.png)
Camper I have waited. I have tried to bite my tongue. Mainly because I didn’t want to admit defeat. I also didn’t want to fall into the “I told you so” category. I wanted to believe we really did do the research on the manufacturer of the camper we were purchasing. But when it comes down to it, the “Camping World” customer service reputation holds true.
We purchased a 2021 Forest River Wild Wood travel trailer from them 6 weeks ago. We saw a few things that we questioned I will go ahead and list them to keep things from getting out of context.
Shower walls not connected or sealed. Lots of “black sludge” on the back right slide (driver side). Same slide not coming all the way in. Door being difficult to open. Floor extremely squeaking. Stove not connected to the counter top. Seal around the sink coming out. Back slide wouldn’t slide “all the way in” - until you hear the clicking sound and they are flush Same with the main living area slide - was never completely flush.
We were told that the slides not sliding all the way in was because where they had the camper sitting was not “completely level” preventing the slides from working properly. We are virgin campers. We had no idea that what we had found to be an issue- would ultimately end in us being completely ripped off and in a devastating situation.
So. We took the camper home reassured that these things were nothing more than “normal” and that they were “minor details” that would be corrected once the camper was “100% level”. We own a remodeling company and know that there is ZERO chance of the camper being %100 level no matter how much we put into it! But also thought “maybe it’s just really off and it will be ok”.
I NOW KNOW WE SHOULDN’T HAVE LEFT BUT THIS IS THE FIRST CAMPER WE HAVE EVER BOUGHT!
So. We get home two days before we leave to go to the beach. We park it. We get back from vacation and plan to take our camper out for the first adventure and realize that one of the stabilizer bars doesn’t have the “set screw” so I call our sales person and they assure us they will call us once they get them in. (Never heard from her).
First trip was pretty ok. All of the same issues we had when driving it off were still there. But nothing too terrible.
Second trip out- we can’t for the life of us get the camper level. We tried everything. It was “a little off” and the same issues that were present in purchasing the camper were present. (Again should have been a red flag).
EVERYTIME we turned the microwave on the breaker would trip. All we had pulling was AC and two push lights. Extremely frustrating.
So fast forward to our 4th... FOURTH camping trip. We parked our camper in the FLAT PARKING LOT TYPE SITE OF A LOCAL CAMPGROUND. We had trouble leveling the camper and once we finally did get it level, we went to open the door. We couldn’t. It was jammed shut. We noticed that above the door there was a bow in the outside of the camper.
The door was lodged in for some reason. Once we finally got it open, we opened it to see the screen hanging down from the top of the screen door. The sliding door inside the screen door near the handle was also lodged. We spent the Entire weekend dealing with the door. Not being able to close it at all. Not being able to open ANY of the interior doors at first. Then once we did WITH THE CAMPER PERFECTLY LEVEL we were no longer able to close any of the interior doors.
The bunk house door was about 1/2 an inch off no chance of us getting it closed. The trim around the inside of the entry door had popped out and the screw wouldn’t even go back in. The wall above the door was “popped out”.
It was a Sh*t show from the beginning. - now. At this point. I was LIVID. The water was leaking both out of the faucet and under the sink. The fridge kept cutting off randomly and the outdoor kitchen fridge has come dislodged and Dumped EVERYTHING as soon as we opened the exterior door. NOT THE FRIDGE DOOR BUT THE CAMPER DOOR so it had dumped glass everywhere that we had to clean up and around $60 worth of groceries had gone bad.
My 15 year old slept on the “jack knife” couch under the top bunk, he ended up in the floor because the bed is SO out of level. AGAIN THE CAMPER WAS AS LEVEL AS IT COULD BE.
We called camping world on Saturday and said basically this is all that’s wrong there is a massive issue something needs to happen. We were told “we will pass it to service and they will figure something out.” - Sunday we go to leave. I had everything cleaned up and ready to go. We go to pull in the back slides and the worst thing ever happens. You have to close the door to the bunk house for the slides to come in. As I am sliding the first one in I have no trouble (this is the one with the out door kitchen) I go to slide the other one in on the driver side and it drops off and goes into the ceiling preventing us from bringing it in any further and causing the entire sliding mechanism to shut down.
It’s 100°F outside and we are three kids deep trying to figure out what to do. We have some neighbor campers come to the rescue and we FINALLY MANUALLY GET THE BACK SLIDE OUT THEN BACK IN. THEN HAVE TO MANUALLY OVERRIDE THE SLIDES TO GET THE REST IN.
THE BREAKER BOX IS LOCATED ON THE BUNK HOUSE. Meaning that both slides have to be OUT for you to access it. Which ultimately doesn’t matter because after sending someone back in the hole, there is no breaker or anything else for the slide. (We probably should of known that but common sense tell us ‘maybe it’s a breaker that tripped once’s the thing went into the ceiling’ we were wrong).
We get it together and get it hooked up safely. (2.5 hours later) we get to camping world. At this point we need to see some sort of resolution the issues we have just gone through with our children and to figure out what we need to do for the next 4 weeks that we have things scheduled.
I was upset. I was angry. I was hot. I was basically broken at this point. The PISS POOR customer service we received from “Shaun” I think is his name. He made sure to let us know that he was the manager and he was dealing with everyone and front to take care of them.
After an hour of us waiting to talk to him he came over to the table (you know the break room tables and chairs they have set out for their rotation of “valued customers”) he got a piece of paper and pen and started to write down everything that we had trouble with.
Then, once we started listing EVERYTHING OUT LOUD he insisted that we “walked through the camper” - long and short we got out there and he decided he had heard enough once the bead of sweat hit his brow and he “needed to refer this to service so he didn’t need to write anything down with out them there” - we knew he was done. We could tell.
I said “we don’t want this camper back. This is crazy. There shouldn’t be so many issues. There has to be something else you can do.” To which he replied “THEY ARENT GOING TO TAKE THIS CAMPER BACK!” I said “I’m sure they won’t because they sold us a lemon!! I know they don’t want it back!” ... then.. he says they need to get someone in service to look at it and figure out what needs to be done. And we needed to “give them a chance to fix it”. But said “I’m the only one here and I am backed up! We have other people waiting and I need to take care of them too. I’m doing the best I can.”
To which I replied “YOU HAVE ALREADY TAKEN OUR MONEY AND WE ARE HERE NOW!! Why are we not important!?”
He immediately changed his point of contact to my husband. And gave him a card with his number. My husband and I spent the next 30 mins getting everything out of the fridge. SOAKING wet with sweat. Shaun also said “we are a month out on service but I will get you in quickly.” To which I responded (bitterly) “ if you are selling everyone the crap you sold us I have no doubt you are out that long in service!” Salesmen walking around everywhere and not one person offering to help!
We left it there with the understanding we would be hearing from someone. I called twice Monday and heard back from Jill in service. NOW let me tell you. This is where the tables turn for me with camping world.
Their service department. At first she did try to let me know how they could basically fix anything. And I kept telling her I felt like this was a “factory problem” it’s structural. It isn’t just a couple of problems.
She kept on. Tuesday I went to camping world to get the rest of our stuff out, she had them pull our camper out so I could get to it (the guy on the forklift drug the jack in the front on the ground then parked it which I have on video) I was getting my stuff and the SWEETEST guy ever, John in service, came to help us get into it. But as he was manually taking out the main slide the manual drive literally broke off. Couldn’t get it out. Which means I couldn’t get anything out of the bathroom with out then coming down and taking apart the bench outside of the bathroom door.
I sat there in tears as they took apart my camper to get to the things we needed. Jill was amazing. So was John who VERY CAREFULLY took it apart. We picked it up a week later and as we were walking through there were still several things that needed to be fixed. We were assured it was safe. We slid the slides out to check them and something made a horrible noise. It was something falling off the slide. Underneath. We took pictures and talked to Jill. She said send them to her she would take care of it.
We went camping, while at the camp ground the awning snapped. Completely snapped. The awning went through the storage compartment door. I called to speak to Jay who said that he can not do anything about it. Got smart with me several times. And said he had “16 units coming in that day so I couldn’t bring it”. This is the only day that my husband could take off of work to get it there. He was completely rude.
I called the “if you aren’t happy I’m not happy number” and spoke to someone saying they were calling from his office. I only pray that conversation was recorded he was TERRIBLE. talking over me. Claiming “camping world didn’t break the camper it’s a manufacturer problem and they are going to try to fix it but they are understaffed and I needed to get over it being their fault because it wasn’t.”
He yelled at me several times. Didn’t care what I had to say but after me hanging up on him twice he made sure to call back and continue to yell at me.
It has been nothing but problems. I have been in contact with the manufacturer who agreed to let me take the camper to someone else. Camping World had the camper on two occasions and have YET to submit ANYTHING to the warranty department.
There are still black marks and tons of junk down the sides of all three slides. Screen door wasn’t fixed at all (which broke when the frame broke above the door) They wrote everything up and said most of it “couldn’t be duplicated” and they were literally going to leave it half fixed.
We are furious. Buddy Gregg now has our camper in the service department and has in ONE DAY submitted it to the warranty department to proceed with fixing the issues. There is so much more. But at this point if they feel like it is a MANUFACTURER ISSUE. The right thing to do would be for CAMPING WORLD TO BUY IT BACK AND GET US IN SOMETHING ELSE THAT IS WORTH THE $30,000 we paid them! And THEM DEALING WITH THE MANUFACTURER!
Instead, we are going to be screwed out of camping, continuing to pay for a camper we can’t use, and missing out on everything we have been looking forward to with our family.
Name: Jessie Keep