In early 2004 my new Saturn abruptly caught fire as I was driving home from an orchestra rehearsal. I pulled the flaming carriage over, got my instrument out, and ran away just before it exploded. You can check out that part of the story here.

This was, to put it mildly, an unexpected occurrence.

The first thought I had (after the voices in my head stopped shrieking) was:

WHY?!?

What possible reason could there be for a one-year-old car to catch fire and explode? The car went from fine to on fire in a matter of minutes, with only a ‘check engine’ light to serve as a warning.

I guess I missed the part in the owner’s manual explaining that ‘check engine’ actually means ‘impending explosion’ in the world of Saturns. Maybe a warning light with a little guy running away and waving his arms would have been a more appropriate indicator. I’ll have to pass that suggestion along to the good folks at Saturn.

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I woke up the morning after the car explosion still wheezing from inhaling all of that black smoke the night before. I didn’t exactly have a game plan as to how to handle the situation. They don’t teach you how to deal with this in Driver’s Ed, and I hadn’t a clue about whom to call or what to do.

Hopefully this tale will serve as an example of what NOT to do.

First things first–where was my car? My last glimpse of it the night before was when the tow truck hauled its sad, charred frame off down the off ramp of the expressway. No one told me where it was being taken the night before.

I was sure that everything in the car was destroyed, which was a drag. To this day, I will still look for a particular CD or book, only to realize that it was in my car the night it went up in flames. My extra tux coat, all of my college music history books (I had been preparing a lecture that week), my favorite music stand from high school, the bass parts I was bowing for the Lake Forest Symphony, a sizable pile of Evanston Public Library audio book sets—all of these little losses hit my mind in a rush, incapacitating and overwhelming me.

Also, I had a gig to get to that night, and no wheels whatsoever. I needed wheels. Right away.

The first call I made was to my insurance company. The format of this call was one that would be repeated to many different people (auto insurance, homeowners insurance, Saturn, rental agencies) over the next few weeks.

“Hello, Farmers Insurance. How may we help you?”

“Hi—my car caught fire and exploded on the highway last night!”

“Oh my gosh!”

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The stack of paperwork grew with every call I made. Each agency needed a copy of x, y, and z, and many of these forms were in the car when it exploded. I needed to get form x and fax it to person z at agency q, and all of this had to be done as soon as possible. A fast, complex flowchart began to clog my mind, the if/then equations bafflingly convoluted.

The problems quickly began. My auto insurance would only cover $30 a day for a car rental, and only for three days. Any car that would get me to a gig would cost much more than $30 to rent, however, and I doubted that this would be resolved in such a short time.

My cries of injustice fell on deaf ears at my auto insurance agency, and I knew that I was going to be spending some serious cash just to get around for the next few days.

I rented a white Chevy minivan for $100 a day (with tax and fees…there are always fees, right?) and breathed a sigh of relief. Having wheels (even if those wheels were going to be quickly draining my meager freelancer budget) gave me a feeling of returning normalcy after the previous night’s explosion, and I knew that I’d at least be able to get to gigs and other work while I dealt with this mess.

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Auto insurance only covered the cost of the car, not any belongings in the car, so I had to call my homeowners insurance. The same song and dance I had with my auto insurance was repeated—shock and sympathy followed by crippling amounts of paperwork. Receipts for incinerated items were requested (which were, of course, nowhere to be found) and the bureaucratic gears continued to grind.

I made a pathetic trip to the Evanston Public Library, clutching the ash-smeared box of one of the many audio book sets that melted in my car.

Same song and dance:

(Jason speaking in hushed library tones)

“Hi—my car caught fire and exploded, and all of my Evanston Library tapes were in the car. I rescued this set [lifting up blackened box] but left one tape in the player of my car.”

The librarian, after consulting in the back for a long while, brought me my bill, which totaled hundreds of dollars.

“Check or cash is fine.” She said.

I wrote a check from my rapidly dwindling account and headed off to deal with the incinerated Lake Forest Symphony parts that I had left in my car.

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As I was driving around, taking care of all of the post-explosion busywork, a little voice started whispering in my ear. I didn’t pay attention at first, but it got louder and louder until I actually started to hear the words it was whispering:

Recall…recall…recall…recall…recall……..

Recall? Wasn’t there a recall on this car for something or other recently?

A knot formed in my stomach as I arrived back home. Now convinced that there was in fact a recall, I began furiously digging through my files. I finally found what I was looking for:

Oh crap.

__________

What I experienced resembled the most extreme version of events described in this letter. The wording of this letter suggests a process of car failure, with fire as an unlikely and extreme result of the failure process.

For me, it was:

Car OK – – – > check engine light – – – > boom – – – – > car on fire – – – > car explodes

All within the span of 15 minutes.

Was my problem the same as the recall problem? Well, the Saturn corporation was never able to conclusively say, since there was nothing left of the car when they hauled it away. The similarities of their description of the recall and my experience are close enough to make this highly probable, although what happened to my car was more sudden and the most extreme of descriptions on the recall notice.

Notice that the recall letter states that there were not sufficient parts available to service the recalls. They told me to wait.

I remembered that I had, in fact, tried to take care of this recall. I had called my area Saturn dealer (you’ll be hearing more about them later). I actually remembered the conversation quite well. I had asked about the recall, and they had said that they didn’t have the parts in and to check back later. I distinctly remember them telling me that the recall was for a problem that was very unlikely to occur, and their dismissive attitude (an attitude that I often noticed at this dealership) regarding the problem made me think that it wasn’t anything to worry about.

They said there were no parts to fix it. They told me to wait.

About three weeks before my car exploded, I got a letter from the Saturn Corporation stating that parts were now available and that I needed to call my local dealership and set up an appointment.

This letter came in January 2004, not in September 2003.

I called my friendly local Saturn dealer and was told that it would take a full day. They would arrange for a compact car rental for the day, but I had to foot the bill on anything bigger.

I had no free days whatsoever for several weeks, and I wouldn’t be able to fit my bass into a compact car. Paying my own money for a rental upgrade because of something that was Saturn’s fault was like sandpaper on my eyeballs, and I decided to wait until I had a free day. I had called, not gotten a helpful response, and was planning to wait a few weeks until I had a free day to hang out at the dealership.

Bad decision.

You know what else is a bad decision? A Corporation with quality control that allows cars that spontaneously catch fire and explode out on the road.

___________

A few days passed, and I was getting nowhere with my auto insurance company. They had still not sent out an investigator to the south side Chicago lot that held the remains of my car. A total loss could not be declared until this happened, and I couldn’t really do anything except rent this van with my own cash until that happened.

Also, my car payment was coming due. Did I have keep making payments on a car that no longer existed? I called my lender. I’m sure you can guess the response:

“Continue making all payments!”

Lovely. I was hemorrhaging money from all directions and saw no resolution on the horizon. This process dragged on for such a long time that I actually ended up making two more payments on the nonexistent car.

___________

The giant annual bass festival that I ran at the University of Wisconsin – Whitewater was only a few days off when my car exploded, and I had the stress of organizing this event (probably the most complicated thing I was involved with at that point). I spent my moments between calls to Saturn, my lender, and my insurance companies fielding calls from parent wondering how to get to the music building on campus at the university.

I drove my big Chevy rental van up to Wisconsin for this event in a state of total stress and fatigue. I wanted to crawl in a hole and die, not interact with parents and students. I normally had a blast at this event (although it was always very tiring), but it was about that last thing I wanted to deal with that week.

Of more pressing concern was my upcoming trip to Memphis, Tennessee to perform with the IRIS Chamber Orchestra the following weekend. Would I still be in the van at that point? If you, I’d have dumped almost $1000 into it in rental fees, and that plus my car payment and other expenses was causing me great concern. This was clearly an unsustainable situation, and my insurance company’s foot-dragging on looking at the charred remains plus their draconian rental policy was not helping my mood.

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The following Monday my insurance company had still not sent an agent to look at the remains of my car.

No agent = no total loss = no new car = still must rent Chevy van + car payments = broke bass player

Something snapped in me. I was not going to take this anymore. I didn’t know what I could do, but I had to do something.

I decided to take a trip down to my friendly Saturn dealer and tell them a little story about exploding cars.

Maybe it’s silly, but I felt betrayed by this dealership. They had sold me the first new car I had ever owned, and that this car turned out to be a hideous flaming death trap angered me. Also, I felt like it was the ultimate in bad customer service. Selling someone a new car that explodes after only one year is just plain old bad PR no matter how you cut it. I thought that they would want to “do right by me” and help me out. Someone out there had to be willing to help me out and potentially illustrate Saturn’s willingness to turn the world’s most dissatisfied customer into the world’s most satisfied customer.

Going to Saturn ended up being probably the worst possible idea. My starry-eyed optimism about the beneficence of the Saturn Corporation would be quickly squashed, and my naïve optimism would turn to frustration and resentment.

__________

I gave customers a good show when I arrived at my friendly Saturn dealer that Monday morning. I walked right in to the showroom and started checking out a newer model of the car that I had just watch burst into flames, melt, and explode a few days before. I wanted to talk to the salesperson that sold me the exploding car, but he had recently left the dealership, so I scouted the room for available salespeople. I smiled inwardly, enjoying the thought of foisting my bizarre tale upon the sales force.

“Can I help you?” asked a salesperson.

“Yes!” I said in my boomy teacher’s voice. “I had a negative experience with Saturn this past weekend. You see, my new Saturn burst into flames while I was driving home last week. I got out of it and ran away, but it ended up exploding.”

“Oh dear. I am so sorry…” she said.

Folks looking for a new Saturn that morning were now paying attention to the conversation, listening intently, apparently interested in my story.

I described how the panels of the car melted off, gesturing at the gleaming new model in the center of the showroom. I pointed to the backseat where the flames erupted, remarking that I’m glad that I didn’t have a child strapped in a car seat back there.

I’m sure I alarmed the sales force and may have even dissuaded a few people from buying Saturns that morning, but beyond this I really had no plan at all. I was just looking for somebody to talk to that could help me with my situation, and I thought that the dealership I had bought the original car from the previous year would be a good place to start.

Here’s the thing—what do dealerships do? They sell cars. They don’t help people that have had their car explode, unless it is to sell them a car.

And that’s what they did.

Before I knew it, I was taking a new (old stock from 2003) red four-door Saturn VUE out for a test drive. The sales person told me that they would get me the same deal that I had before—0% financing with the same payment as the previous car. That sounded fine to me. I didn’t want to sue Saturn, and I didn’t want a protracted, complicated thing. I just wanted my pre-explosion life back.

In retrospect, I never should have gone in to the Saturn dealer that day. I was looking for someone to work with to fix the problem. I’m not sure what I was looking for, but I was in no state to go car shopping. As it turns out, Saturn had no interest in giving me a deal, and I ended up getting the exact same deal that anyone off the street would have gotten.

I did the test drive in a haze, vaguely realizing that I had left the talking phase and entered the car sale phase. They asked me for some money down to hold the car until my insurance adjuster from Farmers declared the previous car a total loss. I wrote them a check for $500.

What an idiot I was! I had just committed to buying another car from Saturn. Honestly, I don’t know what I was thinking, and if I could go and do it again, I would never have walked back into that place in a million years.

The insurance adjuster finally checked out my incinerated auto the day before I was to leave and drive down Memphis to play in the IRIS Chamber Orchestra. I was puzzled as to why it took someone over a week to look at one melted car but happy that the logjam was finally cleared. I went over to Saturn to finish up the paperwork on a new car.

The problems began quickly. I had agreed to buy the big red car I had driven earlier that week, but there was a small, 2 door purple car waiting for me. All of the purchase papers she presented me were for this little car. Puzzled, I told my salesperson that this is not what I had agreed to purchase. She dashed off into another room, doing who knows what.

Fifteen minutes passed…then thirty. Finally she came back with papers for the car I had driven before.

Enter “The Goober”. This is what I’ll call the finance guy from my friendly Saturn dealer. That this squinty-eyed sleaze personified all of the negative stereotypes associated with car salespeople became clear within the first few seconds of conversation.

“What’ja do, wrap your car around a tree? Heh, heh.” He grunted.

“Uh, no. The car that your dealership sold me caught fire and exploded.”

He ignored my response and showed me all of my “financing options”, telling me that I could have 3.8% financing for 36 months, 4.2% financing for 48 months, etc.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “The deal was for 0% financing.”

“No. Absolutely not,” he said. “There is no 0% financing on any new 2005 models.”

“The DEAL was for 0%,” I reiterated. I was not making this up.

“No. These are your options.”

The Goober conferred with my salesperson for a decent length of time in the other room. I didn’t like the way this was headed. My car explodes, I come to the company from which I bought the exploding car from in good faith, and then they send The Goober to nickel-and-dime me.

The Goober came back.

“I can’t offer you 0% financing. Understand? I can’t do it. But what I can do is lower the price to bring your payment to $435 a month.”

I had been paying $383 a month, and I had been told that this was what my new payment would also be.

I should have walked out right then and there. But I didn’t. I’m a chump.

I agreed to the amount. He kept working on the papers, grumbling about the ‘deal’ he was offering.

“Let’s see,” he said. “You put no money down, so…”

“Wait… I actually did put money down. I put $500 down when I was in here the other day.”

“Well, I don’t have a record of that,” he said.

What a sleaze! Was he incompetent, or was he trying to cheat me? I had check my bank account the previous day, and my check from Saturn for $500 had been deposited. I told him to talk to my salesperson. He did so and finally came back, grudgingly agreeing that I had put that money down.

“Well, we don’t have a record of it….” He insisted.

I may be a chump, but this guy was a world-class jerk and total sleaze.

_____________

The typical new car rigmarole followed. Gap insurance? Sure. Dealer detailing on the sides? No thanks. Oh wait, too bad, it’s already on the car. $200 extra.

Finally the Saturn people gathered to do their applause thing as I got in the car. I remember being really into this Saturn tradition when I first bought the car, but fiery visions of my car melting down the freeway and The Goober cackling over the whole scene made me considerably less enthusiastic.

My salesperson handed me the keys.

I looked at her, dumbfounded.

“Where’s the clicker?” I asked?

“Oh, this car doesn’t have power locks,” she said.

What?!?!!?

Had I committed myself to buying a car that had no power locks? How could I have done this? Did the car I test drove the previous week not have power locks? This car cost $26,000! Could someone sell a car for $26,000 and not have power locks?

Not only did the car not have power locks, but it had no power windows. I cranked down the stupid crank on the stupid window of my stupid no-power-lock $26,000 Chumpmobile and drove off. I’m sure that the sales force did a little victory dance at having unloaded this expensive clunker as The Goober went back to his office to torture puppies or do whatever it was he did back here when he wasn’t exercising his incompetent malevolence on explosion victims.

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As I set off the next morning for Memphis, I noticed another unpleasant thing about the Chumpmobile—it had no cruise control. Every car that I had driven since 1992 had come with cruise control, and I got to discover the joys of keeping my foot on the gas pedal during that long trip.

I also realized what a total pain it is to have an SUV without power locks or windows. If I wanted to open a window, I had to get over there and crank it manually (which didn’t work so well while driving), and I had to individually lock and unlock each door on this thing. Bass players usually have to get in to many doors with each trip, and I found myself locking and unlocking four or five doors every time I got to a gig.

I couldn’t believe how stupid I had been to not only have gone back to Saturn, but to have been then suckered into buying a MORE expensive car that was worse in every way from my old car (20 minutes after getting on the freeway a horrible rattle started up inside the passenger door which would continue for the rest of the time I drove that car). I repeatedly smacked myself in the head as I drove to Memphis as punishment for my stupidity.

I began to remember a policy of Saturn’s…..what was it? 3000 miles or 30 days………was that it? Could I possibly RETURN the Chumpmobile?

I did the math and realized with glee that I would have driven only 2700 miles by the time I got back to Chicago from Memphis. I decided to test that policy and return the Chumpmobile.

________________

I returned the car when I got back to Chicago, making an appointment with Saturn for the morning I got back from Memphis. They initially told me that this program was discontinued, but I pulled out my paper, and after much heated discussion in the beck I was proven right.

I went back for another meeting with The Goober.

“So, didn’t like the car?” he said.

I was not going to debate this guy for one second more and remained as silent as possible. They took the old car back and put me in a floor model 2004 VUE for less money, and this is the car that I am driving today.

I should have taken the money and headed over to Toyota, but I felt guilty about putting 2700 miles on the other car and decided to stick with Saturn.

Did I mention that I am a chump?

_______________

About a month after I got the 2004 VUE, a recall notice came, warning that turning left too fast could make one of the axles collapse. I called Saturn immediately and got the same song and dance that I got with the exploding car.

“The parts aren’t in.”

“It’s an unlikely risk.”

“We’ll let you know.”

I found myself taking left turns at granny speed, much to the annoyance of my fellow drivers.

This time, however, I kept calling the dealer, and they finally scheduled a service appointment.

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The final insult to injury from Saturn came in the spring of 2006. I was driving home from teaching in my two year old Saturn when the dreaded ‘check engine’ light came on. The car refused to shift out of first gear, and I drove the 25 miles back to Evanston at the speed of a golf cart. I took it in the next day to my friendly Saturn dealer, who informed me that the transmission was totally wrecked. A rebuilt transmission was not possible (they claimed) due to the newness of the car, and a replacement transmission would cost $5600. I was about 1000 miles out of warranty, so I was informed that the cost was mine to bear.

I asked the service manager if there was any possible way that I could get a transmission for less, and he said that a new transmission was the only option, and that the $5600 price was set in stone. He said that there was absolutely no way that they could cover the cost of this repair given that the car was out of warranty.

Something in me finally snapped, and I called the Saturn Corporation. I told the first person on the phone that I have been having some very unhelpful experiences with Saturn in general and my local dealership in particular, and I wanted to know if there was someone to whom I could discuss my concerns. I was passed through a couple of people and finally spoke to a very nice woman from the corporate office. I told her my whole tale of woe, from explosion to local dealership shenanigans to the failure of the transmission and $5600 bill. I explained that I did not try to sue Saturn—in fact, I went right back to the same dealer and bought a new car. I told them that I felt let down, that my whole family drives Saturns (they do, but they quit buying them after mine exploded!), and that I was disappointed in my experience and simply wanted to share this with Saturn.

The lady from corporate called me back the next day and told me that if I paid for the labor (about $1100) Saturn would cover the rest of the bill. I agreed to this arrangement.

Later that day I got a call from my local Saturn dealer inquiring whether I had called the Saturn Corporate line about their dealership. I told them that I had done so. The same guy who told me a few days prior that there was “absolutely no way” to cover the cost was singing a different tune, telling me that “his dealership” would cover the parts if I would cover the labor. I didn’t say much besides setting an appointment to get the repair done.

$1100 poorer, I drove out of the service garage for my friendly Saturn dealer and have never gone back since. I hope to unload the car the first chance I get.