Fiat Grande Punto MJD Emotion Pk

Amit ji,
No intention of pin-pointing but the company is a lazy bum to solve even minor issues. I also have a 2009 Punto Emotion pack MJD & what i had to go through i can bet & say none of the members here might have faced 50% of the niggling issues. This the CEO of fiat will also accept as the matter was escalated to him with my car registration number as WB-06C-4001 with a minimum of 40 mails to him, his subordinates & his associates in eastern india.

 

Let's take a look at the list of expenses incurred till date to keep the car running smoothly.

- On 13/08/2009 with 1415 kms on the odo, the LH external rear view mirror was replaced. A few days back I hit a pedestrian on a rainy night and the mirror casing fell off. It took the dealer about 10 days from what I remember to source the parts. Total Cost Rs. 2,388.

- On 10/09/2009 with 2,929 kms on the odo, the car goes for it's first service. CSC was replaced during that service. Total cost Rs. 0.

- On 01/12/2009 car went in for some repairs. Total Cost Rs. 4,342. I only have a manual invoice which lists labour cost and parts cost. I don't have the break up. Many times I had to accept manual invoices as invariably the dealerships system's used to be down!

- On 26/03/2010 with 14,855 ams on the odo, the car went for it's second service. Front logo was replaced after it was robbed from a mall parking. Cost for logo was Rs. 554.67. Total second service cost was Rs. 4,551.

- On 26/07/2010 with 20,767 kms on the odo, door beadings were replaced under warranty as they had come loose. Total cost Rs. 0.

- On 01/09/2010, with 22,063 kms door beadings were replaced again. Order for the spare desmodonic key was given which cost me Rs. 5,736.

- On 25/09/2010 air filter was changed as I noticed a fall in mileage. The new air filter did it's job and mileage was back to it's earlier levels. Total Cost Rs. 330

- On 31/03/2011 with 29,891 kms third service was done. No complaints. Total cost Rs. 4,928.

- On 14/09/2011 with 36,066 kms on the odo, I noticed a fall in mileage. The car was sent for air filter change. Clutch slave cylinder was changed again to a metal one. Total cost for air filter Rs. 495.

With things getting difficult at the Tata-Fiat ASC, the car was sent with my colleague everytime it had to be attended to from the 14/09/2011 visit. Since past one year things went from bad to worse at Fortune, Nerul. Currently it takes about 5 days to get an appointment for a repair job and even after having an appointment it takes about 3 hours for them to make the job card and take the car in for service. Effectively it mean's, the customer has to take a day off from work to give the car for service and half day off from work the next day to take it back! Thank God I am lucky enough to have an arrangement where someone is there to take my car and hand it over to & bring it back from the ASC.

- On 01/11/2011 with 39,509 kms suspension problems came in. Elastic pads & both front strut mounts were changed. Brake pads were also changed. Total cost Rs. 10,615. When the car was brought back, I realised that elastic pads had been paid for despite me telling my colleague to take care of this aspect.

- On 23/11/2011 tyres were changed, total cost Rs. 19,800.

- On 17/04/2012 with 45,162 kms on the odo it was time for the third service. Suspension problems came back. This time LH shock absorber along with link rods were changed. Elastic pads had to be changed again! When the invoice came they had charged for elastic pads too. I got a call from my colleague and I went over to the ASC and told them that I was not going to pay for a known problem which the company has asked it's dealer's to repair free of cost. Immediately the charges were waived off. Total cost of repairs plus third service Rs. 14,944.

- Gear's started getting hard with a grinding sound in the reverse. Car was sent twice to Fortune but the problem miraculously disappeared when the technicians checked it out! The third time it happened the dealer changed some clip and "Gear lever knob replace / gear lever lubricate". Total Cost Rs. 1005. This was on 02/08/2012 with 50,545 kms.

- The gear problems came back or rather were not solved. Also, door beadings got loose again. On 2/10/2012 with 53,746 kms on the odo the car goes back for the gear's issue. Clutch kit & clutch bearing were changed alongwith beadings. Rear bumper light had fallen off and it was replaced as well. The horn was acting weird too. Sometimes I had to press the right side & other times the left side for it to honk. Like Amit (VP) told me earlier, some clips had to be changed and it was back to normal. Total cost Rs. 12,908.

The below chart puts things in perspective:



As seen in the above chart, I have spent about Rs.86,500 in service & repair's charges to keep the car running for it's 53,800 kms. That translates to a very high Rs.1.61 per kms!

What's worse is that the servicing costs are amazingly cheap. I have spent barely Rs.16,981 in four services. That's about Rs.0.32 per kms! I have spent less money on servicing the car then I have spent for buying 4 tyres!

Sadly, repair costs have played havoc with the cost of ownership. Rs.47,000 to keep the car running over 53,800 kms, that's about Rs.0.89 per kms. For a car made in 2009, the repair costs are simply atrocious and un-acceptable, not to mention, totally un-necessary if Fiat had paid more attention to quality.

Now you guys know, why I say, 'if only the car was more reliable!!'

 

Please upload the expenses incurred so we can compare. Even yous is the 2009 model isn't it? I am very interested in knowing how much other owner's have spent. Problem is we don't realise the amount we have spent until we examine them in detail. By then, we end up with a shock!

I have all the invoices for all the repairs and service carried out on my car.

I will put up the break down of 47,388 into parts and labour costs. I don't think the labour is that expensive except for the last clutch job for which they charged about Rs.5,500 for labour!

 

You could have saved some of this by goigng to trusted mechanic than to TASS,this is not the problem with TASS every other car makes ASS is doing the this replace stuff. My cars hock absorber was replaced 4 times and still there were noises but I suspension needs a replacement if it makes any sound once you take it out and try to pull the strut rod or if there is issue with the camber or caster.
fifth time when they wanted replace the shocks at my cost , i asked tom to give the car back with old shocks and got it removed and also go the strut mount cleaned while tightening found there is slight gap between strut mount bolts made the bolts to center and got it tightened.
This was almost 8 months back and about 5 months back I had to change them to upgrade the GC then again the same repeat issue of suspension noise but i did not approach TASS but Harish of pride cars issue resolved in 3 hours flat.
I am planning to order parts like Deisel filter,oil filter and air filter at kava and get the service done by Harish. 45K service costs Rs8000/- but by going to Harish i would save at least 4 K and better quality service.