[lochydog]

Picked up my beautiful black titanium convenience/appearance/x pack midday 18 October. Drove it back from Benfield's Harrogate (well they did a way better dealthan rude lookers). She's a beauty; what a proud parent.
Maybe a mistake. Engine management came on that afternoon @ 80 miles.

AA id'd dealer specific fault - it sure was. Went away on a truck from o/s work - that was embarrassing.

Fixed over Mon/Tues - tracked to two wires not connected (never had been). Who checked this car out?!

Enjoyed it all Wed and then Thursday going to work changed from 5th to . . . . well nothing. Could only get 5th.

Stopped and eventually got 1st and limped at 5 mph to local garage - got bigger queues than witha caravan. But better than waiting hours to go on a truck. Turns out a gear cable had 'frayed' - only done 120 miles! Couldn't fix that week so they kept till 3 Nov (and I went on holiday without my precious).

They also promised to fix the driver side locking button which had stopped working.

Well they're still fixing it andmy door has been eviscerated.

So in 3 weeks I've had my car about a day - so my black beauty looks like she was actually made Friday afternoon after a sessionat the pub. She is a tease.

 

[lochydog]

It gets worse - the never ending story. The repair manager tells me 'just to update you. We have checked and repaired a wiring fault ref a TSB from Ford. They have asked us to replace the central locking module, as this wiring fault may have caused the locking problem. The module is on order, but unfortunately as yet we do not have a delivery date, but it may be several days. We will keep pushing though.'
I assume I alone in receiving a car not fit for purpose?

 

[lochydog]

Benfields told me they'd raised all this as a serious fault with Ford customer relationship centre. The updateis adecisionthat 'no goodwill' will be offered and the case closed

. So all the lost time

, frustration

, incovenience

, embarrassment

, constraint (my wife isn't allowed to drive the stand-in)

etc etc is worth nothing, set against thebrand new car+bits list price of25k.
That didn't seem fair, so I managed to ring just before they shut at 6 tonight.

After hearing what is actually happened they have offered to reopen and review the case.

Let's see what happens . . . . . . . .

 

[Rspannerman]

You are very unlucky that is a bad experience for a loverly car Reject it and ask for your money back!!!!!!

 

[amser]

Bad luck buddy! Hope you get everything sorted ASAP!

 

[lochydog]

Thanks. Really appreciate the comments.

Legally speaking can you ask for your money back? in what situation?

Unfortunatley I've fallen in love with the looks and features of the car - it looks really good and I love all the bits it's got on it.

If it keeps falling over (anyone want to take a bet?) am I legally allowed to ask fora complete replacement?

Think I've seen somewhere that if you get the same fault 3 times you can. Does anyone know?

 

[hessisgod]

Someone posted that if it goes back 3 times for the same fault, you can ask for a replacement car. Never heard of that before and would have been helpful when my wife's old Beetle Cabriolet went back to the dealer 27 times because the roof wouldn't work!
Maybe give trading standards a ring if it gets to it as I'm sure they can advise you on what the rules are.

 

[lochydog]

Hess, Thanks. I'll try look into this.

 

[dennersten]

Someone posted that if it goes back 3 times for the same fault, you can ask for a replacement car. Never heard of that before and would have been helpful when my wife's old Beetle Cabriolet went back to the dealer 27 times because the roof wouldn't work!
Maybe give trading standards a ring if it gets to it as I'm sure they can advise you on what the rules are.

yes it is a law in Sweden. Possibly within EU?

The three times needs to be within the guarantee period though.

 

[hessisgod]

Saw an advert over the weekend for a government run consumer advice website and phone number.
www.consumerdirect.gov.uk

specifically mentions problems with cars. Give it a shot

 

[chilluk]

Ford CRC are a joke - at the suggestion of the service manager at my dealership I called them and I couldn't quite work out what they are actually there for - even explicity asking them their purpose I got such a woolly reply that I decided just to deal direct with the dealer - my advice is to get the name of the sales and service managers and deal with them direct - it helped in my case anyway - and simply mentioning the rejection word seems to get them a lot more helpful anyway.


Advice also (which you'll find onall car forums it seems) is to not drive the vehicle with any faults you consider serious - leave it at the dealership until they think it's fixed as this helps strengthen your case if you think it might ever get to the point of rejection.

 

[joe90]

chilluk

Had the same problems with nissan customer services. When I phoned them they said "We will open a case"......and they did. Unfortunately they then filled it with clothes and went on holiday. !!!!!

 

[joe90]

Hi lochydog
Take hessisgod's advice and phone consumer services. They will tell you exactly where you stand from a legal point of view. And use the dealer you bought the car from to sort your problems or you will find it difficult from a legal point of view (painful past experience).
I hope your experience does not put you off what is a great car.



regards Joe.

ps. Had mine for 5 and a bit months now and am still like a kid with a new toy.

 

[lochydog]

Good news and bads news - first the bad news.
You guys were so right. Customer services is a misname. I spoke with them 6 Nov and they re-opened the case and almost immediately offered me a free service (yipee). They then said this was such a serious situation that would investigate further with the dealer and the garage and get back to me the next day. It took till late 10 Nov to call me back. The line was poor so I asked they call again but they did not. I contacted them 11 Nov p.m. Theyoffered me one free service againfor all the trouble I've had so I said they'd already done that, so what else were they proposing? Nothing. The team leader then explained that this was the maximumthey were allowed to offer?! I asked what recourse I had as I felt this was poor consideration. They said there was no-one else I could complain to either within Ford or outside of it.


That's just the incentive I needed. Having had a quick look I can seethe RMIF, Citizens Advice, Consumer Rights, the links above, Small Claims Court, recourse to theOmbudsmanand the Sale of Goods Act 1994.. . . . . . .

 

[lochydog]

Secondly the good news. I have my beautiful kuga back.
10 Nov I got a call that the replacement controller with no delivery date had mysteriouslyarrived at the garage. Oh, and we need your spare keys sir.

- they could have asked me any time for these. So, keen to get my baby back I cancelled some meetings and rushed home. The service manager showed me the problem. 6 of about 100 wires leading forward from the rear passenger side had shorted on a metal protuberance - dumb design if you ask me. They had repaired these (i.e. as per the TSB - beware). This shorting could affect anything but had blown the locking controller, which theyreplaced.

 

[joe90]

Lets hope you can now enjoy your KUGA as much as i have enjoyed mine.


regards joe

 

[flanaia1]

Makes me glad I cancelled mine

back to a dependable Volvo, sorry to hear of your troubles though but after how Ford treated me I would never buy one of their products agian. Good lucj from here on in

 

[lochydog]

This is quirky.

Last night Steven from Ford in Germany rang to check I was enjoying my new kuga! Have you got 5 minutes he said for customer feedback.

Have you got an hour I said, because you've got one seriously disillusioned first time ford customer here.

Some time later and after many oh dears and sorrys he said I'd receivedappalling service that wastotally unnacceptable. How could it take 3.5weeks to repair these faults. The offer of a free service was unnacceptable compared to what I'd spent and the fact that I'd only had use of the car for a day.

He made notes and rest assured he would pass them on.

Guess that's the last I'll hear of this then . . . .

 

[flanaia1]

Hi Lochydog I see you are from Sheffield which dealer did you use? I'm from South Yorkshire too and tried all the dealers for the best deal, I eventually settled on Polar but Looker Ford in Sheffield were absolutely appaling could not tell me anything about the car, would not get it out from behind a row of cars for me to test drive and then insulted me by telling me not to haggle for discount, so I told them exactly what they could do with their Kuga, sorry you are having such a bad time, hope it gets resolved quickly and to your satisfaction good luck !!!

 

[lochydog]

Flanaia, Yes from Sheffield & I tried Lookers first. I wasted a whole afternoon with them just getting a test drive and a price.

Seems they don't know how to sell a car, because I was looking to buy. They said they wanted to develop a presence in the area. They succeeded - I'm going toavoid them with a big fat barge pole.

An underlingtook, checked and input my details and then retook details and then various management levels went in turn to check my beautiful BMW cabriolet with a clipboard - yes it's beautiful and has4 wheels.Then I think we did some more checking & inputting to be sure, before we spent an age waiting while they searchedfor keys and then platesto go on a test drive. Really incompetent.

So night fell and we got down to negotiation and the underling did thisnew game (to me) of 'would you say yes if I said x,000 net' and 'tell me a price you'd shake hands on right now'.So I did.

Underling goes away to master in black room and comes back. Sorry I can't get x,000 or sorry the price you ask for is not achieveable. 'what would you say if I could get y' and we start again. It was frustrating delaing with a slow immovable black hole. I wanted to buy.

The 'big fat controller' eventually came out of the void, he saidto 'educate' me about the value of my vehicle!!!!!! Couldn't believe it and walked out in absolute disgust.

So a week later I found myself in Harrogate and popped into Benfields and met some nice professional car sales people who negotiated and came up with a realistic price so I bought it. Wow, that's easy.

I recommend them for this, but then we go back to the top of this entry . . . .