Driver's door won't lock

[freecellwizard]

Hi all -

I had a frustrating experience today with the driver's door lock on my 2001 New Beetle and I'm stumped.

My fob battery has been out for 2 years and I'm too lazy to replace it, so I just use the key like in the old days. No problem until today when I took the car to a tire shop for a state inspection. Before going in, I locked the car with the key as usual. I went to lunch and they did the inspection as well as a tire rotation and alignment. When I picked up the car and got back to work I tried to lock the car, but it wouldn't lock. The key turns, but nothing happens.

I called them back to let them know and when they insisted it was a coincidence, things got very heated, so I called the local VW dealer to ask them. They think it's a coincidence.

I'm interested to hear if anyone can think of a way that these guys could have broken the door lock. After I argued for a while, the guy asked the tech who worked on the car and he now claims they had to open the trunk and climb in through there to work on the car. It sounds super fishy.

So ... should I be righteously peeved or sheepishly apologetic?

John

[D2Beetle]

Off the top of my head it sounds like the door lock switch.

[hestersu]

I'm thinking apologetic. The locks on these cars are temperamental and over time will break when used with a key constantly (good friend just went through this Monday - 3 years with no fob, lock broke last week).

[freecellwizard]

Well, rats. So far everyone says it's a coincidence. It's just weird that it happened between the drop-off and pick-up of the car and that it worked *right* before.

At this point I guess I just shell out for the repair.