RV Repairs in Louisiana

When you live in an RV having to have repairs done is never fun.  Especially because you have to figure out where you’re going to live while your home is in the shop, and you hope and pray it won’t take too long while you run up a hotel bill.

Last October I noticed this stress crack on the side of our RV.

Since we were going home for the holidays and planned to stay with family we decided to drop it off at our selling dealer Dick Gore’s RV World in Jacksonville and have it taken care of while we were not living in it during December.  Unfortunately even though we left it for 3 weeks, Dick Gore’s did not do anything to fix it.  Once we moved back into it in January we knew we now had to deal with the hassle of finding some place else to have it repaired while we are also living in it again.

We tried to have it repaired in Tampa, but that service center didn’t get around to it either.  After talking with some other RV’ing friends about similar experiences we were starting to think that all RV dealers have terrible customer service when it comes to repairs.

Finally we found Dixie RV in Hammond, LA.  If any of my RV’ing friends ever need something repaired, I would highly recommend Dixie RV.  They were awesome!  They have restored our faith in RV service centers. 🙂   From the moment we checked in, everything was handled smoothly and efficiently.  I heard from my service contact regularly throughout the week to inform me of the progress.  We also had some other items taken care of while we were there and they completed everything perfectly.

I also would like to say that our RV manufacturer, Heartland RV was amazing!  The rep that I worked with was so helpful with finding a place to get this taken care of.  By this time the RV was out of warranty, but he covered all the repairs anyway because we did try to get it fixed in December while it was still under warranty.  He even took care of some other things that should have been fixed in December.  I am thankful that Heartland stands behind their product and takes care of their customers.

UPDATE: the above comment about Heartland is no longer true. Yes they took care of us that one time, but since then we have had several more cracks in the sidewall of this RV until it is now no longer usable. Heartland does not stand behind their product once you are out of warranty (and even sometimes while you are still under warranty based on comments from several of the people that have reached out to me since I shared our Heartland story). See these posts for more details: The Day our Heartland RV Left us Homeless and Heartless Heartland RVs.

In the meantime we had a different kind of adventure staying at Drury Inn & Suites in Baton Rouge, LA.  We had to find a pet-friendly hotel of course for Fat Cat, and Drury allows pets.  Here is Fat Cat wandering the halls.  She was so confused by all the doors!  She had no idea which room was hers.

Besides being pet-friendly, they also happen to be the best hotel we could have chosen to stay at.  This place was awesome!  The rooms were spacious and comfortable.  They had a heated indoor/outdoor pool and a hot tub.  You could swim under the glass wall of the pool to go in or outside.

They serve free breakfast and dinner every day, and dinner includes free beer, wine & mixed drinks too.  And the dinner wasn’t just a bunch of junk food either.  They had really good food each night like soups, salads, pasta & chicken.  In fact, we happened to be there on my birthday and we were supposed to go out to dinner but I thought the dinner looked so good at the hotel we ended up eating there instead.  We did however go out to dinner the next night and had a wonderful dinner at the Ichiban Japanese Steakhouse.

The hotel staff was the friendliest staff we have ever encountered.  Every single employee that we came in contact with was so friendly to us.  They knew us by the end of the week and would ask us how the RV repairs were coming along.  They knew we were anxious to get back on the road.

I would highly recommend Drury Inn & Suites if you ever need a hotel and one of these is in the vicinity.

By Friday our home was finally ready for us to pick up, and I could not have been happier to get back in it.  Since it was late in the day Friday by the time it was ready Dixie let us camp for the night in one of their electric hookup sites.  They have several of these sites which I think is another perk of Dixie’s.  If you buy an RV there, you can camp there for the night to try it out and learn how everything works.  This can also be convenient if anything doesn’t work (which is normal when you buy an RV).  You’re already at the right place to have it fixed!

Anyway, sometimes things need to be taken care of and even though it can be inconvenient, I am happy that things went so well for us that week.  Now we are happily back to our travels, enjoying Texas.