GTI Delivery Woes

[JustCruisn]

A friend of mine has been eagerly waiting for her new GTI. She got the call this week saying it was finally in.
Yesterday she went to pick it up at Austral Newstead.
There were a few problems...
No Bi Xenon lights
No 18inch rims
Had a sunroof, they wanted more cash for it
Had bubbles and contamination in the paint.
Scuffs and scratches on a rim.

She did not take delivery and left in her old Mazda. Next shipment due march 2010.
Apparently they will have found a replacement car, due sometime next week.

What a a complete stuff up.
Has anyone else heard of problems like this ??

[ricksterrr]

A friend of mine has been eagerly waiting for her new GTI. She got the call this week saying it was finally in.
Yesterday she went to pick it up at Austral Newstead.
There were a few problems...
No Bi Xenon lights
No 18inch rims
Had a sunroof, they wanted more cash for it
Had bubbles and contamination in the paint.
Scuffs and scratches on a rim.

She did not take delivery and left in her old Mazda. Next shipment due march 2010.
Apparently they will have found a replacement car, due sometime next week.

What a a complete stuff up.
Has anyone else heard of problems like this ??

That is just appalling.

Was this for a pre-order and did she place a deposit on her car?

Not too many ppl here have had their car delivered yet, except for Murph and from the sounds of things he was extremely happy...

[team_v]

They may have sold her spec car to another person and figured since she was a female they could palm her off a under-spec'd one, giving them a double sale and using up the extra dealer stock that was delivered.

Just one potential reason.

[anarchycamp]

This exact same stuff happened with the MkV's.

Basically it got to the point where the demand was so high and supply so small (each dealer was getting a handful of cars a month) that dealers were selling to the highest bidder essentially. There was a thread on here a couple of years back about it all I think.

Were reports (don't know if its all true) of dealers doing all kinds of dirty tricks to make the biggest margin.

However....I thought that the first shipment of GTI's weren't to spec anyway? They were just a batch that they then sell as they are, could be wrong.

[Lima]

However....I thought that the first shipment of GTI's weren't to spec anyway? They were just a batch that they then sell as they are, could be wrong.

This is my understanding too, and is how we bought our 3dr Mk5 GTI ... the dealer showed a list of cars on a boat and their colours/options. We picked the one we wanted and secured it as "ours".

Presumably this is what the friend of the OP did, but has since been given a different car. I'd be pretty royally pissed off if this happened to me and would be making some enquiries with Volkswagen Australia I think.

Having said that, on one of the UK forums a dude ordered a 3dr S3 and when it came to delivery day was presented with a 5dr, haha. Oops!

[AusScare]

That's absolutely disgraceful. Pathetic work by the dealer.

She should go buy a wrx.

[Maverick]

What a a complete stuff up.
Has anyone else heard of problems like this ??

It's common with Austral. They changed the first contract on me by $1000 in their favour after the agreement was made. No mention of it until I spotted it as I was signing (they devalued my trade by $1000 because they were holding it until my new car arrived).

They tried to screw me out of an additional $5000 on my trade after guaranteeing to hold that price. This is after I had traded it and was waiting for my new car.

Numerous other problems let me to organise another car that was a canceled order from another dealer. Signed the contract on the other car and made contact with the other dealer over a week later and Austral hadn't made contact with them and wouldn't return calls. Salesmanager decided that as I had a car on order he didn't want to get another one in despite my original car not being in production yet.

Other problems including some porkies told about the finance, they went through 3 finance managers in a short period, their stock controller was always too busy washing cars to look up stock and their customer service disappearing after the contract was signed.

I ended up re-registered my care, re-insuring it (both had expired whilst sitting at Austral hence my trade) and canceling the contract after they wanted more $$$$. Picked up my car (which was full of cigarette smoke ) and went to Highway Auto who actually treated me well.

There are many many similar stories about Austral and after my experience I can see why.

[windmagnet]

The way it worked with my dealer was that you could specify the car you wanted but there was no guarantee you would get it. They came on the ship specced based on what VW thought would sell and you took your chances. I could not get details on what cars were available (i.e. on the ship) until my dealer received its allocation of cars only a few weeks ago.

I paid a deposit and signed a contract with a full page of special conditions I wrote to protect myself well before the dealer allocation or pricing was known.

Dealer could not supply car matching my spec but offered an alternative that was acceptable to me. I hoped for an exact match but knew this could happen from day one.

My car was initially to have been delivered Monday this week (modified to no later than Friday this week) and then Wednesday this week I was told I would not get it until next Wednesday.

It may just be processing delays but I have become concerned that there is something not right with all of this and that maybe my car is being patched up while I wait. I am taking an expert with me to inspect the car before I pay and accept the car.

Can you provide any more info about the car in question and its defects so that no-one else here gets stuck with it. If you could PM me the VIN that would at least allow me to rule out that this car is being palmed off on me. What colour? Whereabouts were the paint defects. Can you provide any more detail on the contamination?

[JustCruisn]

Will post VIN next week, friend will let me know after weekend.

The specs on the car.
Tornado red.
Sunroof - apparently all red ones have sunroof
Normal lights - all Oz cars in 1st round have normal lights.
Sat Nav
Standard 17 rims - still no 18s in Oz
5 door.
Leather

The paint defects are on both sides of car (doors) and C pillar. Appear as small bubbles in the clearcoat. Oily substance appears to be under the clearcoat. The oily stuff makes the oil on water rainbow effect at certain angles.

[windmagnet]

Thanks for this info. Car I have ordred is candy white but will look for issues in this area.

Standard 17 rims - still no 18s in Oz

This is not right - see Murph's photos of his new car with 18s on his thread "Four days in heaven". Did the dealer claim this when pushing the dud at her? My car is supposedly the only one in first Adelaide shipment with 18's. Yet to see it though

[G-rig]

That is pretty dodgy, can't believe Austral tried to pull one over her.. oh wait, yes i can.

[MurphyTheElf]

Standard 17 rims - still no 18s in Oz

This is not right - see Murph's photos of his new car with 18s on his thread "Four days in heaven".

Yup - the dealer said it was one of very few with 18s in the first shipment. I originally placed a flexible order and signed a contract based on MkV prices. I then asked the dealer to keep an eye out for a car with 18s. When the allocations came in, he gave me a list of available cars. I chose one, which he said he set aside for me. When the pricing came available, I signed a contract according to its specs.

He told me that VWA pretty pulled the specs of the original shipment of cars out of their arses - not based on pre-orders.

Austral sounds like a dodgy dealer trying to palm off a damaged import.

[mrpayne]

Plenty of red without sunroof, and also a fair few around with 18's.

Interesting to know what we are up against, I guess Austral's have had the monopoly in some form in Brisbane for a fair while, and haven't realised that they are going to have to pick up their act with their service now there are a few more dealers around.

Also, will have to post up a photo or two of our demo next week....Tornado Red with painted bonnet circa Guy H's car, and 18" Motorsport wheels....

[Breno]

I've tried to buy a VW on two occasions from two different dealers in Brisbane, it's not through lack of trying that I now drive an Audi. Are there any good VW dealers in QLD?

[S.A]

I paid a deposit and signed a contract with a full page of special conditions I wrote to protect myself well before the dealer allocation or pricing was known.

What sort of things did you cover with your special conditions windmagnet?