Poor Service and avoiding responsibility

I will give you a brief history and attached is the last correspondence I sent to the ombudsman, Audi South Africa and my service adviser.

Now comes to the new problem which I think should be Audi Cape Town’s responsibility and this was raised with Audi South Africa and they stated it will be escalated to the dealer principle and the heads.

Kindly note that none of the below happen with my car and I never felt none of these things prior to dropping it off for the clutch repairs at Audi Centre Cape Town.

On the 19th of October, I picked the car up from Audi centre Cape Town after the clutch repairs were done, I drove out the dealership and instantly felt a very heavy vibration in the down change from 3,2,1 and very heavy just before switching into gear 1.

Secondly there was a problem with over revving, the car upon braking will over rev pass 3000 rpm and then drop suddenly together with the vibration and clunk into first gear, at this moment I was on table bay boulevard in traffic and couldn’t turn back. I parked the car at home and heard a droning sound which I noted all these in an email to my service Advisor on the evening of the 19th.

I received no feedback, and then got a call on the 22nd of October, to come in the next day and drive with Gideon the technician, which I did, while driving around Audi, Gideon advised he could hear what I was saying and feel the vibration but it’s nothing major, I asked three times are you happy there is nothing wrong with my car and he said yes and reiterated what I said I researched could be the problems, that being exhaust rattle or manifold nuts lose.

I had a meeting and left to go to work, the 23rd and 24th I had uncomfortable drives home and then made contact again to ask if the car could be booked in and was advised again to maybe come in and drive with a tech and I insisted rather book it in.

Car was booked in on the 30th of October 2018, that afternoon I received a call to advise me that the timing chain needs to be replaced or repaired and that was the cause of the droning sound and the over revving.

On the call I was advised that the vibration I was feeling was because the heater shield unit was not put back securely and now has been secured, that is poor service and poor workmanship, that I as a client had to think I was paranoid as your tech advised me nothing major is wrong in the first place when I mentioned all the same things.

I was then advised that it is a totally new fault and the fault was on memory and couldn’t of been picked up the first time. Please advise me how I never experienced none of the above prior to dropping the car of but it’s a new fault after the car was stripped and fixed by Audi Cape Town. (PLEASE NOTE diagnostics ran and no other errors other than transmission was picked up before bringing it in the first time, so the new faults occurred while at the dealership in my opinion.)

To date my email above has not been answered there is no sense of urgency to get the warranty to come out, my car has been in total at Audi Cape town for 30 days since October, I have used my car 10 days from the 19th to 30th and have paid installments for a car that I don’t have spending R400 on uber a day to travel and further had to hire a car twice.

As I advised Audi South Africa, Audi needs to be held liable for giving me a so called repaired car back damaged with faults I never had before it was given to Audi. But it’s been 21 days now and they are still awaiting appropriate feedback, Audi should repair the faults and return my car asap as the claim against warranty will now mean in these 36 days at Audi Cape Town the car needed almost R100 000 damages to be repaired.

I hope you can assist in some way. As I am now waiting feedback from Audi South Africa and the ombudsman.

More feedback as of the last week and today – I raised the concerns with Audi South Africa and I have been dealing with Alex from Audi South Africa.

I would like to set up a meeting with yourself to discuss this matter – As I find it hard to believe that Audi Centre Cape Town was willing to give me my car back on the 19th of October after repairing it and gave me my car back with more faults on it, further to this when I advised Audi the same day there was problems on the car, I was contacted to be advised to bring it back a few days later to drive with an Audi technician whom above confirmed nothing major is wrong and was happy with me taking my car after I asked 3 times if he was happy.

Secondly – He also advised Bronwyn Forbes the service advisor that there is nothing wrong with the car, I then insisted the car be booked in to be checked ,emails are attached to state this, then I am informed there was actually a problem and I just received the invoice which is almost R100 000, How is it possible for your qualified technician to have advised me there is nothing wrong but the exact same things I mentioned from the day I picked this car up from you guys amounts to now the R98k. (But Audi said there was nothing wrong, also my car was given back to me with a heater shield not secure which was causing my vibrations no acknowledgment or responsibility taken)

I have raised this with the Ombudsman against Audi and have also laid a complaint with the National Consumer Commission, I would like my car repaired and given back to me as I am not willing to take on cost for absolutely terrible workmanship from Audi. I am further considering taking personal legal action as well.

I hope we can resolve this amicably, I am at my wits end with this as I haven’t had a car for so long, using alternative transport and money on transport that I shouldn’t be paying.

Your feedback is awaited urgently.