Even when temperatures are beyond what we like to deal with as humans, you probably won’t expect your car to melt in the sun. Just the idea of this sounds fanciful, but a woman who currently leases a was stunned that this happened to her and that her dealership refused to fix it.
Texas-based Brunella Pratesi (@officialgabooboo), about how the SUV and how parts of the plastic trim inside the car had warped and melted, much to her dismay as well as her surprise.
As you would expect, Pratesi took the car into a Mazda dealership to see if they would fix the problem under warranty. A move that made perfect sense, as anybody would be unhappy to learn that parts of their car had melted, but the response she got wasn’t what she had hoped for.
According to Pratesi, she was told that Mazda could not fix the problem because the dealership said they saw this happen all the time. She even tagged Mazda USA in her video to try and get an answer for the problem.
What Happened to the Mazda CX-30?
In her TikTok video, Pratesi explained how two years ago she had switched from a Honda to a Mazda, and that led to her getting the lease on the CX-30. “I got a lease because I heard that Mazdas were great cars. They were reliable. Their customer service was wonderful,” she said in her video. “And I even recommended Mazdas to two of my friends, who went to the same dealership as me and got cars there,” she added.
It was then that she had friends tell her that the side of her car looked like it had melted. The components in question were the side mirror, rear quarter cladding, and the trim running down to the front, which was very deformed. This was all on the passenger side, so Pratesi hadn’t actually been able to see it while she was driving the Mazda. But according to the TikTok user, the plastic had completely melted.
After contacting the dealership, the lessee was told that this was not covered under warranty. The dealership said that this happens all the time, and she was then asked if she worked in downtown Dallas, where reflections from the sun on the buildings can hit cars and affect them. But she doesn’t work downtown, and the car is always parked either sheltered or where reflections can’t damage the SUV.
The TikTok User Was Clearly Frustrated
Image Credit: gabooboo/TikTok
Clearly, Pratesi was left frustrated by her dealership experience. “Mind you, cars are supposed to be made well enough to be able to handle being in the sun,” she said in her video. The dealership actually just called the problem ‘wear and tear’ while they also quoted a repair bill of thousands of dollars. Given Pratesi had leased the car, these were the sort of bills she was hoping to avoid.
Some commenters on the video suggested that Pratesi could use the Texas Lemon Law to get the car fixed. This covers purchased and leased new vehicles in their first 24 months or the first 24,000 miles, although there has to be a warranty-covered defect that impairs the use of or market value of the car. The plot thickened further when a service advisor at Honda said they had seen similar plastic-melting issues, but the company always absorbed the cost on behalf of the customer. Pratesi said Mazda USA is now investigating the issue and that she had opened a corporate case.