Canadian Tire

Truly appalling experience at this garage. Inexperienced techs and a lame garage supervisor.
I have been to many garages but I have never seen one this poorly run. The collective attitude of all the staff at this garage is like that of some bureaucratic government department, like the drivers licencing office. Nobody at this location wants to do ANY work and they show it openly. I had a flat tire during a snow storm and was towed here after calling ahead and receiving assurances that they could accommodate me and change the flat tire.
The 17 year old tech was totally unable to remove my lug nuts to change a simple flat tire. He told me he had tried and it was impossible and that they can’t do it and walked away leaving me sitting in the waiting room stunned. This is after being towed there in a snow storm. I literally followed him into the garage and made him show me his tools. Then, I selected a socket myself, placed it over the first lug nut and instructed him attach his impact wrench to the socket and remove the lug nuts!
And what do you know, they came right off.
If I had not been so assertive, I would have ended up sitting outside in a snow storm with a flat tire!
I would not recommend dealing with this garage unless it’s a last resort and you absolutely have no other choice and keep a very close eye on the techs working on your vehicle.

I am a frequent shopper at this location and have always had great service on the retail side of things. This week we needed to get our drive clean test doen and had had it done at a different Canadian Tire automotive center in the past and decided to make an appointment here. I called at 1030 am and made an appointment for 1pm. Mike on the line said it would get right in. I got to the store at 1250 pm, well ahead of my scheduled appt time. There was a line waiting to get to the counter and I did not get to the counter until 1:14 PM. I said at the counter, I hope I didn’t lose my appt as I was waiting in line for 25 minutes… the girl at the counter said… no one asked if anyone had an appointment in line? They are supposed to she said… I said nope… Strike one I thought to myself… what is the use of making an appointment if the store does not have or does not execute a method of separating the walkins to the clients that made an appointment… strike 2… I then asked how long it would take… she said about 1 hour… she said that the tech was busy… I thought to myself. they probably had a car in my appt slot… and even if I am next in the queue, I am SOL… She said she would call me when the car was done… The girl at the counter was smart enough to ask if the number on file is the correct number… I said no… call my cell… she made a note on the file and said she or someone would call me as soon as the car was ready and she apologized for the delay…
Long story short… My car did not pass the emissions due to an engine light on… apparently they tried to call 3 times…
Fact there were ZERO calls to mobile
Fact there was 1 call to my home number from Canadian tire
Fact the supervisor said they tried to page me in store 3 times
Fact one manager said it takes 20 – 40 minutes for the test…
Who said I was available to be paged… it was on the workorder to call my mobile
Why was I still in the store at 2:37pm .
What really disappointed me was how everyone in management seemed to dismiss my issue of poor communication and service… the only one that seemed to give a crap was the service rep at the counter, she and I both knew that the others in the store had F’d up… but her and I also knew that the owner operator of the auto shop at Canadian Tire obviously doesn’t give a crap about 1 customer spending 33 dollars on an emissions test …
People can deal with delays… people can deal with mistakes… people can even deal with bad news about their car… what they shouldn’t have to deal with is staff lying to protect their own @SS
I will; never go to this auto ctr and possibly the retail store ever again

Customer service is definitely lacking in this location, especially in the returns area. I recently bought a set of tire lug nuts from here, in which I was told I could return if it wasn’t the right size. It was the wrong size and went back and bought 5 sets to return the one which didn’t work out. While I was returning the one set the cashier made the mistake of putting the set which I returned back in the bag, I didn’t notice this til after I changed the tires back home. So I went back to give them back their merchandise and it was a different cashier at the returns desk. I explained what had happened, in which she didn’t understand and got defensive. So I explained it again and she finally got it… no, thank you have a nice day… no, really appreciate you being so honest and taking the time to drive the merchandise back here… nothing. To sum it up… Don’t expect customer service in this area of the store, because it won’t happen.