Ken is facing a $13,000 repair bill on his 2007 Chevy 2500 diesel truck, because the full factory warranty the dealership assured him it had was voided by GM. The reason: GM says at some point in the past, someone put a chip in the truck that doesn’t match the info GM has, so they don’t have to service it. The problem for Ken is that the dealership didn’t check for this chip before it sold the truck to Ken, and Ken didn’t know about this loophole when he bought it. In fact, he says he bought it about a year and a half before GM implemented this rule.

Here’s his story. If you don’t have time to read it, the conclusion is he recommends you request an Engine Calibration Snapshot performed before you buy any used Chevy, so you’ll know whether you really have a warranty attached to the vehicle.

Also, although Ken is in Canada he writes that the truck came from this country and that “the problem exists in both.”

This has been an absolute nightmare and I want to let everyone know what could happen if you buy a used GM vehicle:

In May of 2008 we bought a slightly used 2007 Chevy 2500 diesel truck with just over 12,000 km’s on it. The dealership told us that it had full factory warranty, which is 5 years or 160,000 km’s.

In May 2010, our truck broke down with 70,000 km’s on it and we took it to a GM dealership. The first thing they did was what they call an “Engine Calibration Snapshot”. When the results came back, they stated this truck has had a chip or program in it. Then a warranty block was put on our truck voiding all warranty. We did not install a chip in it, nor is there currently a chip in our truck.

After several phone calls to GM they stated the problem was between us and the dealership we bought it from. The dealership said they had no way of finding out that a chip was ever installed and passed it back to me dealing with GM. I asked GM if there was any type of time or km stamp on when this chip was installed they said no. They can’t tell me when or who installed the chip, but yet they refuse to honour my warranty because there was one installed at some point.

Again making call after call asking dealerships if when they take a vehicle on trade in do you do an Engine Calibration Snapshot and every dealer told me NO they do not. I can not believe they can sell a vehicle claiming it has warranty without knowing if GM will honour the warranty or not.

To make things worse GM only implemented this rule about 10 months ago. I bought the truck 27 month ago being 17 months before this rule even existed. So even if our dealership did a complete inspection they would not have done an Engine Calibration Snapshot. This is not a rule in which dealerships are required to do today.

This is not fair for GM to put warranty blocks on vehicles based on an engine calibration snapshot that for all we know they may have screwed up. GM can’t (or won’t) tell me when the code was changed. They won’t say when the chip was supposedly installed! They want to make a this a rule and yet their own dealers don’t check when trading in or selling a used vehicle. How many others out there think they have warranty and actually don’t? Everyone who has bought a vehicle in the past 2 years should have this Engine Calibration Snapshot done and if it has been altered they should demand their money back before they need warranty coverage they don’t have. If you are going to buy a used vehicle you must DEMAND TO HAVE AN ENGINE CALIBRATION SNAPSHOT DONE BEFORE YOU PURCHASE A USED CHEVY VEHICLE. If it doesn’t match what the factory has, YOU HAVE NO WARRANTY COVERAGE, regardless of what your dealer tells you. Then again what is stopping them from erasing these so called codes just to further make a profit…
Now we are stuck with $13,000 bill for new engine, on a truck with 70,000km’s.

If you or someone you know is about to purchase a used car, please forward this to them and spread the word.

Want more consumer news? Visit our parent organization, Consumer Reports, for the latest on scams, recalls, and other consumer issues.