to sue.

“In the event we do not resolve our differences amicably, it is my intention to retain independent counsel to pursue all legal remedies,” he wrote Wilkinson on Feb. 4.

Later, he refused to take the Corvette back, after it was repaired, unless Tim Ferasin, a GM market area manager, agreed to write a memo to his dealers setting out a new customer service policy.

Ferasin wouldn’t do it. And Parker finally backed down. “I’m not a hard guy,” he told me. “The car is brand new. We love the car.”

So a suit is not in prospect?

“I have no real interest in filing any lawsuit, but I may do it, because I want them to grieve,” said Parker. “I could cause them trouble at no great expense on my part. But . . . my temper has died out.”

Everyone exaggerates now and then. And Parker embellished a bit when he first talked to me, calling the Corvette “a $70,000 car.”

Having unleashed a barrage of letters and phone calls, he explained, “If you pay $60 for a hotel room, you’re not entitled to gripe if it’s no good. But when I paid for a $70,000 Corvette, I was entitled to expect better service than if I had bought a Cavalier.”

But dealer Wilkinson didn’t agree. “We treat all our customers the same, regardless of what kind of car they buy,” he said. “GM believes that everybody should be treated well. That was my problem with him from the beginning. He wanted to be treated special.”

Besides, Wilkinson informed me, this was not a $70,000 car. Parker is actually leasing it, and the total payments, including the $12,000 starting payment, will be $48,000.

“OK, it’s a $50,000 car,” Parker agreed. “Does it make any difference?”

Dealing with this irate consumer certainly was not a pleasant experience for either Wilkinson or the GM area reps, Gorski and Ferasin.

“He was excited the first day,” Wilkinson said. “He went nuts afterward.”

Parker said he felt constrained to let the dealer know that the last GM product he bought was a Cadillac in 1985 and that until leasing the Corvette, he patronized Ford and Mercedes-Benz. These producers, he told Wilkinson, provided much better quality and service.

Wilkinson said nonetheless he tried to be cordial, sending flowers to Parker’s wife.

“They were attractive and very much appreciated,” Parker acknowledged. But, he said, no one at the dealership would tell him when the part would arrive.

The reason, said Wilkinson, was that they didn’t know.

Ferasin, the market area manager, said, “We are really, really making an attempt to satisfy our customers. We have learned that is the way to sell cars.”

But, he indicated, Parker was unusually hard to please.

Although the car had been at the dealer’s only a few days, he said the lawyer had initially told him his car had been laid up in the shop for a month.

“Even when I talked to him the last time, he was refusing the car,” he recalled. “I told him we were willing to pay compensation [for the eight-day loss of use], but he would not be receiving the memo to dealers he wanted.”

Ferasin observed that GM already has a procedure whereby those who are dissatisfied with a dealer response to a problem may call a GM customer assistance department on a toll-free line, which can initiate an investigation of the matter.

Gorski, a 30-year GM employee who often meets with such complainants, said, “I have e-mail, fax and cellular ways to reach me. Anyone can leave me a message . . . I treat them all equally.

But in Parker’s case, he said he had told him he thought calling him on his private line at home was “a little out of line.”

Parker said Gorski had been “very upset” about finding his unlisted number.

Well, this was a real donnybrook. But was it necessary?

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Ken Reich can be contacted with your accounts of true consumer adventures at (213) 237-7060 or by e-mail at ken.reich@latimes.com