Dear friends,
If you have plans to buy fiat avventura please spare few minutes to read this document before making any decision as this could save your 'life', until 9th july’16 04:45 am like every other avventura owners i was delighted & proud to own this vehicle (since ‘3rd may’15‘) however, my perception has been changed on 9th july’16 04:45 am as i encountered a near death experience yes you’re reading it right, usually i drive my car a bit heavier like 90km/h plus as the wording by fiat says boring is dead. adventure comes calling so i blindly trust the 4 discs on the bad boy however the wording has been merely changed to ‘adventure is dead & the real death comes calling’ without further ado let me describe my experience, like every other day my shift got over by 4:00am & i started to commute to home, just 2 miles away from my office location there is a signal since it’s early in the morning nobody follows the rules (i know there are some who doesn’t follow it anytime) i was cruising around 50km/h & there is a vehicle ahead who’s waiting to take a u, hence i slightly took a left to pass (after checking the left side mirror as well as the rear mirror) & there comes a who doesn’t have patience & as if he is driving on a track he tried to pass first hence i’ve applied the so called brake & guess what? brake failure (the brake was as hard as a stone, alike foot rest in an automatic vehicle) for a fraction of second i blamed myself that i didn’t apply the brake (as i had such faith in fabbrica italiana automobili torin the italian stallion) but still no go then i triggered the sixth sense to do the job, as i almost gonna bump into the who is steering ahead of me, i had to use the following brakeing formulae (since i play nfs i gained these tactics however fiat had given me the opportunity to experience it & apply it in the real life ) so oh! yeah, the formulae, if you are gonna buy fiat you should know this for sure, panic brakeing coupled with the hand brake & hard steering to pull the vehicle off the road, so there you go for a few minutes i was completely blank & shivering unsure of what the heck just happened!. then i had called my friends to inquire what should i do (since my soul is half way through to hell & commuting back to earth, i had to reach out to another human being who is physically as well as mentally present on this planet ). my friends have told me to start the vehicle & check the brakeing, if it still the same then contact the help desk either for emergency road assistance or least some suggestions on what can be done to mitigate this, so then i checked my phone book for number unfortunately, there is none hence looked at the service booklet & dialed the number for some reason i was unable to connect tried few times then i gave up.
I tried to start the vehicle again after 20 minutes & tested the effectiveness of the brake, i would say it worked 10% but hard to apply it very hard to gain that 10%, i started driving home at a speed of 20 – 30 km/h again toggling gears from between 1-3, somehow managed to reach home, i tried to contact the support again someone has answered my call & he gave the opening script with a fumbling voice and in less than a minute he hung up on me, tried couple more times the same hence again gave up trying to reach support. waited for 10am drove the car again at the same phase to the nearby service center (ramkay fiat kattupakkam), explained my situation to a guy, he immediately asked a service engineer to address my issue. the engineer checked the vehicle & said the brake booster is gone (brake valve / tube, no vacuum from the brake booster or something whatever all those are jargons & alienated words to me) he then said i had to change it immediately i said yes please go ahead, guess what no spare part available the guy who sits at the spares is a crazy who doesn’t know how to address a customer i was standing beside the engineer, he gave a very weird look as if i have done something very wrong, no greeting no smile no empathy nothing, such a worst treatment after paying 10+lakhs & facing a tragedy. he said it cannot be done it will take 15 plus days to receive the spare & i have to pay 50%, i moved away & phoned a service center located in ambattur, they asked for vehicle number, vin number (std, code road blah blah) then the representative told me that she will check & get back to me, i was on the road thinking what next? whether to drive to ambattur / velachery! what if half way through if they say no spare! so waited for the call almost an hour & half no response nothing hence i had to take the vehicle to a nearby third party service center hoping least i could get a temporary solution to this problem as i had a family engagement to catch which would take place 200kms from chennai (i almost forgot to call out this, it was a very important catchup which takes place in our family after many years almost a decade, but everything screwed up nicely & i was unable to join them)
So coming back to where i left off, the third party engineer too said the same thing & he also added saying it will only be available with so called fiat so don’t waste time in searching for a solution from 3rd party (least he’s got some customer service skills & courtesy). then i phoned the ambattur branch again to check on the status, the same lady answered the phone & said she is still checking on it, i asked for her superior, he came on the line & said spares needs to be checked using vin number so cannot be done immediately, also i got a gist of what you’re looking for (looks like he understood from what i have described to the lady before) he also said the same thing that it would take 15 plus days & i have to pay 50% as advance money (approximate estimation is around 5k, i paid 10lakh to take this vehicle & fiat is not believing a customer for 5k such a sickening & ruthless response from the service centers). then i narrowed down my thinking & finally phoned the branch from where i took this vehicle, went through the same loads of questions & he said pay 50% advance it will take 15 days to receive the parts, then i asked until then? he responds we cannot do anything about this (no empathy nothing, by now you would have understand the amount of frustration that i would have gone through, decided to go back home as the time was around 12:30 pm i didn’t even had a glass of water since morning & i was awake since 8th july’16 04:00pm. after reaching home i said to myself give one last try to call the support, i dialed the number some lady answered the phone, i’ve narrated the entire story & there you go almost after 10 plus hours after the incident i hearing i’m very sorry to hear this, do you need any roadside assistance? finally felt the taste of humanity, i then asked her to help me to find a solution for the problem asap least before eod, she placed me on hold for some time & she resumes back saying sorry to say this we do not have any immediate fix for this problem, seems the service center folks had to place the order for the spare & it would take 15 days for it to reach (in today’s time & with the age of technology that has been evolved, hearing it would take half a month for a spare to reach the support center! which then triggers a question to me, have i done any time travel to 60’s or 70’s! we are getting products from us/uk & even from farther countries in just 2-3 days, saying 15 days which questions the care & service from fiat to their customers) alright sorry for deviating away from the topic, alright let’s go back to the tragedy of journey to hell i then suggested the representative that how about organizing a spare vehicle for me in the meantime, as i won’t be able to drive this car any further & if you would have heard the response of what i heard from the rep you would’ve put this vehicle for scrap & sue fiat & the lady says “we don’t have such policy in place & we won’t be able to do anything beyond this” i lost my patience & started to vent my frustration out on the call, she then placed me on hold to check further, she came back with the same story, i asked for a supervisor/manager & kept telling me that we can’t do anything about it. after me using the weapon “the word legal” she started to consider what needs to be done to get rid of this, she then conferenced me with a service center manager who’s located 40 miles away from where i’m still curious to know why on earth she conferenced me to someone who’s almost located in another state & how the heck is she expecting me to commute there!!! when my vehicle condition is switched from abs to nbs (no-braking system) the service center manager then suggested me to go back to the nearest service center again (as he would be educating the service engineer with some troubleshooting techniques! which i wonder why these guys weren’t trained in the beginning) so got some slight hope that ok least someone is trying to help me with this problem.
The same manager called me again & he gave the nearest service center manager contact number with the name, i reached the service center in 15 minutes & this time the way they received me is totally upside down compared to the hospitality that i’ve received in the morning, warm greeting & service with a smile, glass of water, a place to sit with 2 fans, then the manager said that he’s going to drain brake fluid & change the dot3 to dot4 & see whether it helps to solve the problem (i know you might be asking what now? sorry i didn’t call out this part, ok this takes us almost 12 hours back, and sorry i don’t have the option to put a mosquito coil rotating in anti-clockwise ) so while i was commuting to work from home just a kilometer before my office premises a warning has been popped up @ my dash, which states me to fill the brake fluid as it was nearing empty, i didn’t had any other choice apart from pulling my vehicle along the side of the road, i then walked off 100 meters luckily there was a gasoline station & bought dot3 brake fluid, unfortunately they didn’t have dot 4 that time (my 3rd service was overdue by just 28 days also i get know about this only after reaching the service station as i didn’t get the service reminder which i’m supposed to get as per the design, so the service engineer said that the previous service was not done properly, seriously ) so let’s continue the tragedy, the manager instructed the service engineer to drain the dot 3 & add the dot 4 to check whether it helps to resolve the problem, waited patiently almost an hour plus, they have changed the brake oil & the engineer took the vehicle for a test drive (i was hoping that the problem would’ve been resolved, but the try was a failure at the end) i totally gave up & said keep the vehicle with you & do whatever you gotta do & i walked off from the service center after getting the service token receipt from the service advisor. so it has been a week now still, i don’t see any sign of work towards fixing this problem.
Every time i phone the manager the response i get is we are working on it give me a day/two, blah blah blah that’s it, today he gave me an update that he will try to give the vehicle by today eod, on top he also added that i need to pay for the spare (the vehicle is still under warranty, cold hard fact of life, i then asked him why would someone pay for a spare when the vehicle is under warranty? he fumbled for a while & no clear answer for it) what i speculate from the conversation is he’s trying to take advantage of the brake fluid change from dot 4 to dot 3, but i’ve checked in numerous forums & sites many users are called out that 3 & 4 there aren’t any much differences (i’ve captured some voice of the customer here, “that leaves dot 3 and dot 4 fluids. these fluids are compatible with each other and may be interchanged or mixed with no ill effects." courtesy – bmw forum)
So now my question to fiat is why on earth you would approve a so complicated & very fragile brakeing booster design? aren’t you care about your customers? or do you follow ship & fix method? after paying almost 10 lakhs now i had to commute using private cabs (my wife is carrying & if there is an emergency what i am supposed to do? call 101 for ambulance service?) i seriously didn’t understand your customer policy unsure of the maniac who designed? would he know what is customer service is all about? if not please feel free to let me know, i will for sure take a training / coaching session on what is a true customer service is all about, please learn something from your competitors (the reason being in the past i had owned a suzuki swift & there was a very tiny problem around the wheel alignment, it was actually my mistake that i had reached the service station around 7:00 pm, the service engineer said it would least take 4-5 hours for the general service as well as few minor glitches that i had complaint about, i said i don’t think i would be able to spend such time as i’m on my way to my work, you know what would be the response from him? which i didn’t even dream of, he said please leave the car here, we will provide you a spare vehicle which you can use to commute to work & we will have the vehicle ready the next day around 11am, i was astonished by his response & greatly impressed with the customer service. after i have gone through all these hell hard times, if my financial situation would’ve been right i would for sure throw this vehicle & move on with a different competitor but unfortunately, i’m not in a position to shell out anything at the moment. so i would like to hear what would be the response from fiat for this chaotic experience…
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