There is nothing in the record that suggests that plaintiff’s (Lamson’s) particular act — refusing to report to work because unlawful trade practices might occur there — enjoys high social value.
Oregon Supreme Court Justice W. Michael Gillette in his opinion finding that whistleblower protection does not apply to “business practices that pose no threat to public health or safety.” The business, in this case, being the selling of cars. Kevin Lamson was fired from Crater Lake Motors in Medford, Oregon, for (allegedly) refusing to participate in a sales campaign led by Real Performance Marketing that (allegedly) used deceptive and misleading tactics. According to Gillete’s opinion (by way of the AP/Google), Lamson’s suit “did not involve interests of sufficient public importance to support a claim that plaintiff (Lamson) was discharged for fulfilling an important societal obligation.”
There’s also the angle of, whistleblower protection is supposed to keep those “blown” on from wrecking the blower’s life. Somehow, I don’t think a negative work review from a car dealer is going to equal “you’ll never work in this town again”.
Also, if you don’t agree, bring in the press or someone, sounds like this guy slept in and then came up with justification after-the-fact (note that all he did was skip work, hardly a whistle-blower).
Someone blew the whistle on used car dealers’ unethical behaviour? Oh my god the secret’s out now!
In other words, you can’t get whistleblower protection for “revealing” what anyone with a little common sense already knows.
No wonder car sales people are viewed lower than whale shit. Just always remember!
If you get a flyer in the mail about free trip, free anything else do not go. These tent events or “Special Sale” events are a real life version of the movie “The Goods”.
Trust me I’ve seen guys like this in action and it is not funny.
The Toyota dealership I worked at did 4-5 of these a year and I would always keep an eye out for my regular customers and tell them to go home and come back next week. These guys don’t show up to make hundreds, they heart the thousands!
That graphic is a nice primer on auto advertising. Consumers should place that next to the ad they are reading so they don’t get confused. of course, every auto ad ever has used at least some of those terms.
In this day of C.A.R.S. rebates, most print ads not only use the sleazeball tactics shown in the sample ad, the advertised prices often reflect the full $4,500 maximum allowed by the program…in addition to military and “customer loyalty cash” rebates, and probably the “born-on-a-Tuesday-in-a-month-containing-an-R” rebate.
For years I’ve worked for a stable, conservatively-run bank that sticks to the rules, and it really bugs me when I see dealer ads that ignore Truth-In-Lending, which has been around since 1968. A financial institution could never get away with that.
The first time I dealt with used car lots was when I was shopping for a used XJ (Cherokee for those of you in Rio Linda). At one fine small town lot, the office had pictures of Jesus all over the walls. Not that I have a problem with that, but they were using Jesus to make their customers think that they could trust them! Ha ha! The first thing they asked me was the old line of “So how much do you want your payments to be?!” I replied, “I’ll pay cash.” The other great line was that they had someone on their way to buy it, unless I wanted to offer them more for it!
I then ended up catching the owner in a lie about the brakes being replaced when obviously they needed to be serviced as it hardly came to a stop, so I promptly left.
But really, new car dealers aren’t much better. They just have more people to try and wear you down.
I cannot believe it has only just come to light!
Not that I have a problem with that, but they were using Jesus to make their customers think that they could trust them!
I go out of my way to avoid businesses with this type of “interior desecration,” as I like to call it. It’s no different than slapping a Ferrari logo on the hood of Yaris…deep down, the soul inside doesn’t match the label on the outside.
Back in the mid nineties I read Remar Sutton’s “Don’t Get Taken Every Time” guide to buying cars. It was an enlightening read. I realized the mistakes I had made in the past–mistakes I’ve avoided since. The book has apparently been updated to reflect changes brought on the industry by the Internet.
The ironic part about the way cars are sold, is that I don’t buy cars as often as I would if the experience weren’t so unpleasant. Of course, missed sales are impossible to quantify . . . .
I had a friend who worked several years in various car dealerships as a salesman. He said the movie “Suckers” is pretty close to what goes on behind closed doors in all of the dealerships.
Not that I have a problem with that, but they were using Jesus to make their customers think that they could trust them!
Also the bigger the US flag (or more numerous) is another bad sign
There is nothing in the record that suggests that plaintiff’s (Lamson’s) particular act — refusing to report to work because unlawful trade practices might occur there — enjoys high social value.
You could intrepret this to mean that the Oregon Supreme Court recognizes that it is widely known and accepted that car dealers operate a fundamentally dishonest business and customers and employees should assume that deceptive practices WILL take place when you work or do business there.
Isnt this a dog bites man story?
Maybe the voters of Oregon will pay close attention when they next elect judges to the Oregon Supreme Court, but I doubt it.
Perhaps the current administration should hire Real Performance Marketing to sell health care reform. Wait, I think they already did.
@robstar: “Suckers”?
@lahru: “The Goods”
More info please. IMDB had no info. Meanwhie I’m putting “Used Cars” into the DVD.
(and +1 for Remar Sutton’s book. Best I’ve read on the subject of not being fleeced).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OV5e7WFp3m4
Scene from Suckers – make sure no kids are around or keep the volume low. NSFW
@Bearadise:
It doesn’t get better than that. Made my day!
Saw an ad in a local weekly here yesterday promising 0% financing on 2005-2009 used cars. Small print at the bottom said “minimum 740 FICO SCORE”. Credit score to those lest familiar with jargon.
That gets the number of Americans eligible for the deal down to 7 or 8. An exaggeration, but even before the recession, 740 was significantly above the median.
Funny. My ex and I went to purchase a car a few years back, and we gave the dealer a check because we thought we might buy the car. We decided to not to buy it, and the dealer did not want to give me the check back. I got the check back and never returned. And dealers wonder why people hate to go car shopping!
The funny thing about those deceptive ads is that THEY WORK. The whole point of auto ads is to get people into the showroom, nothing more. My old manager used to run all sorts of B.S. ads, which we as salesmen hated because there really was no way the numbers added up. People would come in and get pissed and tell us “I knew this wasn’t real!” which always made me think “but you came anyway..”
Finally that manager got fired.
So if you read an auto ad and it seems too good to be true, obviously it is. There is no such thing as free money.