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Old 16th October 2013, 08:59   #31
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Re: JLR India PR disaster! Salman Khan tweets his anger on Range Rover breakdown

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Originally Posted by Octane_Power View Post
Moreover, I don't think RR would risk their name by treating the car of a celebrity of his stature in a careless manner.
Careless how? Seems like car is under warranty and dealer is doing whatever they can FOC... but his frustration stems from having to send it for warranty work again & again. His annoyance is with RR and not the dealer

Secondly, the dealer has reportedly mentioned that pad wear is attributed to it being a heavy vehicle (so right there the dealer is also admitting that its indeed wearing faster than other vehicles)

Even accounting for exaggeration, changing pads 3-4 times in 1.5 years is excessive

Quote:
since he doesn't have a smooth style of writing it is very much possible that what he is conveying to us, the actual might be very different from it.
Unless he's downright lying, its pretty clear. The OP has further provided an English translation.

Last edited by Mpower : 16th October 2013 at 19:25.
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Old 16th October 2013, 09:17   #32
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Re: JLR India PR disaster! Salman Khan tweets his frustration on Range Rover breakdow

I dont discount a word he is saying.

I myself have had an awful experience with my s350. Brake pads changed, front air suspension changed 3 times, audio system not working and repaired, engine mounts being replaced.

The standard excuse for Mercedes is always that it is a big, powerful car and indian roads are bad. It makes me livid. As if mercedes does not take into account the weight of the vehicle when designing components.

Im looking down the barrel of another front suspension job. Did i mention my car has done 30k kilometres, all in south mumbai?

I love the car, but reliability wise, i swear by my fortuner. Seems toyota has designed components for the cars weight and environment!
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Old 16th October 2013, 09:22   #33
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Re: JLR India PR disaster! Salman Khan tweets his frustration on Range Rover breakdow

Though I am not a fan of Salman Khan in any way, in fact I downright avoid his movies, it is unfair to say that he is "lying" or deliberately trying to distort the facts.
He must be owning tons of cars, including all kinds of exotics. They would also be having their fair share of problems, being complex vehicles.
Has he ever complained before? If the breakdowns were once in a while, he can always take another car from his garage and not be bothered.

But the car must really have been giving him trouble so that he goes to the extent of making it public.

Manufacturers use the celebrity power to promote their vehicles, they should also stand behind them in case of problems, knowing it can cause PR nightmares.

And if they choose not to care about it, then I think the rest of the buyers can well imagine what treatment they would get. I think the forum is filled with many horror stories, most of which are against premium European brands like Merc, Skoda(Premium in India), Audi (The recent Maharashtra case) etc.


Its time for the manufacturers to take responsibility of their products and not resort to excuses like
- Indian road conditions are bad
- These cars are built for Autobahns, hence not suitable for India. Such things will happen, Sir.
- Car is heavy
- Fuel quality is poor
- You must be abusing your car
- Its your fault, Sir

etc etc.

Rgds
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Old 16th October 2013, 10:29   #34
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Re: JLR India PR disaster! Salman Khan tweets his frustration on Range Rover breakdow

Is this the TATA effect or were they known for poor customer service even before ?
Anyway good to know that Salman tweeted and let the whole world know about it. But it is a shame that they did not even spare a celebrity like Salman from such kind of service. Were they expecting him to not to take notice of it and just keep on changing the brake pads as and when they suggest. It is high time that they learn a lesson or 2 on keeping their customers happy. I loved Salman's reasoning by referring to "bus/train/plane ", lol !
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Old 16th October 2013, 10:45   #35
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Originally Posted by figo_mba View Post
There was a time in Australia it was all Landrovers all the time. They were rugged but not very reliable but most importantly Australians did not have a choice then. For an Australian herder/rancher reliability is life. Landrover would strand him in the middle of the Great Australian desert when he was out to get his groceries, only to be bitten by a snake or a spider. Then in the 70s slowly but steadily the Japanese came in with their Landcruisers and Patrols. They were dead simple and simply reliable. He just switched and LandRover was wiped off in no time.
This is true. Endorsed wholly by an auto enthusiast friend of mine who lived in Oz for many years.
Incidentally it is equally true of North Africa and other bits of Africa too, not to mention the Gulf states and South East Asia as well!
Not sure about Lat Am though it is distinctly possible that this is true there too!
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Old 16th October 2013, 14:34   #36
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Re: JLR India PR disaster! Salman Khan tweets his frustration on Range Rover breakdow

Anyone who's owned an E39 M5 would know a thing or two about cars. Range Rovers are notorious for their unreliable nature and I'm inclined to believe Salman here.

A fellow BHPian's Defender recently suffered its 2nd breakdown (in 30,000 kms total running) earlier this week. Thread coming up soon.
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Old 16th October 2013, 14:57   #37
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Re: JLR India PR disaster! Salman Khan tweets his frustration on Range Rover breakdow

Its a Range Rover and it doesn't like our roads? I dont think it was used for offroad or rough roads.

Not sure how these guys design their cars. A friend of mine had a small accident with a Auto hitting his rear bumper and there was water leakage in the trunk of his VW Vento. Whats more, after twice going for repair, it still leaks.
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Old 16th October 2013, 15:03   #38
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Re: JLR India PR disaster! Salman Khan tweets his frustration on Range Rover breakdow

The Problem with "Premium" cars in India, is that the support staff who are responsible to attend to them, have not evolved to be "Premium" themselves.

Modern cars have extensive and well drawn SOP's for almost every work to be done on the car, but the final mechanic that works on these cars might not even have flipped the pages of the respective service manual, am sure many can't even read and decipher something written in English (let alone German!)
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Old 16th October 2013, 15:07   #39
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Re: JLR India PR disaster! Salman Khan tweets his frustration on Range Rover breakdow

I don't understand why there are posts against Salman. Is it because he is a celebrity ?
All we have here is a disgruntled customer tweeting his opinion.
In our very own forum, we have so many non Skoda owners having all kinda negative opinions and comments on Skoda. Atleast in this case we have an actual owner complaining.
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Old 16th October 2013, 15:17   #40
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Re: JLR India PR disaster! Salman Khan tweets his frustration on Range Rover breakdow

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Originally Posted by 1100D View Post
Modern cars have extensive and well drawn SOP's for almost every work to be done on the car, but the final mechanic that works on these cars might not even have flipped the pages of the respective service manual, am sure many can't even read and decipher something written in English (let alone German!)
When you consider reputed/authorised dealers for brands like BMW, Mercedes, Range Rover, you will be shocked to know the education level of the technicians. These companies spend extensively on trainings, some even abroad and needless to say English (Speaking,Reading Writing) is mandatory. Some dealers even have Diploa/B.E. guys as Technicians!

The problem will arise when the knowledge that they have is not used as needed.
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Old 16th October 2013, 15:56   #41
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Re: JLR India PR disaster! Salman Khan tweets his frustration on Range Rover breakdow

WHAT?!? i thought range rovers were one of the most reliable cars ever made. for instance, topgear uk use them as camera crew and they are very pleased with it! or perhaps, the case is that indian range rovers aren't reliable!
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Old 16th October 2013, 16:01   #42
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Re: JLR India PR disaster. Salman Khan tweet his anger due to his broken down Range R

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Originally Posted by VeyronSuperSprt View Post
Exactly. So it's a story. Where two times has been distorted as 9 times hiding the real facts.
Sorry... It does not works that way. In fact you are playing with words. So stop doing that. If the pads were changed on 9 different occassions while doing R&D then that's what the end user will say. Changed 9 times. Why you had to do that over 9 iterations is entirely your headache as the ASS. I as a user am not (should not) bothered with whether that made only 2 changes for the entire set!
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Old 16th October 2013, 16:07   #43
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Re: JLR India PR disaster! Salman Khan tweets his frustration on Range Rover breakdow

Well we don't know who drives the car. If it's driver his track record is unknown but salman khan has been involved in a much talked about accident in bandra where some one lost life. This issue is still in court. So let's not be under assumption that the vehicle wasn't through some rough use.
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Old 16th October 2013, 17:46   #44
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Re: JLR India PR disaster! Salman Khan tweets his frustration on Range Rover breakdow

First the German trio and now the British brigade? These have never been as reliable as the Japanese. I wonder if the Brits and Germans sell only on the strength of their old lineage and pedigree.

But will it make any difference? I doubt. It's been half a decade of horror stories and breakdowns of German trios but there is no let up in their sales. On the contrary, their number is growing. Every neuo riche wants to own a German or a Brit. We all know a Japanese is much more reliable. But the minute we make it big in life, we go and buy a German/Brit. Someone said Land Rover is finished in Austarlian market and western market. But Australian market itself is insignificant. It is miniscule compared to emerging markets of BRIC nations. BRIC nations is where all the action is and BRIC nations have taken a liking to Land Rover and other Brit brands. So, lucky for them right now but if the number of disgruntled owners rises, it may spell doom for them.
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Old 16th October 2013, 18:05   #45
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Re: JLR India PR disaster! Salman Khan tweets his frustration on Range Rover breakdow

A bit of topic here but Toyota should really wake the Heck up and bring Lexus to India like ASAP.

Every body I know who has a German Trio car or the one who owns a Jaguar and two others owning Volvo's, they all hate the reliability of their cars. I kid you not all of them either have a Fortuner or a few have Pajeros at home and more often than not they are in these Japanese SUV's, reasons are many and they hate to admit why they are not taking out their more expensive cars but factor is same, they do not want to cause excess wear and tear, translating to no heavy bills please.
My own Uncle has an M and an E, the M has 7000 something Km's and the E around 9000 Km's, the M is 3 years old and the E around 2. Their old Fortuner had more than a lakh Km's before they sold to get a new one and this one has already done 40,000 in around an year. Go Figure
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