Dec 28, 2009 03:37 PM
6821 Views
(Updated May 01, 2011 06:02 PM)
In August 09 I wanted to replace my Esteem Vxi with a new car. Being very comfortable with Maruti Suzuki I thought I should buy the SX4 but then I wanted to check the other models that were available. I used Mouthshut to research and compare cars. The final contenders - Fiat Linea, Ford Fiesta, Honda City, Hyundai i20 and Suzuki SX4. After carefully running through the list of pros and cons I choose the Fiat Linea. However in a few days Fiat introduced the Grand Punto.
In appearance the Grand Punto looks like the Linea without the Trunk. However if you look carefully you'd notice other subtle differences. It wasn't very difficult to arrive at a decision once I had a look at the features of the Punto. The Grand Punto is probably the most loaded hatchback. It is loaded with features - front airbags, ABS, steering wheel volume controls, Blaupunkt Stereo, Blue Tooth, Spoken Instructions to configure your phone etc. etc. etc. The close contender was Hyundai i20 but it lost out because it was expensive by a lakh.
Having decided on the Grand Punto I decided to go with TAFE REACH(Concorde was the other dealer) in Chennai because they offered me the best price. I visited the dealer along with my wife on 2nd September 2009. We were made to wait for over an hour before the sales guy who demonstrated the car to us arrived, after that it took us another hour and a half to fill the various forms and swipe my card for the down payment. We chose the electric blue colour and as expected it was not in stock! I was promised that the car would arrive in 10 days. The booking process was not even a bit pleasant. I don't expect any dealership to treat me like a member of any Royal Family but I expect the basic courtesies - Having fixed an appointment I didn't expect the sales person to come late, well if for some excegencies he was delayed the dealership should have had someone else attend on me. There was no reading material for us to spend time so all that we did was to twiddle our thumbs.
Ten days went by there was no sight of the car nor a call from the sales guy or anyone from the dealership. Obviously having successfully made a sale the dealership was concentrating all its energies on the next prospect. I called up the sales guy only to be told that its on its way and should reach Chennai soon. I made several calls in the subsequent days only to be told that its in transit, in the yard, its being inspected and what not. These sales guys never run out of excuses. I wanted it on a particular day(auspicious) and the dealership told me that the car cannot come on the roads without being registered. What a sick joke. I had to escalate this to someone in Fiat and had to ask them how did they take their cars to the RTO? carry them or drive them? They relented with reluctance and let me have the car before it went to the RTO for a few hours on that auspicious day. But some work excegencies and I had to ask them to postpone the delivery by another day and finally on the 26th Sep I was told that the Grand Punto will be delivered to me. So I took time off from work to receive the car. No sight of it till about 11 am I called up the sales guy and he told me it was being inspected at the dealership. At 5pm no sight of the car. He told me that he was about 2kms from my house. At 7pm no sight of the car. All my calls to the sales guy went unanswered. At 8pm he had his friend pick up and tell me that the fuel is being filled. Finally I got the car at 11pm. Fiat is the only company that has late night deliveries! I went through the normal process of tallying the engine and chassis numbers on the vehicle to that in the delivery challan.
The Grand Punto is not peppy because it just has a 1.3L Diesel engine and the body weight is much more than cars in its class. You'll notice this especially when you are accelerating after a brief stop at Traffic signal, before you gain speed you are likely to have angry honks. However once you reach your cruising speed the Punto is very stable. We have done speeds of about 140 kmph on the highway.
The first few weeks we drove the Grand Punto only to work and back(about 8km one way). Sometime after the first month we took it to Pondicherry on the National Highway and on returning I measured the mileage to discover that I was getting a disappointing 16 kmpl on highway, The same week I measured the mileage in the city to discover I got 13 kmpl. I took it for the first free service and told them the problem. The engineer told me that the things would improve as days go by. I was left with no choice but to believe him!
A few days later I paired my Palm Treo 680 and my better half's Nokia to the Punto using the Blue and Me. The spoken instructions sweep you of your feet. It works very well. If you are playing the CD or Radio and you get a call the Punto cuts off the volume and routes your call to the speakers.
Life was smooth till the sales guy called me one day to tell me that the credit card company was refusing to pay him the amount swiped by me. I was taken aback and called my relationship manager to enquire if there was a problem. She inquired and confirmed that there was no issues with my card account. So I
got the sales guy and this lady on a conference call and conveyed that there is no issue from my side and that TAFE has to followup with the bank for the payment. Days passed by and after two weeks I called the sales guy to check if the RC book arrived. He told me he hadn't received it. I kept following up for the RC book only to be told that it hadn't arrived and that my advance payment was not yet released by the bank. One day I called up TAFE on their land lines and asked for the RC book, the chap in the accounts section told me it was received about a week back. It took me a while to realise that the sales guy was not releasing the RC book because he had not received the payment from the bank. What a sick mind instead of solving the issue with the bank they were trying to push the customer to resolve it. I called up TAFE's managing director, I was put to her executive assistant and I explained the whole incident to him and also conveyed that I can only facilitate the discussions between TAFE and the bank and that I did not have the clout to persuade the bank to release the advance swiped on the card. That evening when I reached home the sales guy was at my parking lot with the RC book. I did give him a piece of my mind.
Some days later I paired my iPod Video 5G to the Punto using Blue and Me. Though the Punto recognised the iPOD and downloaded the album and song info searching a song either by the album or artiste is very cumbersome using the controls on the steering wheel. For some reason they don't appear in the alphabetical order.
Ever since I have done two long trips one to Bangalore about 350 kms from Chennai and the other to Namakkal(via Krishnagiri) which is 418 kms from Chennai. That's 1536 kms on the highway for Jan 2010. On both these trips my mileage was a little over 20kmpl. My initial dissapointment with the mileage has disappeared.
As I write this I just noticed that the brake shoes on my left hand front wheel is worn so much that I get the smell of burnt rubber inside the cabin. My odometer reads 8239 kms. Time to take it for a second service.
