Man Goes To Mercedes Dealership With Navy Federal Check And $10,000. Then He Goes To Carvana: ‘They Wanted A Copy Of My Degree’

Content Warning: Contains strong language.

Dealerships are often eager to make a deal since they have quotas to hit and commissions to make. So when a person walks in ready to buy with a pre-approval check and cash for the down payment, you’d think it would translate to a smooth deal.

But this man says that’s not how it went at all at this Dallas-area Mercedes-Benz dealership. He claims they discriminated against him for being Black and barely gave him the time of day. Here’s how he handled it and what viewers thought of the situation. 

Dismissed At The Dealership: Is It Because He’s Black?

"Park Place Mercedes On Lemmon... is the rudest & worst Mercedes dealership in the DFW Area. Y'all don't want a customer that looks like me apparently, so I'll respect it and take myself & clients elsewhere," the text overlay on a trending video reads.

In a video with more than 130,000 views, content creator Ken (@kiisedbyken) shared that he walked into a Dallas Mercedes-Benz dealership with a Navy Federal pre-approval check and $10,000 in cash, ready to buy an E-Class AMG. But Ken, who is Black, says that he felt mistreated by the employees, and he thinks it's because of his race.

"Y'all have made it so abundantly clear that y'all don't give a [expletive] about people's business that I guess look like me,” Ken says.

He says a colleague referred him to a salesman he calls Mr. Ronald after speaking with someone else about the car the day before.

"You were very rude; you were very dismissive when we walked up to your desk," he says.

According to Ken, the salesman offered no greeting and didn't say a word during the drive to a nearby detail shop to view the car.

"Not once did you say ‘Good morning,’ ‘How are you?’ ‘Would you like water?’ ‘What brings you in?’ The whole time he drove us back there to the car, it was a silent, awkward car ride," he describes.

When he asked about a discrepancy in the car's certification status and later asked for someone to appraise his trade-in, Ken says he was brushed off both times.

"I asked, 'I see the car is now showing as certified.' He told me, 'I don't know anything about that.' I asked if he could call somebody out to look at the trade-in. He told me no, I could wait until the other guy got out of his meeting."

Frustrated, Ken pointed out that as a credit repair business owner, he regularly refers clients to dealerships (five or six a week, he says) and had sent a client from Dallas to Houston to buy a car that same day.

"You didn't know I was a credit repair business owner, did you? You did not know that I feed clients to dealerships all throughout the week," he says.

He says he ultimately left and used the same Navy Federal check to buy a car through Carvana instead.

"It will be here next week. Carvana will be getting this good check from Navy Federal," he shared.

"Thanks for letting me know I'm not [expletive] in y'all eyes. The way I was treated, it gave very much elitist," he wrote in the caption.

In a follow-up comment, Ken added that the salesman never asked how he planned to pay.

"They did not know I had a pre-approval check. He didn't ask me how I was paying, he didn't care. When he refused to have someone look at my trade, that was it. I left, went to NW Highway NFCU and picked up the check, ordered from Carvana, got my haircut and went home."

How To File A Dealership Discrimination Complaint

If a customer believes they've been treated unfairly or illegally by a dealer, there's a formal process for it. 

For issues with an auto dealership specifically, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) recommends filing a complaint with the FTC, while issues involving an auto lender or a "buy here, pay here" dealer go to the CFPB directly. 

A complaint can also be filed with a state attorney general, and the CFPB advises keeping documents, messages, voicemails, and records of every interaction with the dealer in case they're needed later.

What Studies Have Found About Racial Bias At Dealerships

This isn't just a one-off complaint. A 2018 investigation by the National Fair Housing Alliance sent paired white and non-white testers, with the non-white tester always the more creditworthy of the two, into eight dealerships in eastern Virginia to request pricing and financing for the same cars. 

The investigation found non-white testers received more costly pricing options 62.5% of the time despite being better qualified and were offered fewer financing options than white testers 75% of the time. 

On average, non-white testers who experienced discrimination would have paid $2,662.56 more over the life of a loan than the less-qualified white tester in the same pair. It's worth noting this report is from 2018, so it reflects testing done at that time rather than current data.

A Real Lawsuit Over Similar Allegations

This kind of complaint has also played out in court. In 2022, the Massachusetts attorney general's office sued Jaffarian Volvo Toyota in Haverhill, alleging the dealership charged Black and Hispanic customers more than white customers for add-on products like paint protection and remote starters, according to the Miami Herald. 

The complaint alleged that, based on sales records from 2016 to 2018, Black customers were charged an average markup of nearly $1,500 and Hispanic customers $1,308, compared to under $1,000 for white customers, and that the dealership earned roughly $170,000 in what the complaint called "extra profits" as a result. 

The lawsuit accused the dealership of encouraging staff to apply "discriminatory, discretionary" markups without providing any training or written policy against pricing based on a customer's race, ethnicity, or gender. 

‘Park Place Been Nasty’

Viewers in the comments section did not seem surprised by Ken’s experience. Some weighed in with their own experiences, and others offered opinions on how Ken handled the situation.

“I went to Mercedes Benz Park Place and had a check in hand. They wanted a copy of my degree to sell me a car. I laughed and walked out,” a top comment read.

“They were rude and unhelpful to me and my husband in their service department. They’re the reason I did not get a Mercedes and went with Porsche,” a person said.

“The General Manager needs to hear about this,” another commenter wrote.

“When you don’t get greeted by the salesman you asked to speak to someone else immediately,” someone else suggested.

“I would have never gone back a 2d time,” another viewer said, referencing the fact that Ken said he’d had a previous poor experience at the dealership.

Motor1 reached out to Ken for comment via email and TikTok direct message and to the dealership via email. We'll be sure to update this if either responds.

 

 

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