[beejay]

Raghav, I understand the agony you are going through. Any person who loves his car would be saddened to be in a situation like this. I hate to see my cars in the sun even and can imagine how heart breaking this is for you.

Of the 64 parts ordered, hasn't any one part arrived?
Why cant they start work on available parts?
Why should you pay them 200 bucks everyday for no mistake of yours?

Raghav, at the outset we should understand that Fiats have always been like this. But there is no arguing the fact that they make some of the best cars around, the 1.6 palios are still a living testimony for that. They still find buyers and passionate owners who just buy them irrrespctive of the fact that incidents like this can occur.

However, its not right on Fiats part to do this to you. You had the legacy running to be treated like this. Dont stop at it and keep sending them mail. Keep sending them repeatedly.
Drive safe.

[D.V.R]

All this wait for a front end shunt which is similar to the Palio,imagine the time they would take for a rear end shunt.

[hrsraghav]

Thanks Buddy
Infact its from start, the biggest reasons for not buying a FIAT were given by FIAT only.
Only one who is dead sure to buy a FIAT can buy a FIAT.
I am not mixing both things, the product and the service.

As quoted so many times,
People who own FIAT sware by it, and they sware by its service also.
Out of 64, 11 parts are not available.

Originally Posted by beejay

Raghav, I understand the agony you are going through. Any person who loves his car would be saddened to be in a situation like this. I hate to see my cars in the sun even and can imagine how heart breaking this is for you.

Of the 64 parts ordered, hasn't any one part arrived?
Why cant they start work on available parts?
Why should you pay them 200 bucks everyday for no mistake of yours?

Raghav, at the outset we should understand that Fiats have always been like this. But there is no arguing the fact that they make some of the best cars around, the 1.6 palios are still a living testimony for that. They still find buyers and passionate owners who just buy them irrrespctive of the fact that incidents like this can occur.

However, its not right on Fiats part to do this to you. You had the legacy running to be treated like this. Dont stop at it and keep sending them mail. Keep sending them repeatedly.
Drive safe.

[rudrah]

Very sorry to hear about the tragic incident happened with your car. Thankfully you all are saved.

Problem with critical spares for retro Palios/Adventure/Siena/Petra are due to shortage of spares suppliers to FIAT India.

As these are outdated models, there aren't much vendors out to supply these parts and hence the delay and higher cost to procure.

There is nothing much we can do than wait and watch or else try out what Pashin suggested or Varun at PUG to source the parts if available in Mumbai!

P.S. I love the Adventure very much which was my initial interest to buy!

Good Luck and hope someone hear u soon at FIAT!

[gemithomas]

Harish. Why dont you get a list of the 11 parts. That way we could see if we could help sourcing it from other dealers.

[hrsraghav]

Originally Posted by gemithomas

Harish. Why dont you get a list of the 11 parts. That way we could see if we could help sourcing it from other dealers.

I Gemi, I really appreciate it. But the problem for geting the parts from other dealers is the billing one.
I spoke with the Surveyor dealing my case, he said it will be problem to get insurance on parts purchased form other dealers, because it will be sale between two delaers, not between Fiat and dealer.
Also it will be double taxed to me, and there is different tax structure between diff states. Liek Delhi has higher tax rate then Haryana.
I tried to do this at very start.
Right now I dont have the exact name of the unavailable 11 parts.
I have asked it several times from Fiat to give it to me.
Also just came to know that TATA-FIAT is having holidays till 25th.
Will get it from dealer.

Thanks again.
Harish

[greenhorn]

Non-availability of Punto Spares | Spares & Accessories | Car Forums - CarWale.com

Punto folks have started to feel the heat too, sadly

[ghost_rider]

Originally Posted by sidindica

I did not intend to make this post public but I am asking one question to all punto/ linea owners (please do not take this personally).

• Are the regular parts for these cars easily available or still is it difficult to procure parts?
• What situation do you expect 4 years from now?

Are you kidding? It took almost two weeks for them get the front fender for my Linea, which met with an accident. The dealers don't stock the parts and order them as and when needed. A job which should take no more than 3 days took almost two weeks to fix, and its still not over yet. They don't have the expertise to match the color of my vocal white Linea and as a result the front bumper and the front right fender have a different shade. And this after a SPECIALIST paint matcher was called in to make the paint and match it exactly. The saga continues.

The workshops don't have the expertise or the parts to fix our cars.

I say we should take out a rally and highlight the nature of FIAT's pathetic service and lack of spares and support. I can try and get a few News channels and Auto magazines to cover the rally and do a 2 minute story on this. But this can only happen if the turnout at the rally has at least a 100 or more cars.

Or we could take out ads in all the auto magazines and come out with spoofs of ADMIRATION GUARANTEED. Time to kick them where it hurts the most!

Who's with me ?

[hrsraghav]

Originally Posted by ghost_rider

I say we should take out a rally and highlight the nature of FIAT's pathetic service and lack of spares and support. I can try and get a few News channels and Auto magazines to cover the rally and do a 2 minute story on this. But this can only happen if the turnout at the rally has at least a 100 or more cars.

Or we could take out ads in all the auto magazines and come out with spoofs of ADMIRATION GUARANTEED. Time to kick them where it hurts the most!

Who's with me ?

Yaa I too thought of doing any such demosntration at their office in Gurgaon at Signature tower.

[Crazy_Eddy]

Originally Posted by sidindica

Rajeev Ji, are you listening? Your "fiat first" program is too biased towards punto/ linea owners and does nothing to care of 80,000 plus project 178 owners.

I kinda got the impression the 'Fiat First' program was targetted only towards the Linea/Punto?

Originally Posted by sidindica

I did not intend to make this post public but I am asking one question to all punto/ linea owners (please do not take this personally).

• Are the regular parts for these cars easily available or still is it difficult to procure parts?
• What situation do you expect 4 years from now?

1. Have had no issues with spare parts in Chennai (believe me, I've had quite a few things replaced but thats for another time and thread ). Just a few days back, the glass in the ORVM got knocked out. I was expecting to have to change the entire unit, but surprisingly when I walked in they had the glass alone readily available as a spare. If they stock something as trivial as that glass, then it looks like they're serious about maintaining their spare part inventory.
The Tata mechanics and service advisors are still a bunch of jokers, but I've learnt that reputed private garages are the only places where you can find competent techs.

2. Too early to tell, but if Fiat doesn't goof up on their sales it should be fine.

Originally Posted by hrsraghav

I won't quote the firgures but the Adventure bonnet is thrice the cost of Linea bonnet. So even if the parts will be available in future, what is the guarantee that the prices will be reasonable.

FIAT is vouching with pamplets at dealers, comparing the spare prices of linea with Honda City and other cars.
Why don't they dare to do it for the other cars?

And remember this is the case when we know that from Palio, to petra to siena to weekend to adventure, all share a hell lot of common parts with same interiors.

For now they are doing the fooling around of reduced spare prices, for linea and punto, just to pick up the sales, and once things started warming up, the spare price of these cars too will be raised for sure.

I sympathise with you, but its not so much a Fiat issue but that your model is a phased out one. I can draw similar parallels to the Maruti Esteem carb we had. Once the face-lifted MPFI Esteem was out, vital parts were difficult to source for the Carb versions. It took a while to understand the subtle changes between the different generations of the Esteem, and why it was difficult to source parts for a model that was still selling - albeit the newer version. And this was not one of those out-on-a-limb type purchases like the Adventure, but one of the most widely sold cars with every tom, dick and hari (hehe) stocking parts. In short, if Maruti can do it.. why not Fiat?

While the Palio, Adventure, etc share similar parts, the Stile has subtle changes in much the same way the MPFI did over the Carb Esteem. I'm guessing if your Adventure was based on the newer Stile platform, you probably would have had better luck sourcing spares. I can tell for a fact, that around Dec 2008 when I gave in my uncle's (pre-Stile) Palio for getting an entire door replaced they had only the Stile's door in stock, and it wasn't compatible. Of course it took a measly 1 week to get the earlier gen door ordered and the work done was quite good as well.

About the spare part prices for Punto/Linea - agreed they have been aggressively pricing it to reel in the sales. But, the quality seems decent enough.. so even if they do jack up prices, I think it would still be fine as long as they do not drop quality.
In chaotic Chennai traffic, it became a routine to lose the Esteem's ORVM. Over the years I noticed a steady drop in quality of the replacement ORVMs, and all the while it still sold for ~1k. The last 'Genuine Maruti' mirror I had would not even hold its position and had to be held in place with bits of paper stuffed in!

Once again, I'm not justifying Fiat's actions.. merely pointing out that this happens across companies when you have an outdated model. My best wishes in getting your issue resolved soon

[sdp1975]

Originally Posted by Crazy_Eddy

2. Too early to tell, but if Fiat doesn't goof up on their sales it should be fine.

+1 to that. I really hope that the Punto/Linea does well in sales in the coming years.

[comfortablynumb]

I cannot believe this scenario! What's that saying about about old habits dying hard?? It's the stuff of nightmares for every Fiat owner! IIRC, the Adventure was being manufactured till approximately 2.5 - 3 years ago; also, I remember reading somewhere that manufacturers are legally bound to provide spares and service till a certain time limit (10 years?) even after the model has been phased out. If that's the case, what possible excuse can Fiat have for this pathetic and incompetent display of after sales service.

Before all the pro-Fiat folks lambast me, please note that I own a retro Palio 1.6 myself, and of late, have noticed that lack of spares issues for pre-Stile models are cropping up with alarming regularity on various online forums. Doesn't bode too well for owners like myself who own pre-Stile Fiat products. I just hope they are aberrations and Fiat gets it's act together pronto!

Harish, 'seedhi ungli se ghee nahi nikalta hai to........' - hope you get my drift. If not, let me spell it out for you. If you have any contacts at all in the media, make use of them highlighting the apathy shown by the dealer and Fiat India. Write a registered letter JD Power Asia-Pac, with a copy to Fiat India. Lodge a complaint in the consumer court. Call up the Fiat toll free number and raise hell. That should set their pants on fire.

Bottom line - STOP BEING A NICE GUY!!

[GTX007]

Raghav, really sad to hear about the agony you are going through.
I am also a Palio 1.2 owner for the past 6 years. Luckily I haven't yet come across any serious repairs or replacements.
Fiat is still the old fiat. I recently booked a Punto, you can see what happened in my case over here,

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/indian...rs-cochin.html

Fiat needs to improve by leaps and bounds. Hope you get your problem resolved soon.

[hrsraghav]

Originally Posted by comfortablynumb

Harish, 'seedhi ungli se ghee nahi nikalta hai to........' - hope you get my drift. If not, let me spell it out for you. If you have any contacts at all in the media, make use of them highlighting the apathy shown by the dealer and Fiat India. Write a registered letter JD Power Asia-Pac, with a copy to Fiat India. Lodge a complaint in the consumer court. Call up the Fiat toll free number and raise hell. That should set their pants on fire.

Bottom line - STOP BEING A NICE GUY!!

Honestly I feel smtimes, that they don't deserve a decent customer.
I am exploring the options told by you. Lets see how things unfold.
All this reminds me of the slogans written in buses and trains

"Passengers are responsible fot their own goods"

Fiat should put this at the front fo every delaers gate

"Buyers are responsible for their own cars"

[tintin82]

Having a Fiat Siena, I went through all the agony you are going through. My car has been in the garage for the past month and a half waiting to be repaired. It's a even greater mess selling it as everybody undervalues it and asks the car for a little more than peanuts.
The Adventure is indeed a great car to drive and so is the Siena, but I'm selling it off only due to the reason that I neither have the time, patience nor the contacts to keep it in excellent shape and maintain it.
I suggest you either write off the car or sell it off. One thing I've learned having the Fiat is that there is no use of owning one if it's in the garage when it's needed most on the road. On all the occasions when I've desperately needed the use of my car, it's been in the garage or will break down midway.
One other important point to consider, looking at the condition of your car is the reliability once it has been repaired. Considering you have structural damage and you are changing a lot of parts, and factoring in the non-existent expertise of Fiat service (of older models), it may not be as reliable or as much fun as before.
If you still insist on having it, buy a used and cheap adventure and swap parts and sell off the rest, retaining what you think you'll need in the future.I've known people to do this.

All the best.