Saab Lost a Loyal Customer

Trade it in on a non-Saab. You'll take a big hit but you will feel better. Tell as many people as you can about your bad experience. There's no room in today's marketplace for an upscale car company who treats it's loyal customers like crap. Saab's once proud reputation continues to decline and you can be sure nobody in charge over there has a clue as to why. The sooner Saab is put out of its misery the better for all it unwitting customers.

That is exactly what I'm doing. It is up on Autotrader and Sabbnet. As a replacement I'm leaning towards the Volvo S60 R.

I thought about that, but the S80 is a lot more expensive. It does have teh same 4C suspension as the S60R, SInce '07 is teh last year for teh R series (Which has not been selling real well anyway) dealers are making insane deals on them.

Unfortunately I may have to go with an automatic, much to my dismay. It is getting harder and harder to find a manual these days. Esp. in traffic choked So. Cal.

Craig

I remember going to the auto show in Philadelphia with my Dad back in the mid 1960's and someone had apparently had an unsatisfactory experience with a navy blue Lincoln 4-door convertible.

They wrote a letter to Ford in a strongly contrasting yellow paint which completely covered the body of the car and then they parked it in a very prominent location directly across from the entry to the auto show.

I suspect that they may have gotten some satisfaction as a result.

You might try something similar with your dealer along with a few videos posted to youtube or wherever seems appropriate.

A 4 door convertible ? How on earth would you stop something like that bending like a banana ?

Graham

clutch burning up at less then 7k miles would burn me up. is there a lemon law where you are at? I don't know if this would be enough to qualify. maybe a local news station would like to do a story and embarrass your local Saab dealer into doing what would be right. where I live a local station does these kind of stories and they get results.

gee whiz less then 7k miles the new car smell is not even gone yet. except in your case burned up clutch smell may overpower it.

my wife and I had a ford product that at 15k miles and then less the 30k miles we had to put in a major brake job. the brakes would all of a sudden start grinding and then the next day we were to late. had to pay big bucks to fix. was told it was how she was driving the car. and no she doesn't drive with 2 feet.

My experience with the S60R has been less than satisfying. My wife had one of the first models, a 2004 which we kept for 22 months and was in the shop for 52 day. Now, admittedly that was mostly for annoying items-like the touted suspension that creaked, groaned and frankly wasn't such a great idea to have electronic suspension with different setting. I had electronic suspension in my Alfa 164Q and it was much more supple and "real world" valuable than the Volvo's. I have owned six Volvos, including the S80 that is coming off lease this month. It is possible that I just got a lemon but I would drive the car for some time before making the decision.

Yes, like Saab, I would check some quality data closely. Volvo has had their share of not-so-great cars in recent years.

Sadly, "Customer service" is a thing of the past in most businesses. "Bigger is better and that means we can ignore you" seems to be the universal motto.

I think you have hit the nail squarely on the head. It isn't that the clutch burned up after 7k miles. There will always be manufacturing defects that occur in any product line. Also, you don't hear lots of stories like this (and I'm sure you would if it was widespread) so it's not really a design issue.

The real problem is that the lousy dealership will not work with this guy to make it right.

in article snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com, still me at snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com wrote on 15/05/2007 18:13:

I was reading on a forum board about some chap who bought a new 9-3SS and posted up whether he had made some sort of record with his new car. He'd got the check engine light within 250 miles!

Oh for the days when they were all hand-built in a shed in Finland :)

I don't think this is peculiar to SAAB or to GM (or GMs stewardship of SAAB). I think so much of today's market is quick, cheap and as a result of that, lacking in quality control. You can get a bargain and you do get a lot for your money nowadays, but that must make for a lot of unhappy customers who end up with the items that "slipped through".

I love it (well, I hate it) when they send one of their "We're sorry you very mortally wounded by our inadequately quality controlled product ..." kind of letters. We're sorry, indeed! Sorry, are you? Liable, then? Mmmm?

What is good about the internet is the fast spread of both good and bad customer feedback. If you have a bad experience of a product or service, there are all manner of forums where you can post your experiences. That reaches a lot of people. Usually a number of other people reply with their experiences and the posting serves as a nice summary for anyone researching that product or company. Likewise, have a good experience and you can do exactly the same. What is funny is that there are so many companies who are not aware of this and continue to treat their customers with bad experience as idiots ... Well, good luck staying in business.

I do think the tide is turning, though and can name a number of companies I have had business with recently who have excellent customer service, who don't fob you off with clauses and techno-speak, or blame your issues with their product on _your_ equipment you are connecting it to, but actually take note, show interest and genuinely try to help before offering to refund your money or replace the product ... Or, shockingly, send you an e-mail a couple of days later having researched the issue more fully and come up with a potential solution.

Bravo! More of that, please ... Especially in automotive quality control :)

Paul

Go Audi, customer service, after sales - the whole experience surpasses the GM moment.

in article C26FC6AE.23CA% snipped-for-privacy@mickx.eclipse.co.uk, Mick x at snipped-for-privacy@mickx.eclipse.co.uk wrote on 15/05/2007 20:21:

... Except for the car ... Awful travel sickness inducing vehicles. Shame, coz I really liked the new Audis until I drove one :(

Paul

Was a tough call at first to even look past Saab - have had 5), but when looking at the 9-5 vs. A6 was no competition IMHP (but have kept my Aero conv)

Lemon Law would not work, unless it was in for 3 or more times for the same problem. Hmmm I never thought about contacting a consumer advocate, I'll look into that. Thanks for the idea.

Actually it is not the dealership, but the Saab Factory rep. The dealer knows me very well, and in years past would've had no problem covering this, but the service manager told me that if he did try and do this under warranty, the factory rep/reg. mgr. would kick it back.

OK, so it's the GM assigned SAAB factory rep. This would explain why it seems to be a common theme...

Yep!

GM seem to be determined to lose customers.

Graham