Shocking Quality of Car and Service

I bought a Nissan Magnite from CMH Ballito in July 2023 and from the beginning I experienced ongoing mechanical issues and extremely poor after sales service.

At around 20,000 km the front brake pads had to be replaced, and again around 45,000 km together with both front brake discs. While wear and tear can vary, I have owned and driven many vehicles over the past 23 years and have never experienced this level of brake wear so early.

The major issue, however, was the clutch. The entire clutch failed at 69,000 km and had to be replaced. Then, only four months later, the clutch failed again. CMH initially tried to blame my driving, despite the fact that I am an experienced manual driver who does high mileage for work and has never had repeated clutch failures on any previous vehicle.

The service department was extremely disappointing throughout this process. Communication was poor, there were almost no follow ups, and my vehicle sat there for weeks with little progress until I repeatedly complained. After the second clutch failure, they offered me a “special discount” but still ended up charging me an additional R4,000 compared to the previous clutch replacement.

Eventually, after my car had been sitting there for nearly a month, I had it flat bedded to another mechanic. That mechanic identified the actual root cause: a worn gearbox mount, which had caused the second clutch failure. This was never properly identified by CMH despite my repeated requests for them to investigate why the clutch kept failing.

The only person who showed genuine care during this entire experience was Alex, who checked on me while I was waiting in tears for my car to be loaded onto the flatbed.

Based on my experience, I cannot recommend CMH Ballito or the Nissan Magnite. The service experience was poor, accountability was lacking, and I was left feeling like the focus was more on charging for repairs than solving the actual problem.