In June, we rented the 2016 REV Dynamax for a 2-week vacation trip to Yellowstone National Park. Due to COVID-19, we decided to vacation via RV to avoid public places along the way (like restaurants, hotels and public
restrooms/showers), especially since my 94-year-old mother was with us.
We started having problems from the moment we left. A few miles after picking up the RV, the side steps sporadically started going in and out as we were driving on I-4. We pulled off the highway, contacted the on-call technician, who told us to press a sequence of buttons to get the steps back in. This happened multiple times the first 2 days. The technician eventually said that the battery needs to charge overnight to fix it. The next problem - water was leaking into the RV. This happened the first night that we stopped at a campsite, connected the city water and turned on the water heater. The technician wasn’t sure what was causing the problem, but it was decided to use the water minimally to avoid additional water on the floor. The next day, we noticed water coming into the RV from the fresh water tank (without turning on the water heater and without the city water connection). The bottom line is that because we could not use the water heater, we had to use the public facilities to shower. We would only turn on the fresh water tank briefly to wash dishes or flush the toilet and then turn it off when done to prevent water from coming into the RV. Next, the generator would not start.
To summarize the problems over the two weeks:
(1) we never had use of the water heater (so had to use the public facilities to take showers),
(2) on the 4th day, we stopped using the side steps during the day (would only use them when we stopped for the
night) because sometimes they would not retract.
(3) on the 6th day, the generator stopped working,
(4) on the 10th day we stopped using the side steps entirely because when we wanted to leave the campsite in the
morning, they would not retract. Without the side steps, my 94-year-old mother had to be lifted in and out of the
RV each time from the passenger door.
We were in contact with their technician practically every day. The office gave us approval to get these problems checked out/fixed at RV repair shops. The multiple times that we had to stop to call the technician, along with the repair stops, took time away from our vacation. In the end, it seems that whoever was responsible for preparing and checking that everything was working properly on this RV did not do their job.
Even though their technician was aware of all of the problems, a couple of days before returning the RV, I sent an email listing a day-by-day account of the problems so they would have all of the information in writing.
After 3 weeks of pursuing them, we finally got reimbursed for the $753 for repairs that we paid for. They haven’t returned our pet deposit of $250. They offered us 3 days of compensation, but their math is off in their favor. We lost more than 1 day of our vacation getting repairs done to the RV so that hardly seems adequate. I left messages several times asking for the owner, Frank, to call me. After 4 weeks of waiting for his call, I realize that he’s not planning to ever call me, so this is my only way to communicate with him.