OK, Dan and Patrick, just for you guys I copied the original post and then a few follow-ups that answered some questions to give you the picture. And, Patrick, no it is much worse than a crappy
oil change. And, the last post below about the exchange between her and the Jiffy Lube guy is priceless.
On April 8th, my sister-in-law took her Honda Pilot to a Jiffy Lube for an
oil change. When finished, the Jiffy Lube employee pulled her car out of the bay and went and got her from their waiting area to pay. They routinely leave the cars running with the driver's door open... While she was paying, a guy jumped in her car and took off. Turns out this scumbag had tried to jack a truck earlier and police were watching him and took pursuit. He lost control of the car and plowed into a storefront at a high rate of speed. Luckily, there was only one minor injury from broken glass.
So, Jiffy Lube is not taking responsibility in any way so she'll have to pursue that and the store is filing suit against her because she's the owner of the car. Worst
oil change ever...
She was in the process of paying with a credit card - will have to ask her if they finished the transaction. We're hoping that Jiffy Lube will take responsibility for costs her insurance doesn't cover. Since they left the car running and she was still in the process of paying, in my opinion they were technically still in possession of the vehicle. However, I'm not a lawyer so don't know how this will play out.
There were 6 or 7 people in the store that the guy plowed into and reportedly it was the post you can see in front of the car that stopped it from hitting them. If it had been left or right of that post, would have been much worse.
My sister-in-law said she was at the Jiffy Lube for quite a while after this occured giving the police her statement and waiting for someone to come to give her a ride home. She said Jiffy Lube continued to leave cars running unattended while they went inside to have the customer pay! I've never been to a Jiffy Lube but if this is their corporate procedure, this incident should change it. She's talking to a lawyer as she should be.
Tarren, as Terry said above, virtually every other car service place I've ever been to keeps the keys and hands them to you at time of payment. A business is responsible for your vehicle while in their possession and they have insurance for that. My guess is that the employees at this Jiffy Lube are not particularly sophisticated and that once someone higher up gets involved, they'll use their insurance to compensate her. I don't know if Jiffy Lubes are corporate owned or individually owned franchises. Either way, I have to believe they are liable here.
This is still in early stages, so she's spoken with a lawyer but hasn't incurred any costs yet and plans to go through her insurance first as much as possible. As far as police using Jiffy Lube to bait car thieves, that wasn't the case. This guy tried to jack an F-150 earlier that day unsuccessfully and police were already tailing him (must have been in an unmarked car since he apparently didn't know it). He arrived at Jiffy Lube on foot and police were watching. Not sure if he targeted Jiffy Lube or if he just saw the opportunity and jumped on it. He's 20 years old and has had brushes with the law in the past, so no surprise there. I'll post an update to this once things take a direction. Still lots of confusion since it just happened.
Well, thought I'd post a quick update on this mess. My sister-in-law appeared before a grand jury to testify as to what happened. She learned that everyone is suing her since she owned the car. The store lost a lot of merchandise in addition to the building damage and, of course, they are closed until repairs can be made. That can't even begin because they are waiting for structural engineers to declare the building safe to enter. A customer that was cut with flying glass is also suing (minor injury, but still has a case).
To answer Charles' question regarding did she pay for the oil change, no - she was getting her credit card out of her purse when the cashier said "some guy just stole your car!" She looked up to see her car speeding out of the parking lot. Everyone in the courtroom laughed out loud when she told them what happened next. Somewhat in shock over seeing her car stolen, she said "Oh no, what am I going to do!" The Jiffy Lube guy said "Don't worry, we'll give you a ride home"