Cole County EMS of Jefferson City, Missouri, was recently met with a months-long headache due to a warranty preventing them from having a local independent shop perform a repair on their ambulance, reports KRCG 13.
The issue first arose this past June, when Cole County EMS’ newly purchased ambulance began having electrical problems. Having a maintenance agreement with the family-owned Donnie Braun and Sons Auto Repair, Cole County EMS took the vehicle there.
Technicians promptly diagnosed the ambulance as having a faulty control module—however, due to the vehicle still being under warranty, they were unable to carry out a repair.
That’s when Cole County EMS Chief Eric Hoy needed to take it in to Joe Machens Capital Ford. It took three weeks for the dealership to complete a diagnosis on the ambulance and complete a repair; however, it broke down again before they could even return it to Cole County EMS.
“When they finally diagnosed the problem, they informed us they recreated the problem and sent the ambulance back to us around July,” Hoy recalled.
A bad alternator and battery were then determined to be the problem, leading to the dealership replacing those components and returning the vehicle. Unfortunately, for a third time, after 6,000 miles, the vehicle experienced the same issues.
The ambulance returned to the dealership, where it remained for another three weeks. Hoy said that it wasn’t until pressure was applied on the dealership by Cole County Commissioners that he began to see progress made on the vehicle’s repair.
Jim Evans, president and chief operating officer of McLarty Auto Group, which owns Joe Machens Capital Ford, said that dealership technicians had difficulty in being able to diagnose what was actually wrong with the ambulance, along with delays in parts.
It wasn’t until the ambulance came back again that the service department had to reach out to the ambulance upfit company. All this time later, they were told the same thing Donnie Braun and Sons Auto Repair diagnosed in the first place: a bad control module that was specific to the ambulance.
At last, the ambulance’s faulty control module has allowed to be replaced. As of this last Thursday, the vehicle is finally back in the possession of Cole County EMS.
