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Old 8th January 2011, 03:30   #1
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2011 i10 Asta A/T - its Korean, its new, its fast, its red, and its coming.

Decision making:


“We should pick the red color” is all my wife bothered to say, she then immersed herself back into her laptop. This was after my 20 minute yapping on what is (could be) the best car in the small-city-hatch segment for a decision on our first car buying process. That is when I switched to TBHP for help and guidance; after countless sleepless hours of research on the forum, we picked our first car – Hyundai i10 Asta A/T. And of course, we picked the red color because the lady wanted so. Our decision process on whether to buy an automatic vs. manual transmission warrants a separate post in itself so I am not going into the details of that, of course there were the usual devil’s advocates preaching us on how ‘automatic transmissions are only useful in the U.S’ and how expensive A/T maintenance could get. But I think the i10 A/T clearly satisfied every requirement of ours being a first car buyer and moreover new learners! We had already begun our driving lessons in a manual transmission car when we made the decision and I could dream of driving in Bangalore traffic without having to change gears (or the instructor nervously asking me to down-shift ahead of traffic lights). Everything just came together – our budget, our liking towards the new i10’s interiors (we didn’t like the interiors of the old i10 and didn’t even consider it until we saw the new one), our conviction that an automatic transmission although having a higher TCO will result in absolute peace of mind in Bangalore traffic, how there were no other A/T cars in the segment that even came close to what the new i10 Asta A/T offered. The decision was clearly unanimous. A special note of thanks goes to blackasta for the confidence his posts gave in our decision towards the i10 A/T.


Dealer pre-sales experience:

We live in Bannerghatta Road so the Advaith showroom on BG Road was our obvious choice; the initial phone calls were met with a lot of courtesy, sales people who seemed to listen more than talk, and a seemingly professional organization. Our demand for a test drive of the A/T was promptly met when a car was brought to our residence so we could drive around. However, the first visit to the showroom (when we paid the advance of Rs10000 for booking) changed our opinion of the dealership – our sales contact (I am leaving the name anonymous for now) didn’t seem to listen to what our specific questions were, and went on with her own agenda, didn’t want to entertain _any_ negotiations or discount conversations, wouldn’t commit to anything beyond free insurance, kept interrupting our questions with irrelevant answers. I said to myself that she (oh I gave away the anonymity here by specifying the gender) was either new to her job, or was a complete idiot. I was so overwhelmed with work the following two weeks that I didn’t bother to do anything about this – my confidence in my decision about the car wasn’t shaken a bit and I always had TBHP to look up to for any questions the sales person couldn’t answer about the car or the process. However, I squeezed some time and called Trident to see how the experience was and I was surprised with how different I felt. This guy on the phone was actually trying to up sell me to an i20 A/T. I work in Sales and I enjoy being sold to as long as the salesman is doing a good job at it, and this guy was clearly doing his job well. He knew what questions to ask, he sensed the fact that I was willing to pay at least 40% of the value of the car as upfront payment and that I could be persuaded to buy a better, bigger car. However, I was disappointed that he wasn’t able to offer any discounts of offers above and beyond what Advaith had offered to me. Moreover, these guys were located in Indranagar or Sankey road which would mean I have to travel far for delivery (they offered to deliver the car at my doorstep and I didn’t like the idea). Finally, I went back to Advaith at BG road and made the final payments ahead of when the bank disbursed the remaining loan amount.


Allotment and Inspection:

Our contact at Advaith confirmed the same day when we made the booking that a car of our color choice and our choice of trim was readily available and they could send it for registration as soon as we make the full payment. I couldn’t follow-up due to work for one full week after that and finally I got a chance to visit their stockyard near KH Road to see the car. Accompanying me was my friend who has owned a car for quite some time now and is a natural at understanding cars, we didn’t find any external damage to the car but we noticed the air-con was just blowing hot air even after we let the engine run for 10 minutes. When we pointed out to the guy at the stockyard, he said they would ‘look into it’. I thought he was just a guy at the stockyard and that I would talk to the sales woman at Advaith. When I called her later and asked her to get someone to check it out, she called me back in a few hours and said that I hadn’t pressed the AC switch and that it was on blower all the while. I gave her a piece of my mind and blew my lid off when I heard her being so absurd. They wanted me to go back and check the car at the stockyard which is a good 15kms from my house and I could squeeze no more time from work that week. I gave her clear instructions that I will check it one more time during delivery (I have the TBHP PDI checklist anyway) and that I want the AC fixed by then. The funny part was that she still maintained that we hadn’t turned the AC switch on!


Bank loan:

I had a contact in HDFC that helped me with this, so I got a loan at 10% for 60 months. I was so overwhelmed with the kind of documents they asked me for – but then that was easier than putting up with our sales woman at Advaith. The only problem I had with HDFC (there had to be something!) was that I realized they put in the loan as EMI in advance when I wanted EMI in arrears and I had to shell out the first EMI in addition to the down payment to Advaith (I hadn’t anticipated this and this cut down my budget for tires and alloys significantly). There was also a last minute drama with Advaith refusing to send the car for registration on the day when they promised they would because HDFC had deducted the first EMI from their disbursement. I had to then put up an argument with the Advaith Sales Manager to get them to send someone to my house and collect the balance in cash in exchange for a commitment that the car will go for registration as promised. At least they kept that promise.


The final deal:

i10 Asta A/T 2011 model: on road 6.86Lacs. Free insurance (worth 21K?!), 10K cash discount in exchange for accessories that I didn’t need (like reverse parking sensor, keyless entry etc as they were part of the Asta trim already), free mud flaps, floor mats, Teflon coating, Garware sun film.


Delivery:

It is 3.30am and I’ve had a long day, we’re going at 12noon today Saturday 1/8 to take delivery of the car. I have the PDI checklist handy and I am asking an experienced (car owner) friend to come long to help. I will post the delivery story and driving experience later this week.


Overall we’re very excited for our first car but we _so_ wish our buying experience was better!
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Old 8th January 2011, 10:45   #2
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Re: 2011 i10 Asta A/T - its Korean, its new, its fast, its red, and its coming.

Congratulations on the car! Please note that Team-BHP does not permit booking / buying experience threads in the Test-Drives section anymore. For the benefit of members & guests alike, it is now imperative to include a complete report on the car (the driving experience / comfort / features, what you like, what you don't like etc.).

This thread is temporarily closed. Please report this post once you are ready to update with a complete driving report; that's when it shall be re-opened. Thanks for your support.
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