[ImmortalZ]

Lalvaz, enough of your holier than thou posturing. In these troubled times, are you telling me that you'll quit your job at the drop of a hat because you're forced to be unethical? It is easy to sit behind a computer terminal and type what you think and accuse people of being whatever.

He came out and admitted what he did.

There are hundreds of dealerships in India who do the same or worse to their customers and not one employee has come out and blew the whole affair open. While this thread may not free him from the responsibility of having sold a lemon to an unsuspecting customer, he has tried to make amends in what way he can. That is man enough in my eyes.

[sameel]

why repent dude?

its the companys job to give proper test drive vehicles. i had driven a lot of cars from my dealer but all of them were test drive vehicles. registered in the name of the delearship!! i ripped them all. hell while my dad was properly running -in my verna i was ripping the test drive verna of my dealer all the time. no one cared and yes there are many other vehicles in this line! but i was told properly that none of the customer vehicles can be taken out of the compound other than to RTO office. once i had to stay for a full day at the dealer and did some spy work also. no use. they didnt budge. in fact they told a customer to give his address and go the dealer will send them a test drive vehicle. even for me i had a trouble. i took the ABS verna. which didnt have a test drive vehicle, the one for test drive was non -ABS i had to test drive the non-ABS car and do the booking for ABS verna! i did it happily . and yes dad asked for Getz CRDI test drive and they gave him the keys to verna test drive vehicle . lolz. he said dont bother i will drive my own verna. hehe .

i was never allowed to drive the customer cars! i have known my delear for long 8 yrs now. upto date they have kept their word i know all the inside jobs that go on. much more dirtier than this. a simple example was the one done by a fiat dealer. THEY WELDED THE OIL SUMP OF A FIAT UNO WITH BRASS AND CHARGED THE CUSTOMER FOR A BRAND NEW OIL SUMP!!!. it depends ON AVAILABILTY OF THE SPARES. if there is no proper stocking of cars then its of no use man!

in the above case the oil sump was not available anywhere in south india !! so they did this. and yes the customer found it out later when he had to sell the car and the buyer saw this when he lifted the car in the ramp for checking underbody!!

lets see what all gimmiks go on with poor LINEA owners.

[HappyWheels]

Originally Posted by ImmortalZ

Lalvaz, enough of your holier than thou posturing. In these troubled times, are you telling me that you'll quit your job at the drop of a hat because you're forced to be unethical? It is easy to sit behind a computer terminal and type what you think and accuse people of being whatever.

He came out and admitted what he did... That is man enough in my eyes.

With you on this ImmortalZ! Muneemmk has the guts to blow the whistle here and he was actually forced to quit due to his love of cars that did not allow him to do what he was doing.

Most people would have just been bothered with their own job and just did what the dealer says, regardless of ripping a new car or selling of a lemon to an unsuspecting customer!

[Lalvaz]

Originally Posted by ImmortalZ

Lalvaz, enough of your holier than thou posturing. In these troubled times, are you telling me that you'll quit your job at the drop of a hat because you're forced to be unethical? It is easy to sit behind a computer terminal and type what you think and accuse people of being whatever.

He came out and admitted what he did.

There are hundreds of dealerships in India who do the same or worse to their customers and not one employee has come out and blew the whole affair open. While this thread may not free him from the responsibility of having sold a lemon to an unsuspecting customer, he has tried to make amends in what way he can. That is man enough in my eyes.

You're entitled to your opinion just as I am entitled to mine. Holier than thou attitude??? Try telling that to the person who was cheated.
Wonder if you would have felt the same if you were the one saddled with the lemon. And hey, I'm not accusing anyone, I'm just responding to his own confessions.

[deepclutch]

I appreciate the guts he got to explain everything here.
--
what I make out of this:
and only smarties gets a brand new car from showroom in general.remember that!
Else ,
you got someone very close to you in the dealership who wont allow them to cheat.
--
Is this the scenario at bombay/west india? and how is the dealers at coimbatore/tn(not madras) for tata/fiat?I hope they are much better than kerala/banglore dealers.

[abk]

Dear all,

It seems to be too commonplace the moment someone narrates an experience immediately we jump to judging the person, let alone examining the actions without first being prejudiced. Whatever Muneemk did is done. I would hold myself from passing any judgement. However, if i were the buyer of that car I'd certainly curse him if i discovered i was made the victim.

The fact of the matter is a lot of money that exchanges hands is done over principles and practices which vary in their degrees of integrity. We are a part of it - whether or not we like it. However, what is more important is what are we doing to improve? to ensure we have higher integrity now than ever before?

Thanks Muneemk for at least enlightening us. Informed customers would only help in reducing the degree of malpractice. So you have contributed towards this positively

[NetfreakBombay]

Originally Posted by deepclutch

Is this the scenario at bombay/west india?

In Bombay, cops do not like to see vehicles with Temp Numbers.

AND dealers can't bring a car inside Bombay unless octroi has been paid.

So, chances of getting a Test Mule are not that high.

But if someone buys a car and it lies for a few days with dealer after registation, then it can be used as a test mule.

[kuttapan]

Everybody and his uncle is upto these kind of shoddy practices.

When I bought my first bike, from my Second cousin's(Once removed) newly opened showroom(Hell, I was the first customer - So his inaugural sales, though delivery happened later), I was so happy. Only later I came to know that the bike had been ridden more than 100 km's and ripped in the process(I found how an employee - again my relative - treated the new bikes, when I went to collect mine). Moreover, they purposely delayed informing me that the bike was in stock, so that they could display the bike in the showroom(the model had just been launched) - I am pretty sure they must have given test rides on it as well. If a relative can be treated like this, what hope does a normal customer have? It is another matter that I got a lots of parts replaced later for free, so I consider it a square deal.

When I had to buy a car, I would go to the showroom everyday to check if my car had arrived or not. My car arrived in the evening and I took delivery the next day itself - no chance for anyone to test drive or rip - I even went on the PDI check drive, LOL. In any case, Maruti had properly designated test drive cars.

[gemithomas]

Originally Posted by kuttapan

When I had to buy a car, I would go to the showroom everyday to check if my car had arrived or not. My car arrived in the evening and I took delivery the next day itself - no chance for anyone to test drive or rip - I even went on the PDI check drive, LOL. In any case, Maruti had properly designated test drive cars.

And i have thrice done a swift test drive and they always gave me a brand new vehicle obviously awaiting a customer. THe third time i insisted on having the test drive vehicle and they said there was no diesel in it!!!

[revhappy]

Originally Posted by muneemmk

....Yes I did rip a 1.6 @ 165kmph...

Mate, at T-BHP we debate what the run in period should be, whether it shud be manufacturer recommended, or much longer like 20K kms!

You have done a Break-In instead of a Run-In free of cost for the customer !
. Might be worth checking what is the kind of FE he is getting right now.

Either the Break in strategy works and he is getting excellent FE and power or else Break in is useless and he is ruined.

[Steeroid]

Originally Posted by ImmortalZ

Lalvaz, enough of your holier than thou posturing.

Yes indeed. I wonder what Lalvaz would have had to contribute if muneem hadnt posted his part of the experience truthfully. All of his posts depend entirely on what muneem had to say about himself, and muneem has not denied any of it. Stating the obvious is unnecessary - people here can read for themselves.

[Lalvaz]

Originally Posted by Steeroid

Yes indeed. I wonder what Lalvaz would have had to contribute if muneem hadnt posted his part of the experience truthfully. All of his posts depend entirely on what muneem had to say about himself, and muneem has not denied any of it. Stating the obvious is unnecessary - people here can read for themselves.

Yes, my posts depend entirely on what Muneem had to say, but is'nt that how blogs work? Someone posts their views and others reply to it, just like you did too.

As far as your concern about me stating the obvious, well, my point was simply that Muneem seemed to be heaping all the blame on the dealer for the malpractices, and none for his own conduct.

As for coming clean, well, I appreciate Muneem for doing so, and have thanked him for sharing his views in my earlier posts.

Lets not let this degenerate any further. You and quite a few others believe that Muneem was faced with no alternative and he did the best under the circumstances. Well, I disagree. Now can we please leave it at that?

[crn12]

I agree with lalvaz, to a certain degree

So why blame FIAT for all this fiasco?

Do you think its the dealer who has shot in his own foot or muneemmk who has the guts to talk about his exp of one of his job's out in open !!

There is a guy who works as a sales executive at a car dealer
Sold a crap car to a customer (who can be part of TBHP) !!
Did 165 or so on a car which wasn't a TD car & confesses
The dealer doesnt have a TD car, not properly registered, and the sales guy ends up paying the fine - Customer sacthes a rick & goes home as he has to take his insulin shots
Sales exe - Gets irritated pays and gets the car released
Goes to office sends out a resignayion letter

Muneemmk: I agree with your sentiments which are emotinally driven, what I dont understand is why blame FIAT for all this? Would it be right for you to see whats happening and not try correcting it..Have you escalated all these issues to FIAT India? If I were you I would have done this..and then probably taken the decision

2 cents

Cheers,
Nitin

[BaCkSeAtDrIVeR]

Muneer, I admire you for using your real name to post this story. ;-)

Some comments:-

1. Trade certificate (numbers with "TC" rather than "TEMP") are valid only for taking the vehicle between manufacturer to dealer, dealer's godowns and from dealership to registration office. If the vehicle is to be registered at a place outside the place of dealer's business place, the dealer has to make a temp registration before delivering the vehicle.

2. I had considered Xeta before I got the present car. And I had visited both RF and Koyenco (then near Sarovaram). Though I had already made up not to go in for Fiat (budget constraints), I had just asked about fiats at both places. At the Koyenco dealership, I was told that different sales teams deal with Tata and Fiat vehicles, and was told that if I am serious, I will be put in touch with fiat dealership.

At RF, I was told point blank by the lady sales rep - "Sir, fiat is not for you - only those already own fiats will go for it." I was like .

At that point of time, budget was only reason I was not considering Fiat.

3. I had actually made an advance "token" for the Xeta at RF. Actually, wife had insisted on making the payment.

We were looking for a colour not easily available (sort of bluish - mostly to avoid the "taxi" image for plain whites and pearl colours). While I could make out the "we will make you take delivery of what we have" look in the sales lady's eyes, biwi could not, and she took out her card (after, the vehicle was to be purchased by her from her money, and she was supposed to drive it to work also - hence my nick), when I gave the excuse of "no cash now, will make the advance tomorrow". The lady told that they will place order for the vehicle soon, and when asked about accessories, I said that we will select them when the vehicle arrives from the mfr.

Two weeks later, the vehicle was not in sight; and the sales ladey dropped the hint tha we have to make the full payment for them to place order with Tatas. I asked wife to talk to the lady (more to convince my wife), got the deal off, and settled for the wagonR. After all, wagonR was what my wife wanted in the first place.

The lady @ RF refused to refund the "token advance". "Sir, we spent so much time and effort on paper work". (she did not place any orders) And wife hates the looks I put on every time we pass RF.

Edit:-

I have a feeling that it is the dealerships which pay poorly to its staff that also end up providing poor service to customers.

But then, this ends up as a vicious cycle. No good pay because poor sales; and poor sales because only second class people go to work for the second class dealerships. This seems to hold good for even Maruti.

The theory was framed by biwi herself - she works in a PSU bank, and her role before we got the car was doling out loans in a sem-urban town near Trichur. She would always say that people from delearship X were more competent and prompt than those from dealership Y; and would occassionally comment that salesman A, working for Y would switch over to X because X paid better salaries. But then, X had better infrastructure, and more turnover, so could afford to.

[tadukuttan]

Originally Posted by crn12

I dont understand is why blame FIAT for all this? Would it be right for you to see whats happening and not try correcting it..Have you escalated all these issues to FIAT India? If I were you I would have done this..and then probably taken the decision.

If any employer knowingly neglects ethics, and forces employees to resort to illegal and unethical practices, they surely deserve blame! Not sure why you think otherwise?

And about "raising" the issue, do you really believe that FIAT India does not know what is going on? Anyway, at least now, from reading this thread, they surely know. Do you think anything will change?

I understand many of us love Fiats to death, let that not blind us please?

@muneer - thank you so much for taking the trouble to pen this...