A woman claims that a sales person at a Bridgestone-owned Firestone Complete Auto Care location in Boise talked her into buying new tires because of a “federal law” that prevented her from getting her old one repaired.
The woman came into the store with a flat tire. When she spoke with the salesperson, he told her that her tires were seven years old and claimed he couldn’t fix them due to a federal law which said they were too old, according to local media reports.
The woman decided to replace all of her tires because of the safety concern he brought up.
“Yeah, I was in a bind and could have taken it somewhere else to get it patched,” the woman told Boise media outlet KTOI. “But to make me feel like there is a federal law that says my tires are dangerous, and I shouldn’t be on the road with them, that’s bad.”
In its response to KTOI, Bridgestone Retail Operations said, “At Bridgestone Retail Operation’s 2,216 tire and automotive service centers, we take the maintenance and repair of our customers’ vehicles very seriously. The experience [name redacted] had at our Boise location, with one store employee, was neither up to her standards, nor ours. We are happy to have reached a satisfactory resolution, one in which she was fully reimbursed for the cost of the new tires, which remain on her vehicle.”
Bridgestone Retail Operations also upgraded her tires to a 2014 model.
According to KTOI, Bridgestone Retail Operations told the news company that they have a policy of not mounting tires that are more than 10 years old. They can also choose not to repair a tire if it is too worn out, or doesn’t have enough tread.
