I made the mistake of purchasing a car battery from Canadian Tire, foolishly believing that they would honour their 3-year replacement warranty. After 18 months the battery would not hold its charge, so I took it into the store to get my free replacement. The fellow at the counter looked at me and condescendingly told me that it was empty and needed to be charged before testing. I told him that of course it was empty; it wasn't holding its charge. That was why I brought it back. After about a half hour of charging he informed me that the battery was perfectly good and that I should have the alternator and voltage regulator checked. Three days later the battery would not charge at all, even with my battery charger. I had to call a tow truck to jump start my car, and I elected to take it to the dealer for service, as it was time for its oil change anyway. The dealer performed an AVR test and told me that the battery was dead and that it should have been fairly obvious from the voltage spikes during charging -- meaning that the Canadian Tire guy had lied to my face. The alternator was perfectly good. I had the dealer replace my battery. Between the AVR test, new battery and tow truck I was out over $200. I angrily went back to Canadian Tire and showed the manager the invoice from the dealer, and that I had brought the battery in for testing, and was told that my dead battery was still good. I felt that at the very least I should get a refund on the original purchase price of the battery. All he would do was give me a replacement battery -- which I no longer needed.
The moral of the story: do not buy a Canadian Tire car battery. Their warranty is not worth the paper it's written on.
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