GM, Ford reputations take a hit

Unfortunately to many customer, 'treating costumers right,' equates to fixing the vehicle for free for as long as they one the vehicle. LOL

mike

Beyond their quality, they have an additional problem that they can't get control of. Many of their dealers make it pure torture to both buy and own their products. Many of their enemies were created by the dealers, not the product or the corporation.

They say they can't really tell their dealers what to do. They're independent. Personally, I bet there are people everywhere who would be more than willing to represent them.

You are so right. That's a real problem for them. They don't actually contact their customers.

No doubt that's a strong motivator for some customers. The 100,000 mile warranties were designed to appeal to them.

It is, after all, what I do at home. I don't spend much money at all fixing my cars. Maybe $100 a year per car, if that. My expectations are going to be hard to live up to.

Right on, some dealers are downright ugly and many including me won't enter their business again. Here we have one rich cat who made his initial fortune on a Gm dealership. He now has many dealerships of several stripes including Toyota. Toyota is recent for him, he's a survivor.

His approach is to fire the worst salesman of each month. This attitude of intimidation is passed on against the customers. i've tried them 4 times over 20 years; since I don't submit to their intimidation I leave very soon. Buying a new car is a tough enough decision, without this as well. He hasn't taken up a Chrysler dealership.

And to others, being treated right means the manufacturer fixing what are very obviously design mistakes in the vehicle even if the warranty has expired. :)

Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')

"Design mistakes?" Maybe.

When these problems show up and are not corrected nor supported for LONG periods of time, one might wonder if these defects are not planned obsolence, or intentional time bombs.

Actually, this is an inexpensive thing for the car makes to do. Some of the repairs they already cover if there is a design problem with the car or truck. And most vehicles don't need major covered repairs in the first

Some Hyundai dealers near where Mike lives purchase insurance contracts (aka extended warranties) on the drivetrain for their costumers for between

Jeff

And not go through hoops to get the repairs covered.

My father has a 2001 or so Grand Prix. My dad a lot of engine rebuilding and head repair work for the dealer over maybe 40 years. When there was a problem with the transmission, most of the costumes got a replacement transmission, but had to pay for the labor. However, because my father knew the people in shop, they got GM to pay for the whole thing. All the costumers, not just my dad, should have gotten the whole thing done without cost. After all, they paid for a working transmission when they bought the car.

Jeff

Considering that the next version of the engine or transmission has this problem fixed, I doubt it is a design feature, as you suggest.

The other thing is that the automaker who made the faulty vehicle is less likely to get repeat business, whether it is to buy a car for the owner's kid or replace the fault vehicle.

One thing is clear, there are fewer new cars on the American road than last year. Auto sales are down like 2.6% from the previous year. They were down in 2005, too. And Americans are driving more each year. Cars are more durable than ever before. It used to be that car engine would last maybe

This was good for my dad and my college education. Dad owned a machine shop that rebuilt engines. He also made lots of money selling tail-pipes, shocks, carburetors, spark plugs and ignition parts. With fuel injection, electronic ignitions, longer-lasting shocks and stainless steel tailpipes, they rarely sell these parts, now. And there is far less engine-rebuilding work now than

The market also changed with a lot of the tailpipe and shock business going to chain stores that don't go local independent warehouses; a lot of garages put on new rotors rather than have them resurfaced because the cost of new rotors is better. In addition, dealerships will often get new short blocks or engines for in-warranty work rather than send out to work to a machine shop.

So the loss of business is due to both the increased longevity of engines and the changing market.

Jeff

Actually, they can pull the dealership from a dealer if they don't make quality standards. One Caddy dealership closed up near where I used to live (Crea Caddy - maybe Mike knows these people). The new dealer was required to increase the size of the showroom within a certain amount of time.

If a McDonald's gets a lot of complaints about a particular independent francise, they will investigate. If there are problems with the way the restaurant is run (other than the restaurant sells lots of unhealthful food), McDonalds will either pull the francise or take over the restaurant if the problems aren't fixed. Likewise, if a dealer refuses to repair cars with complicated problems (I know of one dealer who was known to try to get complicated problems sent to another dealer) or gives a really poor costumer service experience, the car makers should be able to step in.

My dad used to sell and repair Kohler, Tecomsah and B&S engines. If he didn't meet the quality standards (mostly for training), he would not have been a dealer for them.

I would be surprised to learn that if a dealer doesn't do an adeqaute job, that the maker can't pull the francise. I think the Japanese excercise these rights more often than the big 3.

Jeff

Sorry, Jeff, when it takes GM 10 years or better to correct an obvious problem, then your explanation doesnt wash.

It is not as easy to pull a franchise as you might think. Remember Ford and the "Blue Oval Certified Dealer" fiasco? Ford wanted to identify dealers that met certain minimal standards. A group of dealers in Texas sued Ford saying this wasn't fair - and won. States have very restrictive laws that favor the automobile franchise owners over the manufacturers. State legislatures are a lot more likely to favor local dealers than far off manufacturers. The Japanese manufacturers often have better franchise agreements (from the manufacturer's standpoint) than US manufacturers. They arrived much later and avoided many of the bad ideas in the much older US manufacturer's franchise agreements. The newer brands (Acura, Lexus, even Saturn) have even more restrictive agreements. I was surprised that GM got away with creating the Saturn brand. If I had been running a Chevrolet dealership when Saturn was created, I'd have been very upset if GM granted a Saturn franchise that competed with me. I suppose this is why GM originally set Saturn up as a completely different (but wholly owned) corporation.

Ed

Which problem are you talking about?

Ed

I had to go to the Buick zone representative a few years ago when I encountered a dealership that couldnt seem to repair the serious problem, wasnt interested, and wouldnt listen.

After 5-6 visits to the dealership, with the service manager telling me he couldnt find the problem if is it intermittent, I asked him to let me ride with the mechanic and I would show him what was happening. No dice.

Then I asked if he had checked TSBs on this car. He said he had.

As soon as I called the rep, he knew immediately what was wrong, said that a bulletin had been issued, and contacted the dealership.

Within minutes the service manager called me, all upset, asking why I called zone, that it could get them in trouble. Tough s*it!

The owner called me and apologized.

Yes, the manufacturer can demand quality if they want to.

And the big 3 surely have had the oppurtunity to read the Japanese aggreements. They could have failed to renew the francises or put in new terms. The francise aggreements are not for ever.

Jeff

Funny, I think its just the opposite. Car durability peaked in the late '60s. A car from that era (such as the '66 I drive every day) is EXTREMELY rugged. My wife's 93, by comparison, has all the plastic interior bits and exterior trim falling apart. The drivetrain on the '66 went well over 200,000 miles, no problems, until a transmission rebuild. The engine continued well over 270k. I also have a '73 with 450,000 miles. The engine on the '93 so far has 240,000 miles, no problem, but its been through 2 transmissions. Cars used to not last very long because a) they were much cheaper to replace than they are now, and b) things like lubricants have come a LONG way. Much further than the cars themselves. If Mobil 1 had been around in its current form in 1966, things would have been drastically different.

I am specifically referring to the plastic plenum problem which continued for about

The old rusty rot under the rear window problem continued for a number of years too. GM knew about it, chose not to fix it. It was a simple fix which they found more convenient (and perhaps profitable) to avoid, according to people on the inside.

There are others.