I’ve gotten several emails in the last few days from the local Toyota dealer congratulating me on my recent purchase of a Highlander. No, I didn’t buy one. In fact, I’ve never bought a Toyota… well, except for the VERY used pickup we bought in 1984 and sold a year later. Nor have I ever been to this Toyota dealership, altho we did buy our Sonata from the adjacent Hyundai dealer. One of the emails included the VIN and invited me to sign up for a variety of on-line Toyota stuff (I don’t know - I didn’t read that carefully.)
My name isn’t that rare or unusual, but the email I use is part of mail.com, and it isn’t that common. My email address is first-initial-last-name@, but the emails address me by my correct first name - even spelled the way I do (there are several variants.) And that’s what concerns me - too many coincidences.
I emailed the dealership via their website, included the VIN, and pointed out that I wasn’t the buyer, and I asked them to straighten things out. I got a survey in one of the emails, and I replied that I had not, in fact, made the purchase. And just to be sure, I pulled my credit report to see if there was an auto loan in my name. Whew - nope!
Spousal unit suggested maybe the Hyundai and Toyota dealers share a database - I think the same person owns them both because they’re called “Team Toyota” and “Team Hyundai” and they share a parking lot. I don’t recall giving that address to the Hyundai dealer, but maybe I did. So if they had a common data source, maybe they clicked the wrong line on the pull-down?
Am I fretting over nothing? Or is this part of a new scam? Or maybe in a parallel dimension, I do, in fact, own a Highlander? I’m willing to entertain other theories.
I bought a Hyundai Sonata in May 2017. A year later my wife bought a Ford C-Max from a Ford dealer in the same ownership group. (The dealerships are actually in separate facilities across town from each other.) About six months ago, mail and emails about my Hyundai suddenly started showing up with my wife’s name on them. Including a “happy birthday” email on my birthday! So yeah, something got mixed up in a database somewhere.
Please, please let it be a big gift from a secret admirer. And any minute now it will be delivered with the big red bow, music, fanfare, champagne and a street party.
Please, I’m begging, let it be true!!!
(:D)
For years I’ve gotten emails from a dealer in upstate NY telling me it’s time to get service done on my something-or-other and after a while to upgrade to a new model.
Eventually got the name of the real owner but common enough in the region that I couldn’t figure out who it really was.
I have a not so common last name but there are some 300 or so in the US with that name. My Gmail address is first initial and full last name @gmail.com.
My address is all lower case and apparently some distant relative in Missouri had one all upper case. I don’t know why gmail accepted it but it did. I don’t understand the email protocol but apparently upper/lower cases are sometimes ignored because I get some of her email.
I began to get annoyed by the notices from a Ford dealer about my upcoming service scheduled for Tuesday. I tried responding to tell them that I am a GM guy and would not own a Ford car (trucks are fine) if they gave me one, still the notices continued. No response, no change.
So when I would get a notice to confirm my upcoming service I started to cancel the service appointment. Something came up and I can’t make that appointment. This apparently inconvenienced someone enough that I no longer get emails or service notices for that address. Sorry cousin, but it had to be done. Trans Am shuts down another Mustang, service.
Just a WAG, but maybe the database confusion is sorta deliberate…if you ever check your credit report, or do an online search for your own name, you may find you are associated with people and stuff that has some data similar to yours. Not identical, just similar. Not necessarily your name, but a part of an address, a street, or something that a computer program is using to make the association, however tenuous. And it may be difficult or impossible to find the common data used.
Example: I have found strangers associated with me because they lived at an address I once lived. Not at the same time, but sequentially, which isn’t something these programs check closely. There’s no possible connection between us, but the computer makes one, based solely on the address.
Remember there is no legal penalty for doing this, but there are potential rewards to advertisers. Accuracy is not important, but making an association can translate to dollars.
I started getting tons of emails for a Dodge Charger in Salt Lake City. Numerous emails and calls did nothing.
Then I got a confirmation for service and a rental car so I cancelled it. Got a follow up email confirming the cancellation. And two years in I haven’t heard so much as a peep from them.
I was getting something similar, but the name was different on MY car! Just for service notices and stuff. The address was right, just the name was different. I called several times to get it fixed, but nothing ever came of it. Then after I sold the car, I stopped getting notices.
SiriusXM is convinced that I have a Toyota Tundra. I don’t have a Toyota anything, and several emails and one call hasn’t convinced them otherwise. Best I can figure is somehow the Toyota owner entered my email address into their account at some point, and now our accounts are linked and I get emails and snail mail offers for him.
Sorry. I really hoped he’d say “Well, you’ve got the VIN and the emails, I guess it’s yours. We’ll deliver it sometime Friday!”
We bought our first new car, a Buick Encore. Now we get flyers for Buick Encores in the mail. “Golly, hon, we like that new car, right? Why don’t we just get another couple Encores?”
(It’s like Amazon showing you more and more dishwashers after you’ve bought one. “Hey, let’s install a second dishwasher in the kids’ room!”)
I got calls back in the early 80s from creditors for a neighbor based on living in the same apartment building, the address was something like 18425 Random Street and 18425 Random Street Rear [I was in an old carriage house, the apartments were in the house and had letters ] so they did some kind of white pages look up for the same address, but the jackass had gotten the loan without the absolutely correct address, either they left the letter off or the form they filled out didn’t have enough space [?] SO I got calls for about a month demanding to speak with this guy and they didn’t believe that we didn’t live together … so I simply cancelled my phone service.
We took our truck to the local Chevy dealer for a recall. They regularly send us good deals if we want to trade the truck in on a new one. Such a deal…
