Mahindra XUV500 : Test Drive & Review

[Tushargohil]

Originally Posted by Guna

There is a picture of a XUV with the LED running under the grill slot. You may look in the older XUV thread. After seeing that picture I thought this may be the reason why there is a gap between the grill slots and the lower frame.

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/test-d...ml#post2541761 (XUV 500 First impression/Test Drive)

[msinghal80]

i got this mail from Mahindra to change color

Dear XUV500 Customer,

Subject: Your XUV500 Booking- White Satin

This is with reference to your booking of Mahindra XUV500 with our dealership. We are very excited and honored to have you as a part of Mahindra Family and take this opportunity to thank you for reinforcing your belief in us.

We are pleased to inform you that we have received an overwhelming response to the XUV500 across the 5 cities (Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai & Pune) where we have launched. We have received over 8000 bookings within the 1st week of launch. We have presently closed any further booking. As you wait for your White Satin XUV500 , we would like to take this opportunity to apprise you that at this juncture you have an option to opt for other colours, where waiting period is relatively lower. The present waiting period for White Satin is about 4-6 months.
If you would like to change your preference to any other colour, you could be driving your brand new XUV500 sooner. To avail of this opportunity, you are requested to immediately get in touch with your dealership, which will revert to you soon regarding the date of delivery of your newly booked XUV500.
However, if the ‘White Satin’ is your FIRST & ONLY preference, we will revert to you soon and let you know the date of delivery of your XUV500. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience caused and we assure you that every effort is being made to deliver your XUV to you on time.
We thank you again for your confidence in us.

Yours Sincerely,
for Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd.

[mxx]

@Manson:
I am asking these questions as to you as you have already owned a few Mahindra vehicles. This will also help prospective xuv buyers.
1) About A.S.S
What is your opinion regarding mahindra a.s.s. I am not asking about providing customers with coffee or tv in waiting room. But, about workmanship, how do they go about the work on vehicles. Do they effectively solve problems? Have you faced unnecessary delays etc.
2) About Mahindra the manufacturer/company
How fast or effectively does mahindra go about addressing/rectifiying known issues(ie niggles, or slightly bigger problems)?
For example, you mentioned sensor issues on vlx. Once this issue surfaced, where these rectified in the subsequent batches of newly delivered scorpios? If so, approximately how many months did it take for mahindra to solve the problem?

[puchoo]

It does make sense and i hope that will not happen , one of the reasons for such a such a demand is the price point at which the car is coming in , and i am sure the guys at Mahindra realize this as well and would be thinking hard before raising the prices , no company wants a backlash nor a negative sentiment.

Originally Posted by ramkya1

Makes a lot of marketing sense to jack up the price..... I'd bet my bottom dollar the pricing would go north soon. It would be foolish not to skim the the milk while you safely can.

Hope I'm wrong for the sake of customers who have booked to lock the price.

--Ramky
=====

[slackyboy]

Wonderful review Manson. The photographs were really well taken and gave me a clear understanding of how the vehicle looks. Its a pity that Mahindra havent planned well for the kind of volumes for the XUV500. Surely its a missed oppurtunity. But kudos to the team at Mahindra for designing and manufacturing an Indian SUV thats affordable and exciting at the same time!

[m_upreti]

Originally Posted by mxx

@Manson:
I am asking these questions as to you as you have already owned a few Mahindra vehicles. This will also help prospective xuv buyers.
1) About A.S.S
What is your opinion regarding mahindra a.s.s. I am not asking about providing customers with coffee or tv in waiting room. But, about workmanship, how do they go about the work on vehicles. Do they effectively solve problems? Have you faced unnecessary delays etc.

Most of the people have no clue. The technique is hit and trial. If the issue does not occur in front of the Service Advisor it does not exist, and Murphey's law ensures that the problem occuring till the gate of the A.S.S. will not repeat in the presence of the service personell. For most of the issues there will be '(il)logical explanations'

2) About Mahindra the manufacturer/company
How fast or effectively does mahindra go about addressing/rectifiying known issues(ie niggles, or slightly bigger problems)?
For example, you mentioned sensor issues on vlx. Once this issue surfaced, where these rectified in the subsequent batches of newly delivered scorpios? If so, approximately how many months did it take for mahindra to solve the problem? As a company, the senior management is very responsive to customer complaints. However, the sad part is that if you have to approach the senior management for smallest of issues then what is the chain down the line doing

Barging in to share my Scorpio ownership experience vis a vis the Company & A.S.S. (inline in bold). For more details you can check my posts in the Scorpio Issues and Solutions Thread

[DwarkaDelhiWala]

Originally Posted by manson

...
• Overdone front-end design is a hit or miss. Should have been toned down...

What a perfect and apt description. Thanks for great review.

[SPIKE ARRESTOR]

Originally Posted by ramkya1

There's so much heat generated, so much demand on the plate, hysteria if you will.

Makes a lot of marketing sense to jack up the price..... I'd bet my bottom dollar the pricing would go north soon. It would be foolish not to skim the the milk while you safely can.

Hope I'm wrong for the sake of customers who have booked to lock the price.

--Ramky
=====

Ramky, you are absolutely right ! Expect a (substantial) price hike soon, may be within a few months.

Spike

[ramkya1]

Spikey,

I'm in marketing for 30+ years, a game of demand a supply and making a profit whenever you safely can. When demand goes double the supply, the thumb rule is to raise the price, by how much is the tricky decision M&M will have to grapple with. As things stand, IMHO, they can safely take the floor price up by 1 lac.

I only hope they would invest the profit in training the front end staff who make or mar the brand in the long run. I've seen a lot of competence building going on for the technical guys on the floor and there is visible improvement there, but the Front end / Customer Service sucks big time!!

The XUV5OO is a Golden Opportunity to become a big glocal SUV player; it's a brilliant product which fills a void and an awesome value for money proposition. They can deep-six many competitors if they handle this right by scaling up production fast, keep the price reasonable and treat the customers with respect.

--Ramky
======

--Ramky

Originally Posted by SPIKE ARRESTOR

Ramky, you are absolutely right ! Expect a (substantial) price hike soon, may be within a few months.

Spike

[puchoo]

yes i am sure there would be a lot of heads working on this if they are contemplating a price hike to begin with at this stage. The key objective might simply be to meet demand first and then look at the prices , but sometimes to be a game changer or shake up the industry prices need to be kept low - its easy to look at the additional revenue which a price hike might bring in , but if prices were a core reason why the demand was so high to being with , it might be good to leave things as is and a better way to approach it would be to offer additional trim levels , or add on trimmings and make money there.

Originally Posted by ramkya1

Spikey,

, by how much is the tricky decision M&M will have to grapple with. As things stand, IMHO, they can safely take the floor price up by 1 lac.

[tachobells]

Originally Posted by ramkya1

Spikey,

I'm in marketing for 30+ years, a game of demand a supply and making a profit whenever you safely can. When demand goes double the supply, the thumb rule is to raise the price, by how much is the tricky decision M&M will have to grapple with. As things stand, IMHO, they can safely take the floor price up by 1 lac.

A price hike is expected. But, I doubt if M&M will kill the goose that lays golden eggs.

People are flocking in because of the price. If the price hike is around a maximum of 50K, it's still manageable. If they hike it by a Lakh, then the W8 FWD will be about 16 Lakhs on road and W8 AWD will be 17 Lakhs on road in Bangalore. At that price, we can get a tried and tested Cruze. So why take a risk with a new product.

At least I'm likely to cancel my booking if they hike by 1 Lakh. Then wait for another year, get some feedback about reliability, give Mahindra some time to fix the initial niggles and maybe bring on an AT as well. I'm sure many customers would think that way.

[mak10]

Originally Posted by DonnieDarko

Are test-drive vehicles available yet in Bangalore ? I am seriously considering it as my next buy.

I've test driven XUV 5OO at Sirish Auto, near Silk Board. I hear the test drive is also available at SKS Auto, opp. IIM on Bannerghatta Road.

[avisidhu]

Originally Posted by tachobells

People are flocking in because of the price. If the price hike is around a maximum of 50K, it's still manageable. If they hike it by a Lakh, then the W8 FWD will be about 16 Lakhs on road and W8 AWD will be 17 Lakhs on road in Bangalore. At that price, we can get a tried and tested Cruze. So why take a risk with a new product.

And it's not just about the XUV becoming less VFM. Mahindra cannot claim that they were earlier paying out of their pocket and justify a substantial price hike. Would hit the company image substantialy IMO. A price hike in the range of 50K seems more plausible.

But then as a few gentlemen mentioned, no one wants to let go of an opportunity to make hay while the sun shines.

[parsh]

Saw 2 Scorps stranded on road since morning. And again thoughts came as to whether XUV will face similar situations? Or will it be better. Thats where the crux lies and its serviceability. At lenghts I had not been able to service my Innova for a year and still had seen that it did not halt me on road anytime running into the end of 6th year now without any issues till date. How all of us would like to see that happen with XUV500 and it is then that it will trump one and all.

Had quite a few questions on the XUV500 and tried posting them in our millenium (views) XUV scoop thread. A few things still come to mind but will try posting them later.

Meanwhile, kudos to the team for putting up such an excellent review as usual. 5 stars all the way. However, what I missed outright is the comparison that is put up with What you will like and What you won't of its competitors.

Hats off to the team to take such tremdendous efforts to putting such an excellent review.

[R.I.P]

Originally Posted by manson

From the 'PR' talk I gathered their Cheetah angle implies the 'go anywhere' character of the XUV. IMHO the XUV would have sold as many numbers even without that cheesy resemblance.

I agree. its just some MBA thinking yaa this will work.......

Originally Posted by Warhound

Look closely, The grill is the nose and the weird shapes all around it are supposedly 'whiskers'

no man..... can't agree with you