I noticed that there are a lot of recent reviews online about the customer service declining at the napaonline.com website and at the local NAPA stores. An average review score of like 1.8 out of 5, particularly regarding returns or warranty replacement. What is your experience? Has there been some sort of coporate change with NAPA recently?
I haven't ordered from the online site in several years, but still use the local store. The service has never been particularly "friendly" at the NAPA store like it was at our now-closed Car Quest store, but OK if you know what you need. Prices of course are sometimes high compared to other places like Advance Auto or O'Reily, and especially compared to Rockauto.com.
In looking recently at napaonline.com, it seems that website has changed a lot from a few years ago. When you select a vehicle and then search for the part needed, it sometimes gives you a huge list of parts, most not specific to that vehicle. Or in a generic part name search it gives you all sorts of parts that simply have a word similar to one word in your search. Also, a lot of the important parts specs have disappeared from the individual listings. The old website worked much better and had complete part specs.
There are also several complaints about napaonline.com not honoring the NAPA warranty, as well as local stores not honoring the warranty any more for parts purchased at different local stores. That was never a problem years ago at the local stores if you had the dated receipt. Parts purchased from napaonline.com apparently must be returned to them directly for warranty replacement, not a local store (unless you used "ship to store.")
I've personally noticed some weird stuff at the local NAPA store, like small parts that before came two to a box, such as a bearing grease cap, now only have one part. One review I saw mentioned the same thing.
Unfortunately, Car Quest (NAPA's main competition) was mostly wrecked when they were bought by Advance Auto, and many of the stores were closed (our two local stores are gone.) I believe you can still get Car Quest parts through Advance Auto, but the service you got with local stores was excellent (with a nationwide warranty) and they supplied many local mechanics, including with their Tech Net support network. Now most of the stores are gone and none of our local mechanics display the Tech Net membership sign any more. That type of Corporate takeover is what people call "vulture capitalism". I read that something similar happened in the Cabela's hostile takeover, where many employees lost their jobs.
I haven't ordered from the online site in several years, but still use the local store. The service has never been particularly "friendly" at the NAPA store like it was at our now-closed Car Quest store, but OK if you know what you need. Prices of course are sometimes high compared to other places like Advance Auto or O'Reily, and especially compared to Rockauto.com.
In looking recently at napaonline.com, it seems that website has changed a lot from a few years ago. When you select a vehicle and then search for the part needed, it sometimes gives you a huge list of parts, most not specific to that vehicle. Or in a generic part name search it gives you all sorts of parts that simply have a word similar to one word in your search. Also, a lot of the important parts specs have disappeared from the individual listings. The old website worked much better and had complete part specs.
There are also several complaints about napaonline.com not honoring the NAPA warranty, as well as local stores not honoring the warranty any more for parts purchased at different local stores. That was never a problem years ago at the local stores if you had the dated receipt. Parts purchased from napaonline.com apparently must be returned to them directly for warranty replacement, not a local store (unless you used "ship to store.")
I've personally noticed some weird stuff at the local NAPA store, like small parts that before came two to a box, such as a bearing grease cap, now only have one part. One review I saw mentioned the same thing.
Unfortunately, Car Quest (NAPA's main competition) was mostly wrecked when they were bought by Advance Auto, and many of the stores were closed (our two local stores are gone.) I believe you can still get Car Quest parts through Advance Auto, but the service you got with local stores was excellent (with a nationwide warranty) and they supplied many local mechanics, including with their Tech Net support network. Now most of the stores are gone and none of our local mechanics display the Tech Net membership sign any more. That type of Corporate takeover is what people call "vulture capitalism". I read that something similar happened in the Cabela's hostile takeover, where many employees lost their jobs.
