When I embarked on the Volt press launch, I made a public promise to keep my impressions of the car itself separate from concerns about its overall viability. My review of the Volt is coming on Monday, but a new issue is already raising its head to confront GM’s extended-range electric car. The Volt’s home charger costs $490 on top of the Volt’s $41,000 (pre-tax credit) price, and costs another $1,500 to install. But, according to BNet’s Jim Motavelli, money isn’t the only obstacle to obtaining the home charger that’s necessary to tap the Volt’s 40 miles of electric range. EV advocate and Volt Customer Advisory Board member Chelsea Sexton, of “Who Killed The Electric Car? fame, is one of the first Americans to live with the Volt, and despite enjoying the backing of GM, she’s run into a problem that she and other EV advocates worry will blunt enthusiasm for home-charged EVs like the Volt: she needs a “time of use” meter.
Category: Customer Relations
Welcome to Tinfoil Time. A public service for paranoids and their enemies. When the NHTSA went after Toyota for their runaway cars, some people (me, included) saw this as a transparent attempt to undermine Toyota in order to make GM and Chrysler (A.K.A new arms of the US government) more attractive both in terms of purchasing their products and the IPO’s. But now that the circus is leaving town, is the NHTSA looking for a new victim? Whilst searching the net, I saw (part of) an article (sub) which mentions how Ford’s North American market share is on the rise. Sure, Toyota’s market share in the U.S. dropped by 1.5 percent compared to September 2009. But GM did not pick up those sales. They lost 2.8 percent. The winners were Ford (+ 1.4 percent), and Chrysler (+2.1 percent).I also remember a poll that was taken which claimed that how 54 percent of people were less likely to buy a GM car because of their bailout. Rising sales at Ford and bad will towards GM? I’ve seen this scenario before! The next stage is now the NHTSA will tell us to stop driving our Fords. Trouble is, Ford doesn’t have any recalls of recent. So what can the NHTSA do? You recycle a recall. Read More >
What do you do when a company you own (through your trusty Treasury Department) won’t help you out over the phone? Out of luck with his dealer and pissed off at the “condescending” attitude of GM’s phone support staff, one former Marine and “lifelong GM customer” drove from Virginia to Detroit in order to get The General to take responsibility for chronic power steering pump failures in his wife’s Chevy HHR. His initial reward: more condescension, and the privilege of getting escorted from the premises of GM’s Headquarters. But Marines don’t quit that easily…
When I was a young whippersnapper and did advertising for Volkswagen, we had a rule of thumb: “Over the lifetime of the car, you’ll spend the purchase price again.” In gas, oil, taxes, insurance, repairs, parts, you name it. We kept that rule to ourselves. We didn‘t want to shock the prospective buyer. Now, Volkswagen changed their mind. They are going for full disclosure. Read More >
GM is announcing the arrival of the first “driveable Volt” in China, in a move that GM’s China boss Kevin Wale calls a sign of The General’s “long-term commitment to bringing our industry-leading technology to China.” And despite a distinct lack of Chinese demand for green vehicles, a recent survey that shows as much as 75 percent of Shanghai’s drivers plan to purchase an EV in the next three years (not to mention government plans for increased EV subsidies) is giving GM hope that its plug-in will take off there. But in order to achieve Chinese-market success with the Volt, GM will likely have to offer the vehicle at a price point well below its US-market MSRP of $41,000.
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We don’t just want it to be seen,” said Jeff Eggen, Ford’s car experiential marketing manager, speaking about the Fiesta’s appearance in “Diaries.” The idea is to “have a second element or a third element” rather than just a placement on a TV program, “where we can engage with the fans outside of the show with additional content
While AdAge raves over Ford’s “product placement plus” marketing scheme for the Fiesta, actual customers for the Mexican-built subcompact are starting to get testy. The Fiesta’s Facebook page is home to several customer complaints about slow delivery of Fiesta, and Ford has already sent out $50 Mastercard gift cards to waiting customers. But in the letter accompanying the gift cards, Ford blamed hurricanes for Fiesta delays… and it turns out there’s more to the story than that. The Freep reports that 6,000 Fiestas were delayed last week due what Ford’s Mark Fields calls “a part-quality issue.”
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Honda’s Civic Hybrid has always been something of an afterthought in the marketplace, as Honda’s “mild” hybrid system consistently fell behind the Toyota Prius in terms of mileage, electric-only range and green street-cred. Then, late last year, Honda settled a class action lawsuit alleging that the Civic Hybrid couldn’t hit its EPA numbers. And though the weak-selling Insight has replaced the Civic Hybrid as Honda’s problem hybrid of the moment, the Civic Hybrid woes are still piling up. The latest bad news comes from the LA TImes, which reports that Civic Hybrid batteries have been dying before their time, and that Honda’s software “fix” for the problem reduces mileage from 45 MPG to 33 MPG. Since the standard Civic is rated at 30 MPG, a number of Civic Hybrid owners are wondering why they paid extra for what amounts to a 3 MPG improvement on the highway… and they’re accusing Honda of refusing to replace batteries under warranty. In other words, this looks to be one of the first major battery warranty-related fiascos of the hybrid era… and it’s shaping up to be a nasty one. Electric car makers, take notice.
Do you remember when Saturn made a last ditch attempt to bring customers back to their showrooms? It asked us to “Rethink” Saturn. Whatever our perception was of them, we almost certainly had it wrong and we had to check them out once more. Ford did a similar thing with “Have you driven a Ford lately?” It’s quite a clever strategy, convince the customer that they had it wrong about your product and invite them to try them again. Well, Toyota seems to trying a similar tactic in order to woo customers back and polish up their corporate image. Now at this point you’re expecting me to unveil some hokey advert which asks us “Try Toyota” (if Toyota is reading this, give me a call and we can work out a licensing fee for my ad slogan). Wrong. It’s not their products. They are fine.
Toyota asks us to rethink the meaning of recall. Read More >
If you are under water with your car, will any friendly GM dealer bail you out? Of course. If you live in what was formerly called “East Germany.” Read More >
This week’s “Haggler” column in the Sunday New York Times was ripped from the pages of TTAC’s beloved Piston Slap series, with a Wendy Marek writing in to complain that
In July 2008, I made a huge mistake: I bought a Ford Explorer. It was a 2006 model with 40,000 miles, and it cost $17,000. At first I thought I got a great deal, but after a few weeks of driving, the radiator started leaking. Then the replacement radiator started leaking. Then the radiator that replaced the replacement started leaking. To date, six new radiators have been installed in this vehicle. Six.
After some research, The Haggler found that both carcomplaints.com and Consumer Reports showed a record of radiator problems in 2006 Explorers. Furthermore, Ford issued a TSB on 2006 Explorer radiators in 2009, which the automaker insists covers its liability. Since the Explorer in question is a used car, Ms Marek’s only real recourse would have been to file a breach of warranty claim, but the statue of limitations had already run out. Since so few protections exist for used-car buyers, one has to assume that the moral of the story is that buying used Explorers is a risky business… but is that the truth? Or is the outgoing Explorer a good value that’s getting a bum rap?
Nitrobahn reports that Kimmel and Silverman, a law firm, has noticed that cases that have the fuel pump on BMW cars as Exhibit A are on the increase. According to both, bad fuel pumps have been found in 1, 3 and 5 series BMW’s. Kimmel and Silverman have fought these cases on behalf of claimants and have been awarded refunds and cash recoveries. Read More >
Anybody who made it through the last 12 months or so with their passion for the Saab brand intact deserves some kind of free psychological screening and endangered species protection award. Hell, anyone who made it through the last 20 years… you know what, this isn’t the moment for cynicism. Through the wrenching chaos of GM’s often-abortive attempts to sell Saab, the website SaabsUnited has stood by its brand, aggregating the most complete Saab sale coverage on the web, and generally consoling the faithful. Oh yes, and suffering through a relentless stream of cynicism from yours truly (sorry guys, it’s all we know). Anyway, for being the keepers of hope when all hope seemed lost, Saab has named and annual award after SaabsUnited which
will be made annually as the company’s way of expressing its gratitude to people like [SU founder Steven Wade] and others who continue to show us such great support.
Well, the debate over the viability of the Chevy Volt has been well and truly joined, as political and auto writers around the web spent the last week weighing in on the issue. Needless to say, a scan of these opinions shows that my NY Times Op-Ed has drawn a wide variety of reactions, ranging from complete agreement to utter contempt. But, in a phenomenon that seems all-too common on the internet these days, very few commentaries on my opinion (positive and negative alike) bring more detail or nuance to the issue. Which is too bad, because I’d be the last person to argue that I’m capable of doing complete justice to an issue as complex as the Volt in only 900 words. The variables and unforeseeable consequences floating around the Volt’s future are so vast and varied, no writer could possibly hope to cover them all. And one such problem didn’t even emerge until the day after I wrote the Times Op-Ed: dealer markups on the Volt.
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Have we scrutinized all the issues behind what they’re doing? Not really. My feeling is that a manufacturer-owned store as a business model violates the spirit of the state law here. But not a single person is complaining about it, and it’s kind of a back-burner thing for us. I imagine that if we start getting complaints from our membership, we would move it up to a front-burner thing
Tim Jackson, President of the Colorado Automobile Dealer Association tells Automotive News [sub] that Tesla’s non-franchise dealership in Colorado is not a long-term strategy, despite the company’s avowed desire to do without dealers. Well, franchised dealers, anyway (state law allows one OEM-owned dealership, and lots of EV tax breaks). Tesla admits (in its prospectus, no less) that wanting to own its own dealers will cause problems in Texas, but in the unlikely event that Tesla becomes a viable automaker, it’s easy to imagine a number of states putting up barriers to the franchise-free strategy. Especially since what we do know about Tesla’s dealer model plan is… highly irregular.
China’s quality regulator has ordered the recall of 875 imported C30 vehicles. What’s wrong with the car? Nothing. Read More >
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