marinetowing
Member
A word of warning to anyone considering purchasing an Mitsubishi MN Triton
I purchased a MY10 GXL-R manual triton in early January last year brand new from a Hobart dealership, it was my 2nd triton that I have owned since new, buying a MK TD 4wd in 2003.
I use the ute for occassionally towing the car to events and for daily duties.
A couple of weeks before Xmas my wife took the car to the dealership for a 15,000k service, she was told by the service department that the front brake pads were badly worn and the rotors were damaged, which constituted a warranty claim due to the low kilometres and that they had contacted me by phone to inform me of the situation (which they did not do).
I inspected the brakes when the car arrived home and the pads were down to around 1mm of remaining material and the rotors were badly scored and showed signs of hot spots.
I called the dealership first thing Monday morning to be informed that they would submit a warranty claim and let me know the outcome in a day or so, I heard nothing all week so decided to call on Friday afternoon when I was told that MMA required more detail as this was a "unique" incident, my wife took the car back the following week where they photographed the brakes and sent the images of to MMA.
In between this week and the time the photos were sent I have heard nothing from MMA nor the dealership apart from the offer from the dealership to pay for new pads, rotors and fitting at my expence and be reimbursed if the claim was approved, to which I declined.
I called MMA on Tuesday to find out what was going on with the claim, only to be told by some halfwit at the front desk (who refused to let me speak to anyone higher up the foodchain as it was policy) that my claim would be rejected as the items were consumables and this was again a "unique" incident. When I questioned him about the low kilometres and the fact the rotors were also destroyed he replied "yes that's our policy, but I don't exactly know what rotors are" so basically I was accused of mistreating the car, left foot braking and I was wasting my time persuing a claim.
Wednesday I decided to turn up the heat a little and spoke to the dealership manager, explaining that it was probably not in his or MMA's best interest to refuse if they wanted to keep me as a future customer, considering I had bought 2 new vehicles from them and I do buy quite a lot of parts from ralliart for the TME and the GSR, he said he would push the matter and do everything within his power to get a result which would keep everyone happy, but once again mentioned the problem with it not being a common fauly MMA would be reluctant to approve the claim. He assured me that a result would come immediately and I would hear from him the following day (yesterday).
Surprise surprise yesterday came and went and no call from the dealership or MMA, in the meantime I did a bit of searching and found a forum (which has quite a large membership) soley for Triton's 2005 and up, it is also Australian based. I signed up and explained my dillema and instantly I was given links and stories of numerous owners with the exact same issue as mine with the MN model, one particular vehicle was identical with rotor damage at 15,000ks but overall a large percentage of these vehicles had had premature brake wear and it had been reported to dealerships which no doubt would have to brought to MMA's attention.
This problem was so widespread to that model that brake upgrade group buys for MN's were highly recommended on the site, all of the members that replied to my question agreed that it should be a warranty issue and for some reason it appeared that Mitsubishi had somewhat "skimped" for that model and used sub standard pad material.
This morning armed with the above info and feeling somewhat infuriated that MMA had lied to me about not knowing about the issue and that I was the first to make such a complaint, I decided to make a few calls.
First off was the service department manager (this call did not end so well) who informed me that MMA had officially refused my claim at the close of business Thursday night, I proceeded to question him on the info I had received from the other Triton owners to which he said he was not aware of such claims being made, which he may not have but no doubt MMA knew when they were investigating the claim. I asked him in all honesty if he had purchased the vehicle and in that low amount of k's would he be happy with brake component failure and expect to foot the bill himself, to which he told me that he wouldn't but my only option from here was to put in writing a complaint to MMA......as my blood pressure was at Mt St Helens level by now I told him his best option was to go fuck himself and this was far from over, then hung up and moved onto the dealership manager.
The dealership manager is trying a little harder to keep me onside and did mention that he had not heard of the brake wear issue before and would talk to MMA and try and sort out the situation, I informed him that if it was not resolved today and the tables turned in my favour he would not only lose me as a customer to the service dept, new vehicle sales etc I would also do my best to spread the joy on how great the ute is and how wonderful customer care is at MMA. I do tow the car around to a lot of places for events and people often do ask how it performs as a tow vehicle being the new 2.5 model, so it's quite easy to spread a negative if required.
He called me back some time later and said that MMA were standing firm on their decision but as a sign of goodwill the dealership was prepared to have pads and rotors fitted to the car for a cost to me of $200, I informed him that I appreciated the offer but unfortunately I am not prepared to give mitsubishi 1c of my money in order to fit substandard parts to my car and that as a customer he and I were finished and hung up.
.....I have had 8 missed calls from him in the meantime but not quite prepared to talk to him at the moment.
I have just got off the phone to MMA who still refuse to let me speak to anyone higher up the foodchain, the only action I can take apparently is by writing, I told the customer care I will not be writing a letter and that I will continue to call until I can speak to someone who can actually do something for me.
Customer care have just been in contact with the dealership and tell me that the dealership has submitted a claim of "goodwill" to MMA where they will contribute some of the cost of repair towards the car and to seek approval for MMA to pay the remainder of cost, the result I am told will come early next week.
I can get the dba rotor and pad upgrade for around $500 from the other forum, which is no doubt a good thing anyway as obviously the pads that are used for genuine parts are garbage, but it's not the point.
I never once had to put so much as a set of pads in my old triton in 84,000ks and it was used for the same purpose, driven the same way.
I find it astounding that MMA would be prepared to lie to a customer, then risk losing that customer and suffer negative publicity just for a petty set of brakes that were obviously crap and would more than likely not set them back more than a few hundred dollars.
Stay tuned....and yes I will be putting the "THIS CAR IS CRAP, DO NOT BUY ONE" stickers on the ute and parking it outside the dealership if this turns to custard.
I purchased a MY10 GXL-R manual triton in early January last year brand new from a Hobart dealership, it was my 2nd triton that I have owned since new, buying a MK TD 4wd in 2003.
I use the ute for occassionally towing the car to events and for daily duties.
A couple of weeks before Xmas my wife took the car to the dealership for a 15,000k service, she was told by the service department that the front brake pads were badly worn and the rotors were damaged, which constituted a warranty claim due to the low kilometres and that they had contacted me by phone to inform me of the situation (which they did not do).
I inspected the brakes when the car arrived home and the pads were down to around 1mm of remaining material and the rotors were badly scored and showed signs of hot spots.
I called the dealership first thing Monday morning to be informed that they would submit a warranty claim and let me know the outcome in a day or so, I heard nothing all week so decided to call on Friday afternoon when I was told that MMA required more detail as this was a "unique" incident, my wife took the car back the following week where they photographed the brakes and sent the images of to MMA.
In between this week and the time the photos were sent I have heard nothing from MMA nor the dealership apart from the offer from the dealership to pay for new pads, rotors and fitting at my expence and be reimbursed if the claim was approved, to which I declined.
I called MMA on Tuesday to find out what was going on with the claim, only to be told by some halfwit at the front desk (who refused to let me speak to anyone higher up the foodchain as it was policy) that my claim would be rejected as the items were consumables and this was again a "unique" incident. When I questioned him about the low kilometres and the fact the rotors were also destroyed he replied "yes that's our policy, but I don't exactly know what rotors are" so basically I was accused of mistreating the car, left foot braking and I was wasting my time persuing a claim.
Wednesday I decided to turn up the heat a little and spoke to the dealership manager, explaining that it was probably not in his or MMA's best interest to refuse if they wanted to keep me as a future customer, considering I had bought 2 new vehicles from them and I do buy quite a lot of parts from ralliart for the TME and the GSR, he said he would push the matter and do everything within his power to get a result which would keep everyone happy, but once again mentioned the problem with it not being a common fauly MMA would be reluctant to approve the claim. He assured me that a result would come immediately and I would hear from him the following day (yesterday).
Surprise surprise yesterday came and went and no call from the dealership or MMA, in the meantime I did a bit of searching and found a forum (which has quite a large membership) soley for Triton's 2005 and up, it is also Australian based. I signed up and explained my dillema and instantly I was given links and stories of numerous owners with the exact same issue as mine with the MN model, one particular vehicle was identical with rotor damage at 15,000ks but overall a large percentage of these vehicles had had premature brake wear and it had been reported to dealerships which no doubt would have to brought to MMA's attention.
This problem was so widespread to that model that brake upgrade group buys for MN's were highly recommended on the site, all of the members that replied to my question agreed that it should be a warranty issue and for some reason it appeared that Mitsubishi had somewhat "skimped" for that model and used sub standard pad material.
This morning armed with the above info and feeling somewhat infuriated that MMA had lied to me about not knowing about the issue and that I was the first to make such a complaint, I decided to make a few calls.
First off was the service department manager (this call did not end so well) who informed me that MMA had officially refused my claim at the close of business Thursday night, I proceeded to question him on the info I had received from the other Triton owners to which he said he was not aware of such claims being made, which he may not have but no doubt MMA knew when they were investigating the claim. I asked him in all honesty if he had purchased the vehicle and in that low amount of k's would he be happy with brake component failure and expect to foot the bill himself, to which he told me that he wouldn't but my only option from here was to put in writing a complaint to MMA......as my blood pressure was at Mt St Helens level by now I told him his best option was to go fuck himself and this was far from over, then hung up and moved onto the dealership manager.
The dealership manager is trying a little harder to keep me onside and did mention that he had not heard of the brake wear issue before and would talk to MMA and try and sort out the situation, I informed him that if it was not resolved today and the tables turned in my favour he would not only lose me as a customer to the service dept, new vehicle sales etc I would also do my best to spread the joy on how great the ute is and how wonderful customer care is at MMA. I do tow the car around to a lot of places for events and people often do ask how it performs as a tow vehicle being the new 2.5 model, so it's quite easy to spread a negative if required.
He called me back some time later and said that MMA were standing firm on their decision but as a sign of goodwill the dealership was prepared to have pads and rotors fitted to the car for a cost to me of $200, I informed him that I appreciated the offer but unfortunately I am not prepared to give mitsubishi 1c of my money in order to fit substandard parts to my car and that as a customer he and I were finished and hung up.
.....I have had 8 missed calls from him in the meantime but not quite prepared to talk to him at the moment.
I have just got off the phone to MMA who still refuse to let me speak to anyone higher up the foodchain, the only action I can take apparently is by writing, I told the customer care I will not be writing a letter and that I will continue to call until I can speak to someone who can actually do something for me.
Customer care have just been in contact with the dealership and tell me that the dealership has submitted a claim of "goodwill" to MMA where they will contribute some of the cost of repair towards the car and to seek approval for MMA to pay the remainder of cost, the result I am told will come early next week.
I can get the dba rotor and pad upgrade for around $500 from the other forum, which is no doubt a good thing anyway as obviously the pads that are used for genuine parts are garbage, but it's not the point.
I never once had to put so much as a set of pads in my old triton in 84,000ks and it was used for the same purpose, driven the same way.
I find it astounding that MMA would be prepared to lie to a customer, then risk losing that customer and suffer negative publicity just for a petty set of brakes that were obviously crap and would more than likely not set them back more than a few hundred dollars.
Stay tuned....and yes I will be putting the "THIS CAR IS CRAP, DO NOT BUY ONE" stickers on the ute and parking it outside the dealership if this turns to custard.
