Team-BHP - Ford EcoSport : Official Review

I got a call from Delhi Ford, inviting me to come check out the car and TD it.

On display - Diamond White & Mars Red
On Test Drive - Diesel and... well the executive didnt know what to say to present ecoboost so goes "And sir petrol ki ek nayi engine aayi hai, ecoboost, kaafi alag hai and sahi hai, woh bhi TD pe hai"... So yeah and Ecoboost!

Gonna go check it out and confirm if I still want the White or Im gonna change to Sea Grey... Though for sure I do not want Mars red, cant imagine myself sitting in a bright orangey-red small SUV... Sports cars are different, but Mini SUV is a straight no-no in red, unless, it was the Duster's red... totally love it (so does my mum)!

:OT Another purchase query I have is regarding "Depot Charges". I guess Delhi high court has banned such charges but still almost all dealers in Mumbai charge Depot charges ranging from 3000-5000 rupees.

e.g. I bought a i20 in January and was charged Rs. 8000 extra for registration (dealer officially billed this to me as "registration other charges"). Upon asking the dealer he says 5k has to be bribed to Vasai RTO and 3k are agent charges. Great! I had no time to fight with them so let to. :Frustrati I am sure Ford dealers will also do the same.

So my question is do we pay Ford Depot charges? What do we do if they refuse to pull it off from the OTR?

Re: Pricing. Went into Wasan Ford at Marine Lines/Churchgate to see if they had one around for a TD. 26th it comes in. The sales agent I talked to seemed to be pretty certain that the Diesel fully loaded would come in at around the high end of 11, just under 12 L. *sigh*.

Would have seriously considered it if it were somewhere between the quanto and the duster. Looks like its going to be the most expensive of the three.

Is anyone getting clearer indications of what the price point is going to be? Websites that say between 6 and 12 lakhs are no use at all

J

Quote:

Originally Posted by esma1981 (Post 3156137)

I don't think this will be the case. If I understand you correctly, they will announce the pricelist but it will be only available to people who have Pre-booked, So then they will announce another pricelist for people who want to book the car.

I think i was not clear, i meant to say that people who booked initially will get an introductory price which will be revised at a later stage looking at the demand.

Quote:

Originally Posted by sunilg33 (Post 3156162)

I do not think that should be taken literally. Renault when they announced their first price hike for duster in october, they waved off the hike for people who booked before august. So even ford could do something like this as a show of goodwill for the ones who booked early.

I hope so :)

By god, are they so blatant these days? If I were the Govt. I'd ask these dealers who the respective individuals are whose palms are greased.

e.g. I bought a i20 in January and was charged Rs. 8000 extra for registration (dealer officially billed this to me as "registration other charges"). Upon asking the dealer he says 5k has to be bribed to Vasai RTO and 3k are agent charges.

Quote:

Originally Posted by revv_maniac (Post 3156481)

The sales guy said within Rs.12 lacs OTR :Shockked:

somehow, something tells me it will be max Rs.10.5 lacs OTR for Tdci titanium.

Expect Tdci Titanium (O) to be around 12 lacs OTR in Pune. The Tdci Titanium to be around 11.35lacs OTR. And this is per the sales advisor i'm speaking to.

Went and saw an Ecosport being prepped for 26th with accessories. None of them except the spare wheel cover change the Ecosport exteriors in a significant way. TD only from 26th in spite of quoting that other dealers down south have already started.

Talera Ford stock yard, Pune has around 22-24 Ecosports. No petrol or Ecoboost. All Tdci, 4 T(O), 2-3 (T) and most Trend and few ambiente. The T(O) & T variants will mostly end up being display & TD vehicles since they have 2 showrooms. Saw the "Chill" color in person and i changed my mind from Sea Grey to Chill...makes the car look so much larger. Only 1 Blue, Mars Red & Chill, rest of the 22-24 probably evenly spread b/w Sea Grey, Black & White. As per the PDI person, the cars are being dispatched as and when they come off the line and get distributed/allocated to dealers. No specific schedule from Ford that says month 1 = x cars, month 2 = y cars..which i kinda find hard to believe.

There were 5 adults from my family checking out the interiors, speaker quality etc. Trust me when i say this (again), there is brilliant space at the back with the driver seat pushed back all the way. We drove in a Getz and its pretty spacious for a hatch. In the Ecosport, 3 at the rear is a squeeze you will feel only if all three are XL :D

Quote:

Originally Posted by agambhandari (Post 3156483)

Looks good, but somehow it looks smaller than it does in other colours. I have seen the Mars Red in flesh, and others in pictures.

Normally Darker Colours like Red, Black and to some extent Dark Blue are expected to make a vehicle look smaller and lighter colours like White, Silver, light grey are expected to make it look larger.

The same is true for interiors, Darker Interior colour like Black and Dark Grey make the car look smaller and claustrophobic while Beige and Light grey make it look larger and roomier.

This is the conventional logic.

The titanium has black and biege'ish interiors. Looks nice. But the material of seat cover was a little too flashy.Also the silver finish on dash looked a little brownish.Not sure if it was light effect.

The car felt totally different from inside. It feels like typical crossover and nowhere like sedan or hatch w.r.to drive.

Somethings that i observed:
1.Rear bench provides good under thigh support and felt much more comfortable than vento and figo while on standstill.
2.since insulation is good you assume to be travelling at lower speed but u are not.I didnt realise that car was on 90 until the Sales person told me.
3.I didnt find the steering wheel very comfy.It has a sharp edge at top half.
4.The drive is typical ford.The steering is nothing like hyundai but at same time not like earlier fords.I would still rate steering response as good .

Many of you seem to be expexcting titanium diesel tobe priced at 10-10.5 on road.In this case you have rwo option either forget ecosport or increase your budget.11 -11.5 on road seems spot on , anything above 12 we " might "see another fiesta in making. Its only "might" because ecosport does almost all what Duster does but you get advantage of ford service and still save some money.

Quote:

Originally Posted by PrideRed (Post 3156736)

Many of you seem to be expexcting titanium diesel tobe priced at 10-10.5 on road.In this case you have rwo option either forget ecosport or increase your budget.11 -11.5 on road seems spot on , anything above 12 we " might "see another fiesta in making. Its only "might" because ecosport does almost all what Duster does but you get advantage of ford service and still save some money.

Anything close to 12 OTR might result in another Fiesta mostly, until 11 at launch is alright, considering they'll increase prices afterwards. Also isn't 11/12 lakh dangerously close to Vento/Rapid/Verna territory ? All these cars are subject to duty at 27% vs 12% for the Ecosport. I hope Ford hits the sweet spot wrt to pricing as this car promises to deliver so much more than regular hatch.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ACM (Post 3156679)

Yes, I am aware of that. My observation seemed to deviate a lot from this logic, hence I made a post about it. It is my personal POV, or it could be just because of the angles from which the shot was taken.