23,157 units of Toyota Corolla Altis recalled in India

[dZired]

Toyota has recalled 23,157 units of the Corolla Altis in India over faulty Takata airbag inflators. This recall is a part of the automaker's globally issued recall drive that affects 2.9 million vehicles. Toyota India had previously recalled 7,100 units of the Corolla in July 2015 for the same issue. At that time, models manufactured between April 2007 and July 2008 were affected by the recall.

Reports suggest that for the latest recall, affected models in India include 23,157 units of the Corolla Altis sedan that have been manufactured between January 2010 and December 2012. Toyota will be informing owners of affected vehicles about the recall process in the coming weeks. All inspection and replacement jobs will be carried out at authorised Toyota service centres and will be free of cost to the customer.

The Takata airbag recall is said to be the largest and most complex safety recall ever, with over 100 million cars affected globally. The issue revolves around a large batch of airbag inflators manufactured by Takata that have been found to be potentially at a risk of deploying randomly with explosive force. This high force can result in the inflator housing getting ruptured, which can, in turn, spray sharp metal shards into the cabin.

Source: Autocar India

Link to Team-BHP News

[fuel_addict]

Waiting for the call from my Toyota dealer. My Altis petrol falls in the timeframe mentioned (purchase date April 2010). Isn't 7 years too late for Toyota to issue a recall? This exercise should have been carried out much earlier!

[drmohitg]

Is there anyway to find out if my car is part of the recall ( Sept 2011 make) other than waiting for a call from Toyota? Second I agree with fuel_addict above that is this the right time to call for a recall? Technically for last 6 years, I have been driving a potentially dangerous car while having paid extra for the exact opposite. Where does a customer stand legally on this?

[fordfreak]

I'm guessing my Altis (September 2010) will be affected by this recall. I'm still to hear anything from the dealer's end on this matter, nor is there any helpful information on Toyota's website. Honda (also affected by the Takata recall) had a helpful VIN checker on their website that allowed customer's to check if a particular recall applied to their vehicle. Toyota haven't seem to have put up anything of this sort.

Also, I wonder why Toyota took so long to issue the recall for this batch of vehicles. Honda carried this out ages ago. My 2010 City got the airbag rectification work done over a year ago.

[fuel_addict]

Have any one of you got a call from the Toyota dealer in connection with this recall? I called my dealer last week but they didn't seem to have a clear idea. The lady who took the call was aware of a recall and said that they have already started calling customers. Another person I spoke to seemed to have no idea about the recall program.

My request to have a technical person call me back on this subject has not been responded to as yet. Very unlike the normal Toyota attitude!

[ranjeet_sam]

Has anybody received a call from Toyota? I had called Toyota in April and they had no clue about this specific recall at that time. They said that they will get back to me. Its been more than two months and I am still waiting for that call.

[ranjeet_sam]

Ok, I have good news. The airbag inflator in my car was replaced yesterday. Nandi Toyota sent their service engineer over to my place to replace it. No this is not how the replacement usually happens. Mine was a one off case as I had visited Toyota twice regarding this airbag recall and was simply made to wait for a few hours only to hear that the part was unavailable. Second time around when this happened I had to make my inconvenience felt and as a result Nandi Toyota promised to order the part and have the part replaced at my home within 3 working days. True to their word they sent over their service engineer albeit after 6 working days(not that i am complaining) and replaced the part. Overall I am happy with the way Nandi Toyota has responded. The service engineer told me that mine was the first car that had the inflator changed as part of this recall..

I also was told that they presently do not have stock of the part so you may want to call them and specifically ask for the parts availability before you go to their service center. Wish you all the best!

[drmohitg]

I have been following up with Toyota since last week regarding this and it has been a very surprising experience. Twice I have spoken to their call centre staff, once after having included links to news articles regarding this recall in my Email, but both times they told me that no such recall has been ordered. What is going on? On both occasions they told me about some recall that is out there for cars made between 2003 -2008. On the second occasion I made the representative open my Email and click on links that I had included, one being from Team BHP itself, and see for himself that there is a recall. How can they be clueless about it? He just told me he will escalate this to next level.

What is cooking up at Toyota? How can the support staff not be even aware of this recall even my I mailed them categorically asking about it and even included links the second time since they stated that they didn't know of any such recall. I had always heard that Toyota was very active w.r.t. customer queries and complaints. And here I was foolishly waiting all this while long for them to call me and let me know about this.

[asit.kulkarni93]

Isn't this old news? My 2007 Toyota Corolla's airbag inflators were replaced in July 2016 at DSK Toyota during a regular service.

[R2D2]

Originally Posted by drmohitg

. How can they be clueless about it? He just told me he will escalate this to next level.

What is cooking up at Toyota? How can the support staff not be even aware of this recall even my I mailed them categorically asking about it and even included links the second time since they stated that they didn't know of any such recall. I had always heard that Toyota was very active w.r.t. customer queries and complaints. And here I was foolishly waiting all this while long for them to call me and let me know about this.

Doc, they will not respond directly to you and I think their corporate lawyers have something to do with it.

Recalls are by VIN # and TKM or the dealer will contact you directly if the replacement is required. In such cases no news is really good news.

My car isn't in the manufacturing date range specified by the recall. I haven't verified personally if the airbags or seatbelts fitted are by Takata or some other make. Maybe I need to check it soon.

In the case of my car there have been 2 recalls; one for a front brake pad replacement about 2 months after delivery and the driver's side power window switch replacement/lubrication a few years ago. Both were performed during a scheduled service.

[drmohitg]

Originally Posted by asit.kulkarni93

Isn't this old news? My 2007 Toyota Corolla's airbag inflators were replaced in July 2016 at DSK Toyota during a regular service.

This is in regard to the current recall issued in April, 2017 about which Toyota feigned ignorance even though there are numerous news reports out there.

Originally Posted by R2D2

Doc, they will not respond directly to you and I think their corporate lawyers have something to do with it.

Recalls are by VIN # and TKM or the dealer will contact you directly if the replacement is required. In such cases no news is really good news.

I thought so too and waited all along. But since the call never came and I have heard off many instances regarding recalls where unless the owners made some proactive action, the company/dealer never contacted them and hence I mailed Toyota to enquire. A simple " No your car is not part of it" would have sufficed but this total lack of awareness regarding the recall is very surprising and disappointing. What can be more shameful than a customer sending you links as evidence of recall when on the other hand you are in denial mode.

[R2D2]

Originally Posted by drmohitg

A simple " No your car is not part of it" would have sufficed but this total lack of awareness regarding the recall is very surprising and disappointing. What can be more shameful than a customer sending you links as evidence of recall when on the other hand you are in denial mode.

As I said earlier, I think their lack of response has something to do with a corporate decision probably under advice from legal professionals.

Even though my car is not in the model month/year recall batch I plan to check the seatbelts one of the days by taking off the pillar trim. I noted (from info on the net) the restraint system including the belts and airbags are made by the same OEM supplier. So hopefully if the belts are not Takata neither will the airbags.

[drmohitg]

Originally Posted by R2D2

As I said earlier, I think their lack of response has something to do with a corporate decision probably under advice from legal professionals.

But why should that be an issue here when they have already announced it publicly? If it was being done in a secretive manner then I could have understood. But here the company has already announced to the world about the recall. Why would the legal team or any other team later advice them to go back? All those departments would have had to give their go ahead in the first place before the public announcement was made.

Currently the issue is just plain miscommunication between the company and it's workforce.

[R2D2]

Originally Posted by drmohitg

But why should that be an issue here when they have already announced it publicly? If it was being done in a secretive manner then I could have understood. But here the company has already announced to the world about the recall. Why would the legal team or any other team later advice them to go back? All those departments would have had to give their go ahead in the first place before the public announcement was made.

Currently the issue is just plain miscommunication between the company and it's workforce.

Mohit, the entire thread is based on an article on Autocar India Ltd. And this story has been parroted faithfully, as journos are wont to do, across several other press sites. There is no mention of the source of the news but simply attributed to a "Global recall"

Now, here is a list of recalls & announcements at the official Toyota India site:

Toyota India Announcements

In fact 3rd from top is the power window switch replacement recall that was applicable to my car and mentioned in one of my previous posts.

Do you see the Corolla Altis airbag recall mentioned anywhere? I don't.

Which is probably the reason why Toyota's customer service has shown ignorance or denied recalls over the phone or email. I think replacements (if any) are handled offline by their ASCs.

[drmohitg]

Originally Posted by R2D2

Mohit, the entire thread is based on an article on Autocar India Ltd. And this story has been parroted faithfully, as journos are wont to do, across several other press sites. There is no mention of the source of the news but simply attributed to a "Global recall"

Hmm. What you are suggesting might be true. But what I am unable to understand is that why will a company like Toyota not issue a statement immediately denying such a recall and probably even force ACI to issue an apology. Afterall recalls hurt a company's image and this news is published all accross the media.

Second how do you explain this post from this thread where apparently a member got the said replacement done:

Ok, I have good news. The airbag inflator in my car was replaced yesterday. Nandi Toyota sent their service engineer over to my place to replace it. No this is not how the replacement usually happens. Mine was a one off case as I had visited Toyota twice regarding this airbag recall and was simply made to wait for a few hours only to hear that the part was unavailable. Second time around when this happened I had to make my inconvenience felt and as a result Nandi Toyota promised to order the part and have the part replaced at my home within 3 working days. True to their word they sent over their service engineer albeit after 6 working days(not that i am complaining) and replaced the part. Overall I am happy with the way Nandi Toyota has responded. The service engineer told me that mine was the first car that had the inflator changed as part of this recall..

I also was told that they presently do not have stock of the part so you may want to call them and specifically ask for the parts availability before you go to their service center. Wish you all the best!