I'm a traitor

[The Yeti]

Its desided after 3 1/2 years of a house car backed up buy equeally house support when the lease is up on the BA Farimont I'm going holden. My wife has a VY ex cop car, with simular K's to my BA and I've always been supprised at how good the pannel fit etc is it compared you my Fairmont then last week when my Ford was in for its regular AC and air bag falt I drove my wifes car, I have to tell ya it has less rattels less squeaks and every thing works as advertised not like my fairmont we have had it since it was 40,000k old its been in for warranty work only as I service it my self, the warranty complants have been AC compresser and drivers window thats it. In the same time, my ford has had the dash out no less than 8 times for blender motor faults, both the drivers and passanger seat air bags replaced, + 7 other airbag related faults, not to mention the rattels and poor pannel fit that was never addresed properly from day one, this week I have been driving a new Commodore (just a povity pack) given to me from holden to test to see if I want our fleet to change, and today its friday Ive taken it to wollongong, Newcastle + my normal driving and I am impressed, Its not all the hype sugests but its still a very well presented car and has all the stuff I want in a car as well as the crap my techs and reps need.

So my first car was an XC Ute, my next a ZK, followed by ZL NC, fairlanes (I had company cars after that so they were veradas) but once I got A choise again I had AU Fairmont then the BA Fairmont, + my toys being an XL and the ZC

The straw that broke the cammels back was ford rejecting warranty on the last airbag fault as the car is now 3years and 3 months old regardless of the fact they have doen all the servicing, the best they would come back with was 75%, so as the VY has had no warranty issues by comparison I'm taking my fleet of over 30 vechiels over to Holden.

Word of warnging Ford dont off the fleet manager.

[pb02]

Fair enough. However I've done the opposite with our fleet and gone from Holdens to Fords. I found that Holden wouldn't deal and offer any bonus or even test drives. Ford have been great with us, however, at the end of the day it comes down to which dealership you are with and what experiences you have with either brand.

[EA2BA]

Do go basing your opinion on just 1 car, go drive some 2nd hand cars at the dealers, there always exceptional, good, average, bad and lemons in any manufacture of productions cars.

[james22]

not a commonwhore..... god no.

Its a pity that ford service are such pricks. The majority of ppl converting from Ford to Holden have done it because they have had a jack of Ford Service, if only they lifted their game a little they wouldnt be so far behind all the time.

[Dayvo]

Originally Posted by james22

not a commonwhore..... god no.

Its a pity that ford service are such pricks. The majority of ppl converting from Ford to Holden have done it because they have had a jack of Ford Service, if only they lifted their game a little they wouldnt be so far behind all the time.

Holden service are not much better , Check out the bitching on some of the Commodore forums.

[MethodX]

Commodore over Bitsaremissing anyday

[EF, What else?]

Learn to bloody spell

[HLC]

Originally Posted by EF, What else?

Learn to bloody spell.

If you are going to tell people to "Learn to bloody spell", at least get the grammar right.

[EF, What else?]

Originally Posted by HLC

If you are going to tell people to "Learn to bloody spell", at least get the grammar right.

I would argue that in response to shocking spelling as above, the structuring of a sentence takes backseat to getting a message across.

[Twisted]

Please take the time to check your post for spelling and grammar and ensure that it is legible. There are many errors in this post that make it very difficult to read that would be easily picked up if you went back and re-read it after you had finished.

[nugget378]

Originally Posted by Twisted

Please take the time to check your post for spelling and grammar and ensure that it is legible. There are many errors in this post that make it very difficult to read that would be easily picked up if you went back and re-read it after you had finished.

I read it easy enough..
One or two spelling mistakes does not make something un-readable,
This topic is coming up far too often in posts lately,
cant this be done through PM if you have any advice to give or a bone to pick?keeps the thread on topic then...

[The Yeti]

spelling and punctuation are for amatures, as for basing it on 1 car no I wont I have till june for the common expiory on our fleet I intend on using this time to drive plenty of cars both new and used the dunnydoor is an easy choise at this stage but I will do alot more research.

I have had bad experance with other ford dealers not just this 1 and my techs in Melbourne, Brisbane and Adalaide dont have many good things to say about there respective dealers either. Ford have had there chance and they blew it, Hell I'd look at a Skoda before I put Fords in to the fleet again.

I'm sorry but 3 months out of warranty and they wont cover a fault that has been reacuring since day one, thats not product support in my book

[05MkIIFutura]

Did you do some sort of cost camparison? Running your cars longer than three years is pretty unusual for fleets which are as significant as yours appear to be.

[xe351]

sounds like you got more of a lemon than anything else - dont be fooled, every brand has the occassional lemon

but you seem to be right in saying that ford service sucks

[The Yeti]

as a rule we would keep them no longer than 3 years hoever we got a great rate from the bank when we sorted a common expiery the down side was my car had to stay an extra 9 months hence I will have it 3years 9months and my GM will only have his 2years 4 months etc, a which point most of the cars will be changed to what ever, we will keep 5 of them some of the Utes have done 10k a year so we will buy them out and run them a bit longer

[xe351]

hey maybe you could go the mitsu 380's or something, have to bw a better option than the dunnydores

[Bipolar]

Sounds like you got a dud. Our fleet consists of 6 BA variants and 3 VX/Z Commodore variants. Each car has a file. The Falcon files look like they're empty and the Commodore files are fat. The amount of recalls and ongoing problems with them are ridiculous. The VZ Calais has a brake light warning light that randomly comes on and it has been looked at 4 times already. The driver, a diehard Holden man, is seriously considering other options. The guy who takes the cars in for servicing knows the names of the service people now. From memory the falcons have been in once for a minor recall and we've never had a problem with the Ford service centre we take them to. Some of the Falcons are flogged and some sit there for weeks without being used. Some have had services long overdue, but all never miss a beat. On the other hand, I know a guy who owns an ex-rental BA and he's had nothing but problems with it.

I've had my EL for 2½ years and the only problem I had was very slightly leaky overflow tank. I was a bit paranoid when I bought it, so I got a warranty and I take it to Ford for servicing because I don't trust anyone else. They've been fantastic. I probably sound a bit naive, but it just sounds like lots of bad luck to me.

[blueoval]

I hope it all works out for you Yeti.

Sometimes you need to make changes outside your usual decisions. Hell I did.

Dont get me wrong, I love my fords, be it classic or V8SC. But there are better cars out there, and you are gonna get your fair share of brand jumpers from one side to the other.

I'll be always a ford man deep down, but I dont think I could bring myself to get a new ford over a classic mustang or gt. In the meantime, I'll stick with what I know and my experiences much like you.

If your choice is a Holden, then that is exactly that, your choice. Enjoy it.

[Danny]

I gave up after "Its desided"

[EF, What else?]

Originally Posted by Danny

I gave up after "Its desided"

: Sorry, I missed that.

Ok, what part didn't you get?

Everything after Its desided. :

[nugget378]

Originally Posted by Danny

I gave up after "Its desided"

Good on ya,but did you need to really need to post and tell everyone..

[Danny]

Originally Posted by nugget378

Good on ya,but did you need to really need to post and tell everyone..

Yeah **** it I did. Sorry to have offended you...

[davro_xr6]

Honestly though, if you're basing your decision on a warranty issue (three months out of warranty) I hate to say it, every manufacture will say the same thing - its out of warranty - and for a car that is out of warranty, for them to offer 75% of cost of re-doing the airbag is pretty good... Granted there are some ordinary dealerships out there - but if you think Holden, or any other manufacturer for that matter, are going to be any different, I think you will find yourself a little dissappointed...

I must agree with some of the above posts -
1) You get a lemon in every car brand - its the nature of the beast unfortunately, especially with today's mass productions.
2) Just cause your particular fairmont is a lemon and gave you grief, does not equate to every Ford being a lemon - I got my BA with 150,000klms on the clock and I have not had a problem...

[The Yeti]

The issue is not so much the 3months out of warranty as, it has had constant air bag issues since day 1 and this one comes just 3 months out of warranty, just to ad to this on its last service (a week inside warranty) it also had an air bag light fault and i will bet that this wont be the last

Originally Posted by The Yeti

40,000k old its been in for warranty work only as I service it my self

Then you say:

Originally Posted by The Yeti

The straw that broke the cammels back was ford rejecting warranty on the last airbag fault as the car is now 3years and 3 months old regardless of the fact they have doen all the servicing

So which one is it? If you had actually taken the car in for it's regular service intervals you may not have had all the issues.

[MAGPIE]

Originally Posted by RATT

Then you say:



So which one is it? If you had actually taken the car in for it's regular service intervals you may not have had all the issues.

He services the VY himself & has only taken it in for two warranty issue's.

The BA he gets serviced at the dealer, along with all the warranty complaints.... then they shaft him over a recurrent issue.

Thats how I read it anyway.

[VSSII]

5 XR8's at work and 4 SS's. Ford are great with discounting of vehicles but the cars are regularly at the dealers having warranty work. The local dealer whom I won't name just shrug and say it's nothing unusual and don't see a problem. Holden are never interested in competing on price and instead try to promote better quality. The Holdens get diff whine after a while and years ago the early Gen III's suffered piston slap but the Fords suffer plastics coming loose, diff problems and one did a boss engine in the first 300klm. No VE's yet. Neither marque can boast Jap build quality but Ford are definately trailing and have been for the last 6 years I've been involved in costing and servicing. The bottom line is the Fords are off the road more often losing income.

[GasoLane]

Originally Posted by The Yeti

I'm taking my fleet of over 30 vechiels over to Holden.
Word of warnging Ford dont off the fleet manager.

Your the Fleet manager of 30 vehicles? Cool, but tell the guys in purchasing that the next batch of PC's they buy should come with spell checkers. The one your using now is broken!

[S3SR]

all i can say is more ford for me!