Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Discount Tire scam

I've been buying tires from Discount Tire for over 30 years and I'm real close to needing new tires. I got on their website to see if they had the tires I want and they didn't have them in stock but can get them in a few days. I was about to place my order when I noticed on my shopping cart that they will give a 10% veteran discount for "online orders only". All you have to do is create an account on the "ID.me" website and they will verify that you are a veteran.

Sounded easy enough so I created an account and made a huge mistake of entering my Social Security number. I knew I shouldn't have done it as soon as I entered it. Nobody these days asks for your whole SS number they only want the last 4 digits. I'd already screwed up so I'd go ahead and get approved for the discount and order the tires. When I input the branch of service and service dates the response was "No records found". So now "ID.me " has my name, address, telephone number, email address and SS number and I didn't qualify for the discount. I guess "ID.me" is paying Discount Tire a lot of money so can gather their customer's information.

I'll go in person to Discount Tire to see if they will give me the 10% discount in person. If not I'll just buy tires somewhere else. I had some problems with Discount with the last set of tires I bought anyway. Not a problem with the tires themselves but with poor service. I mean serous things like loose/missing lug nuts and over tightened lug nuts (stretches/weakens the wheel stud).

I signed up for ID.me several years back, so don't remember if I had to give my full SSN or not. There are several websites that use it to verify military service for discounts, and it always works for me. Just fyi. Maybe it takes a while for them to verify your service and it to work?

Just visited my ID.me account and had no problem. Maybe a mistake?

My current tires are Firestone. The tires have been excellent but nobody has beat Discount Tire for customer service in my experience.

How did Discount scam you?

Just a boomer overreaction, nothing to see here..

When I was sent to ID.me for something a couple of weeks ago, one of the methods was to click on "Have a USAA account." Makes sense because you have to be military to have USAA. I clicked there and in less than 10 seconds, it came back VERIFIED. Never had to enter any personal data.

Not true, you DO NOT have to be military to have USSA, all you gotta do is have someone in your family who is military. Shouldn't be that way, but it is.

They are great to deal with in my area. Excellent service. A buddy of mine bought tires at Costco then moved 80 miles away. I took him to discount tire to see what they would charge to rotate, rebalance, air them. They charge 64.00 ,16.00 per tire but that covers him for the life of the tires every 6k miles. They really act like they want your business.

By using a service that collects your personal information.

If you like fast service they're great. The problem with Discount Tire is that they hire a bunch of young kids, pay them very little and don't pay attention to what their doing. Anytime I have tires mounted, rotated, balanced or have a flat fixed at Discount I always check the torque on the lug nuts and the air pressure when I get home (I live 2 miles from Discount Tire). When I bought the tires I have now I only checked the tire pressure when I got home because my truck was bouncing. They had put over 80 psi in each tire. Two weeks later I was at Home Depot (right next to Discount Tire) and I noticed a couple of lug nuts missing. I went straight to Discount and showed one of the managers. He got a couple of lug nuts and a torque wrench. It turned out that NONE of the lug nuts had been torqued and most were just finger tight. They also have a habit of overtightening the lug nuts. I recently rotated my tires using my my new 650 ft. lb. Milwaukee battery powered impact wrench and I had to use a big breaker bar on several of the nuts. This has always been a problem with Discount because some of the kids get lazy and don't use a torque wrench like they're supposed to. Over tightening the lug nuts will stretch and weaken the wheel studs. I've heard of all the wheel studs breaking at once and a wheel coming off while you're driving. I'm putting new hubs w/ new studs on the front when I install locking hubs on my truck and will probably put new studs in the rear hubs while I'm at it.

I guess you've just been real lucky.

They claim that it verifies your veteran status instantly. I know when my crazy ex-wife threw away all my stuff I had to get my US representative John Carter to help me locate/get copies of my records and it still took a few weeks.

They do want your business and will sell you a warranty (which includes free flat repair. road hazards and balancing) for the tires on your new vehicle. The Discount Tire warranty for my new tires will be $129 per tire. The replacement warranty is only good for as long as the tire manufacturer's warranty (that's another thing to check out). I was reading about the BF Goodrich warranty for the tires I was going to buy and it said they will only replace one out of round tire on your vehicle if it goes out of round within 6 months of your purchase. After that it is the dealers problem because they should have corrected the problem that caused the first out of round tire. I'm not kidding about this. My new Chevy truck I bought in 2000 came with Goodyear tires and all of the tires got out of round including the spare. Guess how many Goodyear tires I've bought since them. I've been driving for 65 years and have never had a tire damaged by a road hazard. I've had only a few flats and one blowout. The tires I have now have only been balanced once and that was when I bought them. I think I'm going to save that $645 warranty (for 5 tires) and pay for flat repair and balancing when/if needed. I can rotate my own tires. I'll save enough to pay for the cost of my new spare tire. The tire warranty will hopefully cover manufacturing defects.

So for a recap, no scam. Just someone giving someone else their SSN voluntarily and then having regrets.

I buy tires from an independent tire shop locally owned and operated and don't give two craps about a military discount. I also make sure my tires say made in the USA on the side as well.

I found out last week that you can go to your local Texas DPS driver's license office with your military records and they will put Veteran & Branch of service on your driver's license. You have to schedule an appointment with the DPS which is fairly easy. I have an appt. next Friday.

It is a scam because ID.me sells your information for money. Discount Tire makes a big deal about their founder being a Marine who served in Korea and how they want to help veterans but they will only help you if you use ID.me. I do have regrets for giving my SS number to anybody.

"I buy tires from an independent tire shop locally owned and operated and don't give two craps about a military discount. I also make sure my tires say made in the USA on the side as well".

Wow! You're my new hero
.