[ghodlur]

Originally Posted by sidindica

QC at plant level. Still more tightening up required.

+1 to that esp the QC part. Classic examples of door locks, batteries, horns etc need to have stringent QC process. These are the parts which fail often and in new cars just out of the factory. If consumer confidence is dented on spares failing withing few days/months of ownership, the brand image goes for a toss.

Originally Posted by greenhorn

Since lead time is critical, I wonder why the only central warehouse is in the north. No love for southern customers?

The central warehouse is at Pune which is midway to the North and South market. Ideally Fiat should have a dedicated warehouse for north, east, south and western regions. This will reduce their dependance on logistics to farthest market.

[puchoo]

I agree , in fact this is exactly what Skoda did last year to better the demand-supply and associated lead times for their spare parts as well. They eventually opened a warehouse in North India at Manesar to be exact.

Originally Posted by ghodlur

The central warehouse is at Pune which is midway to the North and South market. Ideally Fiat should have a dedicated warehouse for north, east, south and western regions. This will reduce their dependance on logistics to farthest market.

[Thumping Soul]

As a matter of fact, in my 3+ years of owning the Grande Punto, I never had to face an issue with any major / minor parts being out-of-stock. Except once, when 'Horn' was not in stock & I got a call from the Service Manager, within 4days, and was replaced the very next weekend. This was just before Tata & Fiat parted ways.

And with this step of Fiat, I hope availability of parts would improve across all service centers and not limited to just a few.

[ad3952n]

Originally Posted by mints21

In a latest move to enhance customer service levels at Fiat India, the company has decided to ensure that each dealer should have adequate stock of spare parts for more efficient customer service.

The company hopes to meet around 75-80 percent of service requirements with this move.

The company also plans to increase its dealerships from the present 108 to 500 dealerships by December 2014.

Dear Sir, I guess FIAT has taken the right step at the right time. Not only the issue regarding the spares availability shall be rectified but it shall bring down the cost of maintenance for the owners as well.

As far as increasing the number of dealers is concerned, I feel this is a major step towards increasing the brand's presence in India and it also shall help FIAT reach to places which are at present being dominated by it's Korean and Japanese counterparts.

Thanks

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[riturajsharma19]

I have had the most wretched ownership experience so far. Spare parts have taken anywhere between 2 to 7 months to arrive. To top it all, there is no service center now even in the 320 km radius. With the earlier Tata-Fiat arrangement, there were dealerships/service centers everywhere. To make things worse, there are major issues with my car- issues that have remained unresolved for more than a year. At a personal level, a big thumbs down to Fiat.

[one-77]

There have been a four or five times I've required minor parts replacements in my Linea. Only once was the part required in stock. All other times, parts took between five days and two months to arrive.
Had they been major parts, these could have been really inconvenient waits for me. Also even with standalone Fiat dealerships and service centres, the ownership experience has hardly improved. The Tata hangover still remains in the staff.
Good that Fiat has realized at least the spares problem, although a few years too late.

[GrammarNazi]

On further thought I feel this 'move to increase spare part availability across dealers' is makes no sense at all. I mean, why not just create a single spare part distributor for every metro city? I guess FIAT is quite cash rich and can easily afford to set up such a distributor. Currently service centers have a lead time of 1 week, this can even be reduced to a single day!

Dealers and customers could both buy genuine OEM spares OTC from there. This would ease inventory management costs to dealers and overall reduce carrying costs too, leading to more profitability. Infact, it'd also be more easy to manage and operate such a setup rather than 'ensuring' dealers keep spares.

Also, I genuinely believe this '500 dealerships by Dec 2014' news is absolutely absurd, and could be detrimental to customers. Just imagine - they'll have to do not just the paperwork but also ALOT of ground-work, like for example training the new workers. What kind of quality training will they be given within 2-3 months? What kind of competence or expertise will the workers gain?

Also, newly trained staff will practice on customer cars. (I genuinely believe that's what happens, and I'm NOT ready to be the scapegoat for new dealers R&D activities).

Then they also have to create internal controls and quality checks so that customers don't get cheated. Yes, DMS (dealer management system) helps keep track of dealer activity, but I do not believe FIAT has the machinery or operating capability to take necessary corrective or even punitive action against, if necessary, 100 (1/5th of total) erring dealers at a time.

All this from a company which, apart from other flaws I came across, doesn't even have the managing capability to ensure they employ & operate a decent communications department to talk to people through social media. Their Facebook page admins don't seem to have BASIC common sense when spoken to!

I'm neither a huge Fiat Fan, nor do I like bashing them. What I like about their cars are the way the handle and the way they keep you safely cocooned. But that's about it. Reason is the issues I face (even after being an extremely sedate and careful driver) and service bills I see, being rather displeasing.

IMHO FIAT needs to give a serious look into operating efficiently as a company and pass on that benefit in guise of good service and lower costs to its customers. I believe they can, and I hope they do.

Dear FIAT, in short, we DONT need quantity, we need quality, we need competence, we need expertise.

[selvagp]

This Monday, I purchased lower grill and tow hook plug for my Punto OTC. Thats right over the counter. There were some small talk among themselves when I said I am here to buy just some spares. They did not make too much of a scene and gave me the parts I needed. I was pleasantly surprised.

[viper_711]

Originally Posted by greenhorn

Since lead time is critical, I wonder why the only central warehouse is in the north. No love for southern customers?

Chakan is in the Pune area - making it kind of equidistant for North and South India. East India should be complaining!
On another note, Having one depot in North and one in South would be better from a logistical point of view IMO.

[Pedaltothefloor]

In two years of ownership, I don't remember being held up for any parts for a long time. While you can argue that the initial two years of ownership do not call for many parts to be replaced, I had the remote key, front suspension, both brake discs, a pillar interior panel, rear window motor, C Bed, MAF Sensor & ECR Valve / Intake switch replaced for several reasons.

Only the last part was not available & they pulled it out from another vehicle that is going to be at the service center for a long time & needs a lot of other parts to be replaced. Not ethical at all but they completed the job & assured me that this is normal & they did it to ensure my car is not waiting for a part for a week whereas the other car anyway needs to be here for a couple of weeks.

[Sommos]

Originally Posted by Pedaltothefloor

Only the last part was not available & they pulled it out from another vehicle that is going to be at the service center for a long time & needs a lot of other parts to be replaced. Not ethical at all but they completed the job & assured me that this is normal & they did it to ensure my car is not waiting for a part for a week whereas the other car anyway needs to be here for a couple of weeks.

How can this practice be Normal by any standards. I understand that your car did not have to wait but how can it be normal to pull out spares from one's car and putting the same into another's.

You put yourself into the other gentleman's shoe and say would you approve anyone taking out spares from your vehicle.

[rohittunga]

Originally Posted by Pedaltothefloor

Only the last part was not available & they pulled it out from another vehicle that is going to be at the service center for a long time & needs a lot of other parts to be replaced. Not ethical at all but they completed the job & assured me that this is normal & they did it to ensure my car is not waiting for a part for a week whereas the other car anyway needs to be here for a couple of weeks.

Isn't this cheating on the part of the Service Center. Let the other car be in the workshop for whatever reason. That does not give the right or authority to the Service Center to swap his perfectly working component without the consent of the owner. At least the Service Center could have tried sourcing it with other service centers within the same city, or worst case, take the specific part from their demo cars or loaner cars. But swapping from another customer's car is down right ridiculous. As said by Sommos, How would you feel if someone flicks a part from your car without you knowing.

I wonder how you even agreed to a shady deal. If you had to bear the cost of the swapped part, didn't you feel shortchanged as you had to pay the cost of a new part, but instead got a used one.

For the benefit of other Fiat car owners, can you please share the details of the Service Center who indulges in such malpractices so that we all steer clear from that service center

[riturajsharma19]

I will repeat what I had said in my earlier post. I had to wait for 2 to 7 months for parts to arrive. The car in question is a 2011 May example Punto MJD, not some old Palio or Uno. On each of those occasions, the parts arrived only after the delay issue was escalated to Fiat's customer care, which by the way is a joke. I have found Fiat's service quality to be nothing short of pathetic. Their service has only increased the number of issues with the car, never solved them.

[Pedaltothefloor]

Originally Posted by rohittunga

Isn't this cheating on the part of the Service Center. Let the other car be in the workshop for whatever reason. That does not give the right or authority to the Service Center to swap his perfectly working component without the consent of the owner. At least the Service Center could have tried sourcing it with other service centers within the same city, or worst case, take the specific part from their demo cars or loaner cars. But swapping from another customer's car is down right ridiculous. As said by Sommos, How would you feel if someone flicks a part from your car without you knowing.

I wonder how you even agreed to a shady deal. If you had to bear the cost of the swapped part, didn't you feel shortchanged as you had to pay the cost of a new part, but instead got a used one.

For the benefit of other Fiat car owners, can you please share the details of the Service Center who indulges in such malpractices so that we all steer clear from that service center

I should have been able to pre-empt this. The car in question is a new car yet to be sold. It is there because it has some problems and needs some parts to be replaced. The reason I mentioned the word "unethical" is because if so much is wrong with this brand new Punto 90HP that it will be there for a few weeks getting many parts replaced, it is not fair to the prospective buyer.

[Sommos]

Originally Posted by Pedaltothefloor

I should have been able to pre-empt this. The car in question is a new car yet to be sold. It is there because it has some problems and needs some parts to be replaced. The reason I mentioned the word "unethical" is because if so much is wrong with this brand new Punto 90HP that it will be there for a few weeks getting many parts replaced, it is not fair to the prospective buyer.

Now, this clarification pacifies the issue to a large extent, but still if a brand new car requires several parts replacement then what QC and improvement is Fiat talking about.

I agree with your views that it is totally unethical on the part of the dealer to sell such a car (which required several parts to be replaced) to an unsuspecting buyer.