[rohintonw]

I booked my MG Astor Sharp ZS AT on Oct 21, 2021. Was all happy and good. Then came the wait and then the video from the company by Gaurav Gupta - CCO MG Motors India. This video was released on Nov 20, 2021 announcing the delay in cars (expected due to chips). He stated there that the price would hold true for people who booked early.

This week I get an email from my dealer saying prices have increased and that now I need to pay extra. The justification is that it is a 2022 car so you need to pay more and its just 30k more. Well for me its not just 30k more its ethics.

When I tweeted i get a call justifying the price rise and saying that the dealer controls the price and not the OEN. This is the most crazy answer I have heard.
I guess too quick a popularity gets you forget customer service.

I have gone ahead and cancelled the booking and will buy a Tata/Mahindra. At least they are ethical. Just penning down here to let others know.

Cheers and stay safe.

[Agarwal_Aayush]

Are you sure you got the call from MG and not the dealer?
To me this looks like the dealer called you as he either did not want to honor the old price or he wanted you to cancel the booking so that the car allotted to you can be passed down to someone else and he can make that extra 30k. Just guessing but could be true!

[Sammy1234]

Similar thing happened to me. Since 21st Oct, i have been told by the dealership that I am in the first 5000. Post the price increase in Jan22, I am being told that it was a mistake at their end and I am not in the first 5000 list and henceforth, will be invoiced at the new price during delivery..Seems strange that such things are happening despite MG supposedly managing the bookings. There seems to be no transparency from MG and the dealers and ut is leaving bad taste on the mouth.

[satnan]

Originally Posted by rohintonw

I booked my MG Astor Sharp ZS AT on Oct 21, 2021. Was all happy and good. Then came the wait and then the video from the company by Gaurav Gupta - CCO MG Motors India. This video was released on Nov 20, 2021 announcing the delay in cars (expected due to chips). He stated there that the price would hold true for people who booked early.

This week I get an email from my dealer saying prices have increased and that now I need to pay extra. The justification is that it is a 2022 car so you need to pay more and its just 30k more. Well for me its not just 30k more its ethics.

Did MyMG App show your car to be in batch 1? If so, this is totally unacceptable. If it was not in batch 1 (not all cars booked on 21st Oct are in batch 1), I think we cannot complain as price protection promise from MG was only for batch 1 cars.

[GTO]

At times like this, it is best to get information straight from the horse's mouth. Start off with writing a detailed email directly to MG with your booking details & especially the commitment of price protection.

Do keep us posted on the reply you get.

[immortalmechano]

As far as I understand customers who have specifically got "Batch 1" in their booking status on the app are getting price protection. My dealer has confirmed the same for me and I will be taking delivery in the next 10 days. Payment process as per old pricing has just been initiated.

[Sidban85]

Posting from Astor thread: my dealer in Bangalore said that I will get at old ex showroom price but the road tax will be on new price. Can someone confirm if this can be the case?

He also mentioned that only 3 of 20 or so cars that he got in January are from Batch 1 and so, getting price protection like me.

[gkveda]

I think you should have the video as evidence and write to MG informing the dealer behaviour and discussions.

Dealer wants to make more money. Period. He is not worried about Ethics of OEM. if you write to MG, you may be surprised to know the miscommunication and mischief by dealership.

And you should not have cancelled the booking based on some meaningless phone call. One mail to MG would have solved the problem.

[RajeVenu]

Originally Posted by gkveda

I think you should have the video as evidence and write to MG informing the dealer behaviour and discussions.

And you should not have cancelled the booking based on some meaningless phone call. One mail to MG would have solved the problem.

Most of the dealers resort to such antics to squeeze out money from buyers and since most of us would have waited for their rides for long and would have also dreamt of the moments cherishing it, will go about paying the extra bit to possess it rather than cancel the bookings. This sentiment is exploited to the hilt by dealers..

[TheVegabond]

I am finding myself on the same boat as many of us on this thread.

I booked MG Hector in October 2021 with a written commitment of car delivery within 8-10 weeks. There was also a verbal assurance of delivering the car in 4-5 weeks which obviously seemed to be done in order to secure the booking. The dealer also offered a cash discount of Rs10000 along with additional accessories while I can buy my own insurance . Happy and excited I gave away the booking amount.

The official written waiting period ended in December 2021 with no sign of the car. In January MG decided to hike the prices which inflated the OTR price in my case by about Rs60000.

I have been chasing the dealer for delivery of the car and also protect me from price hike since I already waited out the written waiting period. I have also been raising complaints on MG Pulsehub but all I get is a call stating that only the dealer can confirm the delivery date and that I have to pay the new price without any fault of mine in delay in delivery.

[hbkamit]

Originally Posted by TheVegabond

I am finding myself on the same boat as many of us on this thread.

I booked MG Hector in October 2021 with a written commitment of car delivery within 8-10 weeks. There was also a verbal assurance of delivering the car in 4-5 weeks which obviously seemed to be done in order to secure the booking. The dealer also offered a cash discount of Rs10000 along with additional accessories while I can buy my own insurance . Happy and excited I gave away the booking amount.

The official written waiting period ended in December 2021 with no sign of the car. In January MG decided to hike the prices which inflated the OTR price in my case by about Rs60000.

I have been chasing the dealer for delivery of the car and also protect me from price hike since I already waited out the written waiting period. I have also been raising complaints on MG Pulsehub but all I get is a call stating that only the dealer can confirm the delivery date and that I have to pay the new price without any fault of mine in delay in delivery.

Same thing happened with me as I well. I booked my Hector in October (Havana Grey) color and 4-5 times I was committed that I will get my color and car before December. But once the waiting period ended, i wrote an email to MG about the false commitments they are making and then the dealer called me to offer me a white color. Since I knew the price was going to increase and I did not want to pay extra for just the color, i took the delivery of the car in December. I now got to know the prices have increased by approx 70,000 which is a huge amount. I was lucky but this is really irresponsible at the end of the OEM as well as the dealer.

I am sure when the dealers were quoting delivery times of 8 to 10 weeks, this would have come in from MG looking and these delivery times would have considered the availability of chips, however, it seems like either someone in MG was not doing there demand planning correctly. In the end the customers get to suffer despite paying north of 20 lacs for a car (which by no means is a small amount.

[TheVegabond]

Originally Posted by hbkamit

Same thing happened with me as I well. I booked my Hector in October (Havana Grey) color and 4-5 times I was committed that I will get my color and car before December. But once the waiting period ended, i wrote an email to MG about the false commitments they are making and then the dealer called me to offer me a white color. Since I knew the price was going to increase and I did not want to pay extra for just the color, i took the delivery of the car in December. I now got to know the prices have increased by approx 70,000 which is a huge amount. I was lucky but this is really irresponsible at the end of the OEM as well as the dealer.

I am sure when the dealers were quoting delivery times of 8 to 10 weeks, this would have come in from MG looking and these delivery times would have considered the availability of chips, however, it seems like either someone in MG was not doing there demand planning correctly. In the end the customers get to suffer despite paying north of 20 lacs for a car (which by no means is a small amount.

You certainly were lucky to get the car delivered before the price hike.

I too booked in Havana Gray color but about a month after the booking I conveyed to the dealer that I can take the car in any available color to which he responded that it will certainly make it easier for them to get the car delivered in December which obviously did not happen.

At the time of booking I specifically asked about the impact of chip shortage to which the dealer responded that without chip shortage they were getting the cars delivered within 3-4 weeks and that the waiting period had been increased to 8 weeks taking the chip shortage into consideration.

When I escalated to the dealership in December, they offered me a demo car with Rs1.5 lacs discount. After going through the details I came to know that what they were offering was a January 2021 manufactured demo car with 12000KMs on the ODO and the discount would be calculated based on the prices in December 2021; they conveniently assumed that I would not know that MG had hiked the prices multiple times between January 2021 and December 2021.

[TheStRyder]

MG is really not being transparent. They are just passing the buck between the dealer and the OEM. My booking is from Batch 1. The online status still shows delivery in Nov 2021. Dealer is not ready to commit delivery even by Jan end and pulsehub customercare is clueless and does not call back. Though they have offered price protection. This I guess will be as a discount as the dealer communicated that I will have to bear increase in Registration cost and insurance as they have already updated the increased ex showroom prices in the gov system.

[AkhilR]

The call might be from the dealer but since the OP tweeted directly to MG, they could have called him or got back to him and solved the issue. Anyway the confusion occurs only because MG promised the price protection just for batch 1 instead of all cars booked before the price hike, or at least in Oct 21. Seems like MG is interested just in marketing and doesn’t care about customer service.

[anjan_c2007]

Happens when the manufacturer and dealer develop an attitude due to the popularity of their product. The many complaints of no price protection listed here show that the dealers with more like minded dealers have formed a cartel to gain unduly at the cost of their customers. The Chinese carmaker's professional and seasoned silence shows that it is hand in glove with its dealers.

What kind of post sales service can one expect from such a car maker and the ASC's when hapless customers have no other option rather than go only there with their SUV's problems??