FIAT Ducato!!

We have had our vehicle (a FIAT Ducato) from new, for 2Yrs 8Months and it has done 40,000 miles, which considering it is a commercial vehicle (Transit sized vehicle) and is only being used pretty lightly loaded, its had a pretty easy life.

We have this vehicle as an adapted (wheelchair accessible) vehicle, supplied by Motability, including finance from the charity section to cover costs not covered by the normal hire agreement, it is ours for 5 years, which means we have a little under 2 ½ years left.

So, can anyone tell me why it has had to go into Glyn Hopkins in Milton Keynes twice so far, with the same symptoms? Apparently the first time it was the centre bearing on the drive shaft, but after they had replaced that it didn’t make any difference to the noise coming from the running gear which was then diagnosed as an ‘additional fault’ of the wheel bearing, and now I have it back they are telling me the other wheel bearing needs doing!! But as they don’t carry stock of anything it will have to take a 3^rd trip to the garage, I hasten to add NOT Glyn Hopkins.

I have so far had to journey to Glyn Hopkins 3 times, first time was for the engineer to diagnose the fault then twice to have the 2 different faults rectified.

Now it wouldn’t have been such a major issue had it not been for the fact that the dealer is actually some 25 Miles from where we live, in Milton Keynes. This is compounded and made worse by the fact that they wont supply me with a courtesy car so that I can go there come back and then pick it up the next day, they will only let me have a car if I return it the same day, or at least by 8am the next day! Not really on, hence I have opted to waste, err spend, the day in CMK and collect the car at the end of the job, which today was quite late because they had some sort of trouble, I think it is just that they were too busy!!

I am frustrated that having had 2 full days wasted (spent) in CMK they are telling me that I still need to go back and it cant wait until October when the Service & MOT are due so I will have to fit in another trip and then back again for the same kind of performance when it is due for a service.

I am also frustrated because essentially the job they did first time round, stripping down to do the centre bearing axle, I am told, was pretty much the same as what they had to do to sort the wheel bearing out and then will have to do it all over again to do the other wheel bearing! And this could have been avoided if they had held the parts in stock instead of having to wait a week to get them in.

You would have thought that a FIAT dealer would hold stocks of FIAT parts wouldn’t you? well apparently not! As an ex-transport manager I would have been livid at the kind of incompetence being displayed by this dealer as the numerous taking apart and reassembling all adds to the labour cost, and increases the downtime over all. It seems pretty basic mechanics to me that if one wheel bearing is gone you check the other to make sure that’s OK as they have both done the same amount of mileage and wear and tear in exactly the same conditions and at the same time, therefore isn’t there a chance, if one is naff enough to have packed up so soon so might the other? Or am I being too simplistic?

Fortunately I am off work at the moment, sick, so its not costing me loss of earnings or downtime for my employer but had I been working it would have been so frustrating that I would effectively have lost 3 days work as a result of their incompetence and inability to stock items.

On the grounds of their inability to fully diagnose faults first, or even second, time around and the fact that I waste a full day every time I take the vehicle into them I am pretty certain that I will not be returning to Glyn Hopkins to do any further work. I have to say that to date I don’t care much for the other FIAT dealers in the area as they don’t give very good customer service but this seems to be pretty standard for FIAT dealers? At least the dealer in Northampton will let me take a Courtesy Car home and return it the next day, after the vehicle is fixed and when I am able to get back across, it wouldn’t be so bad if Glyn Hopkins could offer to collect and return the car for us so that at least we don’t have to do that journey each time. By October of course, when its due MOT & Service, I will hopefully be well back into work so to loose a day then just isn’t fair on work, especially after the length of time I have had off work.

I will also not be replacing this vehicle with another FIAT when it is due for renewal, if a commercial vehicle can have problems with wheel bearings, on both sides, and a centre bearing, all on a vehicle significantly less than 3 years old and having done just over 40,000 miles then it really isn’t up to much is it!

The frustration for us is that when we were considering which vehicle to go for, this was offered to us but we were advised to check that the local FIAT dealer could service commercial vehicles, which we did, in Bedford there WAS a FIAT dealer and we checked with them, explaining why we were checking, and they said yes they could do it, sadly what they didn’t tell us was that they would not be doing FIAT for much longer, within a month of us signing the contract, before we even took delivery, they stopped doing FIAT and we had to choose between MK &N Northampton fro servicing, not really very helpful is it?

I hope that FIAT & Glyn Hopkins like the advertising I am providing them, it is all free of course I will make no charge for this advertising and I am willing to have your comments go up in response to this posting! IF you can find a way to justify the standard of customer care and explain why so many faults on such a new vehicle.

Moan off my chest now to get on with the rest of my life, will call Motability some time next week to see what can be done about getting it serviced by someone more reliable and nearer to home! I Don’t hold out much hope though!