Please help. My tires were switched secretly at a gas station. What do I do?

[ACWhite]

I don't think it is a good idea to confront/accuse the service people or manager of a crime without strong evidence. No one likes to be accused of wrongdoing. You will likely get push back, especially if they did nothing wrong, and then what will you do? Depending on the number of miles you have driven, four years of use is pretty good. I had a nail in a tire with < 15000 miles and had to replace it-- it happens.

If I were you, I would learn from this experience that if I see something questionable, I would raise questions at the time I saw it. If I didn't do this, then I would need to gather the evidence (and many here have made good suggestions). If I did obtain strong evidence, and it was a significant amount of $, then I would pursue it. But without the evidence, I would let it go.

[blackonyx03]

I'd follow the advice about matching up the numbers to see if, in fact, a switch was made. If so, confront the store and, if unavailing, call the police. Also, did you pay by credit card? I'd challenge the charge if I felt like the other avenues were going nowhere.

That said, it's good to be really sure first...

[VRE332]

Toyota usually puts Continental Tires on their new cars, and the barely last 25k miles. So I'm not surprised that you found them worn down.

[steel7]

What is the name & address of the gas station ? You can post it.

[ViennaSausages]

Were the tires the same before the "switch"? Same brand and same model? Are the tires the same now?

What about the wheels, rims, and caps? Same then and now?

It takes a good few minutes to swap out a wheel. A perpetrator would have to not only remove all four, but then reinstall four dead tires on your rims. That takes some effort for one person. I can't see it being done in less than 45 minutes.

[easychair]

If these were the original tires, I would imagine that they would have about 40K miles on them and getting to end of life. If you had the car recently serviced at the dealer, they may have done a safety check that included tireware and made recommendations as to when the tires need to be replaced. Use this information to determine whether or not the tires could have been switched.

As a previous poster indicated, a tire can go flat for may reasons. Brand new tires go flat due to penetration of the tire tread/wall and also by hitting curbs or pot holes.