[Sahil]

27th July was a horrifying day for all of us. Thankfully all my cars werent on the roads. My dad had to spend the night at our office and the mercedes was parked safely in the compound, through out the rains thanks to the good drainage system in the office building the water reached only till the ankel length which is barely till the the bottom of the mercs bumper. Next morning my driver started the car and it drove properly for about half a kilometer and spotted. My dad called autohangar and they towed the car to their workshop.........
Now the terror begins, they sent us an estimate of approx 1.5 Lakhs claiming that the car was damaged in the rains. Its suprising as barely any water had seeped into the car, only the floor carpets were wet. In the estimate two parts had to be changed which costed approx 70,000rs - the 'central ECU' and the 'front SAM' (Rest 80,000 was just to clean the car and small jobs!!). I was clueless as to how my car can get so damaged even though it was just standing in the building, my other office cars were parked right beside mine and none of them had any problems at all. I was sure something was wrong, I went to the work shop and got the ECU and front SAM out to inspect it myself. Thats when i realised that these guys r cheats....these two parts sit right above the engine...there is no way in hell that the water reached there.... the estimate they gave me seemed to be a standard one given to all customers without checking how much water had go into the car....I took the parts and sent it to Millenium (Mercedes Benz authorized dealer and service center) in poona as my dad has a good contact their ...they said that there seems to be nothign wrong with it but we need to fit the part into the your car to be sure.... I got the car towed from bombay to poona and they charged me 6000rs for the same..........autohangar asked me to pay them 8000rs for towing charges from bandra to andheri!!!!!!!! When the car reached pune it was put on the scanner and checked for the ECU and other malfuncations and it came out clean! They said it was working fine, minor fuse change problem and cleaning was required at nominal charges will be applied.
Autohangar did not even bother to check into my car just decided for themselves and lied to us saying these parts have been damaged. It was my good sight that i spotted something fishy, I feel bad for the numerous merc owners that have fallen pray to these tricks pulled by autohangar. I had considered them to be the best dealers for MB in mumbai and was planning to buy my E 270 Cdi from them soon, forget buying it from them i dont think i would ever wanna buy a merc again !!! The tons of problems that my C180 has given has move than proven to me that MBIL sux and autohangar sux even more!! Cant wait for BMW to launch officially!! until then i will get my mercedes work done in poona itself, i dont mind taking the problem to drive it down their for servicing but there is no way autohangar is touching my car from now on! Honesty and trust are qualities that one expects from a mercedes and when their own dealers r dishonest cheats it just ruins the companys image totally. They have definatly lost me as a customer, if BMW was avaible offically at the moment I would pick it up right way without a doubt over mercedes.

[revtech]

hey sad to hear about how they tried to cheat you but its good that you just didnt give in and took the initiative to check things out.

similar things have happened tones of times but it seems they will never change...

so much for the great name of MERCEDES BENZ !!!

Rev

[Beemer]

Its pity to know that even in such situation these people try to play such games with their customers and as you told you were not the only one ....

Originally Posted by Sahil

Honesty and trust are qualities that one expects from a mercedes

Well , there are some things out of DCIL hands (until they are being told) and i think you should write a strong letter to DCIL , detailing about the things and i am sure they would revert back to you and do the necessary things against Autohangar .

Originally Posted by Sahil

There's no guarantee that the BMW dealers ll always be honest and true to you . Remember its dealers who do such nasty things , so you 've no control over them except to change .


when their own dealers r dishonest cheats it just ruins the companys image totally.They have definatly lost me as a customer, if BMW was avaible offically at the moment I would pick it up right way without a doubt over mercedes.

IMO , i dont think just coz of one dealer the Brand overall should be blamed .

Let me tell you the incident hppened to me .....

When my octavia was fully crashed , i took it to the silvertone motors and as the car was not in the state of repair , i had to make my car stand there for two months and i was told that i ll be charged Rs. 10,000 only .... But the day i was about to take my car i was told to pay Rs 40,000 , i was too unhappy as these were just the Paking charges , but i had no other option then to pay and move .... I had sweared , i wont ever go to that dealer again but that never changed my opinion of skoda as a Car/brand .


p.s IMO the Brand should not be blamed for such ....

[sivadas]

You need to post this incident in all auto magazines (and where ever possible).

[Mpower]

Someone had recently posted about getting a 90,000 bill for servicing an old W124 E class at Autohangar.

[Surprise]

Is this can be claimed under Insurance?. If we can do that, dealers know people won't question the estimate. This is how dealers compensate their expensive living.

[Sahil]

Originally Posted by Beemer

IMO , i dont think just coz of one dealer the Brand overall should be blamed .

Buddy my decision to never buy a merc is not coz of one dealer...its due to the series of problems that my car has faced.... i have mentioned the same in previous posts....I own two C180's both... i''ll repeat few of the major problems for u once again
-The fuel tank leaked in the middle of the road...all the petrol dropped .... just thank my stars that there was no fire around or else this would be MAJOR!!... i dont even expect this to happen in the worest of cars.
- Once on my way to nasik i pressed the clutch to shift up and the clutch refuse to come back out....it just got stuck in .... i was luckily at just 30km/hr and hence managed to control it to a hault somehow! Called the MBIL helpline and they are like yaa such things happen when the oil in the clutch gets heated, just turn the car off for a while and the oil will get a little thin so u can use it then. The car was not even overheating!
- The AC just stopped cooling one day ...took it to the service center they gave an estimate of 80,000 as some major part had conked off.....i instead took it to my local ac guy and filled up the gas and the ac was back to perfect! Again this time they tried to cheat me. For a minor problem of gas filled to an 80,000 component!!
- Electronic braking system started failing.... I was driving down marine drive once, enjoy my car and suddenly the screen flash ABS fail!! BAS Fail!! Imagine at 120km/hr the car just tells u that the major braking systems have jsut conked off !!

Well these r jsut the few MAJOR problems that i can think of now.......there have been several other small problems which i have tried to let go..... This is why i said that a BMW is going to be my next car and not a merc.....not that i have faith in the future BMW dealers but i have faith in the brand. Mercedes comes up with millions of problem which causes owners to go back to the service center and hence gives the cheats like autohangar a chance to swindle us.... but i have faith that BMW wont make me visit the service center as often apart from servicing so that reduces the chance for the dealers to cheat us.

Originally Posted by Surprise

Is this can be claimed under Insurance?. If we can do that, dealers know people won't question the estimate. This is how dealers compensate their expensive living.

Compensate their expensive living by cheating customers!!??!! I didnt not want to claim insurance because i have a high no claim bonus.... its upto the customer to decide if he wants to or not....fine if i have told them that i wanna claim insurance and then they bump up the estimate to cheat the insurance company then its between the two of them as the insurance is not their customer.... but when i have said that i am not goin to claim insurance then why cheat me for things that r not damaged!!?

[aseem]

I think a person buying MB in India should not care about the price of repairs. 1.5 lakhs is cheap considering the peace of mind you will get. Why waste your precious time and effort going from Bombay to Pune to verify things etc. You could have just mentioned to the Bombay showroom that you feel ECU is ok. What they are recommending is for the safety of their highly valued customers, that change the ECU and front SAM so that you can have that peace of mind.
Rest if you think MB is bad in service, dont even consider BMW as those people rip you off on spares. If you are looking for a car with cheap spares, than try Baleno in C segment or Hyundai Sonata in D segment. Kindly post the pics when you buy a new car.

[sridhar24]

Hey Sahil good to hear that you didn't get cheated like other poor customers, the BMW might have better quality and fewer problems but the dealers are the main culprits, they should stop cheating the customers like this.
You should have reported this to ACI, so that even other people read that and don't get cheatd by Autohanger.

[sandeepmdas]

Originally Posted by aseem

I think a person buying MB in India should not care about the price of repairs. 1.5 lakhs is cheap considering the peace of mind you will get. Why waste your precious time and effort going from Bombay to Pune to verify things etc.

@aseem, I think you missed the point completely. Why should one spend INR 1.5L just for nothing? I think the Auto Hanger guys were under the impression that this merc owner will go for the insurance claim...that is:
- prepare and present an estimate for 1.5L to the owner
- the owner will immediately approve it without blinking an eye
- collude with the insurer and get the claim passed at that end.

Apparently, things took a bad turn when Sahil went for the pay-out-of-his-pocket plan.

Let's call a cheat, a cheat...

[v1p3r]

Originally Posted by aseem

I think a person buying MB in India should not care about the price of repairs.

Why? Why should no buyer care about the spares prices? It's his hard-earned moeny, and he has a right to not be cheated out of it.

Originally Posted by aseem

1.5 lakhs is cheap considering the peace of mind you will get. .

What peace of mind? The tank leaking in the middle of the road? The ABS BAS failure? These are things that don't even happen in a 2.5 lakh M800. Why should they happen on a 25 lakh car then?

Originally Posted by aseem

Why waste your precious time and effort going from Bombay to Pune to verify things etc. You could have just mentioned to the Bombay showroom that you feel ECU is ok. What they are recommending is for the safety of their highly valued customers

And money is not precious? Why waste 1.5 lakhs on something that shouldn't cost that much? Why should the onus of checking be on the customer? Why can't the dealer check for himself before presenting a bill for his Mauritius holiday? Is this the safety that led to the petrol tank and brake systems failing?

Aseem, I'm sorry if I sound personal. No such issue with you. But it irks me when car companies/dealers try and take customers for a ride. Imagine, on TBHP, we are atleast aware. Some layman will be paying 10 lakhs to get his S class repaired, for an Rs 20000 damage

.

[Sahil]

Originally Posted by aseem

I think a person buying MB in India should not care about the price of repairs. 1.5 lakhs is cheap considering the peace of mind you will get. Why waste your precious time and effort going from Bombay to Pune to verify things etc. You could have just mentioned to the Bombay showroom that you feel ECU is ok. What they are recommending is for the safety of their highly valued customers, that change the ECU and front SAM so that you can have that peace of mind.
Rest if you think MB is bad in service, dont even consider BMW as those people rip you off on spares. If you are looking for a car with cheap spares, than try Baleno in C segment or Hyundai Sonata in D segment. Kindly post the pics when you buy a new car.

You crack me up buddy...i have nothing to say to you.... v1p3r put my sentiments quite rightly,thnx....I fail to understand your logic aseem, lets leave it at that

[aseem]

Originally Posted by Sahil

You crack me up buddy...i have nothing to say to you.... v1p3r put my sentiments quite rightly,thnx....I fail to understand your logic aseem, lets leave it at that

I think everyone is this forum is missing the point. What I have mentioned is very practical. See we all go and see movies in PVR and pay 150 bucks whereas we can see the same movie in a front stall at some local theatre for 20 bucks. So we pay 7 times more and than also spend another 300-400 bucks on snacks. So we pay at least 20 times more to watch a movie in PVR as opposed to watching the same movie at a local theatre. But we pay that for the ambience, for the infrastructure that PVR provides and for the comfort.
Same is true in your case with your MB dealership. They are charging you more for the same thing than a local mechanic outside simply because the peace of mind they provide. I agree that they are overpriced, but they provide quality service to their high profile and valued customers. Like stated previously, if you are fed up with being overcharged and dont want to pay 20x times more on repairs, than consider Baleno, City, or Sonata they are excellent VFM with good service and cheap spears.
No hard feelings.

[Surprise]

Originally Posted by Sahil

but when i have said that i am not goin to claim insurance then why cheat me for things that r not damaged!!?

If there is real damage, you mean to say that you will pocket it out ( 1.5 L) to maintain no claim bonus.

[Surprise]

Originally Posted by aseem

but they provide quality service to their high profile and valued customers

I am not with your logic. Those cheats are trying to bill you for a non-existent problem.

There is no question of over charging, its a question of cheating.