[Mr.Ogre]

You got lots of patience man, and can probably hold your nerves. I wish I had those qualities. I always back out of such situations the moment something goes the way it shouldn't in the first place. It just becomes too hard to trust the process, the checks in place, and ultimately the final product. Be it a car a motorbike or anything.

[Raghu M]

The car pic that you shared looks like from a used market. How is TATA so dumb to not even consider a buyer smart? It's basic common sense. If there is something wrong in the engine a PDI wouldn't reveal it but dents and scratches?

[Neversaygbye]

Originally Posted by Drdriver

Something about the work ethic and unprofessional behaviour of Northie sales executives doesn't sit right

I don't think region has anything to do with it. When my friend was shopping around for a CSUV, we had gone to the Lexus Motors showroom in Automall, New Town, Calcutta to check out the Nexon and the showroom experience was horrible to say the least. That too despite me being present there and telling the showroom folks that I was an existing Tata car owner, right at the outset. No one was interested in attending to us and when we finally went and interrupted a group of staff busy gossiping, one came over and cursorily accompanied us without showing any interest at all. He could not even answer basic questions about the car that my friend asked. Eventually my friend dropped Tata and went for the Sonet.

Lexus Motors is one of the biggest dealers in Calcutta and even handle the JLR portfolio - yet their attitude was lackadaisical in the extreme and they had even refused a test drive saying that no test drive vehicles were available (we had not asked for an on the spot test drive).

It was a singularly pathetic experience. I don't think Tata has much control over its dealers, especially the legacy ones from the Indica days.

[Stribog]

Originally Posted by Shreyans_Jain

It is an open secret that the car dealership model is broken. The OP correctly mentioned that all shortages are artificial and waiting periods are deliberately created to shift the balance of power away from the customer. Odd exception aside, almost all mass market cars are available for immediate delivery, providing you have the right contacts or you are willing to pay underhand premiums and buy overpriced accessories and insurance.

In this sense, the model has changed from them sweetening the deal with discounts/benefits. But ultimately, it is cartelisation, and car companies are complicit by having ridiculous booking procedures with zero transparency, and refusing to exercise control on dealers. They are also benefiting by getting away with higher priced cars and not having to offer dealer benefits.

Tata here were extremely unprofessional, absolutely no two ways about it. However please let us not make the very real delivery backlog caused in part by a chip shortage to be some gigantic conspiracy that the,

1) Media who covered it are complicit in (globally)
2) the analysts and banks who reported and continue to report this in their industry analysis
3) the OEM's themselves who have reported this also

[DSC]

Originally Posted by NorthernStar

I'm a proud owner of Tata Nexon XZ+ Petrol. The car is excellent and running like a dream for almost an year but I understand that in order to buy a car from Tata you need to awaken your 6th sense and your 3rd eye at times!

A very useful Post and every observation you made is spot on. I have faced all these issues while buying my Punch (Oct 2022), starting from waiting period. Only difference is, despite some minor paint and build defect (left rear door), I choose to take delivery of the car. As usual, no discount. The waiting is completely artificial.

The service experience is even worse. The service experience of tata is even worse than buying experience. Talking about Hyderabad City. They have people as service executive who can't even difference between petrol and diesel engines. One of my colleague found a 10mm T spanner stuck in the bay area after a month of service.

The decision of buying Tata cars to be seriously reconsidered in the present aspects. If one has budget, Mahindra is almost always a much better choice. In service aspects, Suzuki and Hyundai is miles ahead of Tata.

Mod Note : Please quote ONLY the relevant bits of a post. Quoting a full, long post inconveniences our mobile readers.

Thanks!

[SS80]

I have owned 4 TATA cars till now, I will not touch another TATA car even with a barge pole. Their cars are getting better and better, their dealers are getting worse with each day passing.

I have seen 2week old Nexon with rusted nuts and bolts in the engine bay, missing foam in the fender gap on one side, and crude edges of sheet metal everywhere. Service is another nightmare, they love it when Nexon, Tiago, and Harrier come into the garage, but try driving a Manza, Nano, Indigo etc The step-motherly treatment will be there for sure. They somehow dislike out-of-production cars and don't care much.

Best to stay away from TATA, unless you have a really good dealer in your town.

[Draunzer21]

I am stunned to read so many stories on this forum while I never thought dealerships would do that. When I had bought my first car from Maruti in 2017, I paid booking amount, the guy said your vehicle is here, paid all amount no PDI, got delivery and then had missing fog lamps which were part of extra accessories I had bought. They gave it in the following week. I am lucky that the car has aged well without any issues, but this forum is surely increasing my knowledge of car PDI and delivery.

[DSC]

Originally Posted by SS80

Best to stay away from TATA, unless you have a really good dealer in your town.

No matter how good the dealer is, svc support will lack. The other option is to ditch authorised SVC and get it done elsewhere. But then, there will be other issues for sure.

Except for the safety and VFM proposition in some models and variants, TM is lacking in almost all departments.

[iampulo]

I would add my friends' experience of buying and servicing Nexon from both Karnal Metro Motors.
1. My friend purchased Nexon XTO petrol version on Oct'2022. He had enquired about test drive, but the same wasn't available for test drive. Instead they insisted for going for paying the token amount. There only logic was that, we have sold xx amount of nexons to your company employees, you can trust on us. On the day of payment, they hadn't cleaned/prepared the vehicle from backyard for delivery. After the paperwork, they said to sign all the papers and sign all feedback form. We argued that without a final inspection, there wouldn't be any handover. Windshield fluid was empty. They filled it with tap water. Tey have quickly jet sprayed leaving all dust traces on the body. Spare wheel was having low pressure and we werent unsure if it was leaking or had just low pressure. On complaining they seemed to be ignorant. And we were bound to complete as our home location was on a remote place.
2. Another colleague had his topbox being clunky(1st and reverse gear) not engaging. On raising complaint, they said they they would open and check. After 2 visits, they couldn't detect the issue and ended up raising a warranty request.
After 2 weeks and delivery of new topbox assembly(as claimed by service executive), my friend went on the day of attending his replacement. But he found the packaging of top box having tag of "refurbished". He raised the complaint and mailed to customer care, and finally he got the response that no where it is mentioned in the warranty that the replacable parts would be new. After multiple email wars, finally he got a new top box assembly replaced under warranty.

[Drdriver]

Originally Posted by Drdriver

I must point out though, my father is not having an ounce of such horrid dealing while buying the same car from Ahmedabad. Something about the work ethic and unprofessional behaviour of Northie sales executives doesn't sit right

I eat my words. Come delivery time and they have frustrated my father to no end. He specifically took a 2 day leave to pick the car, informed them a week in advance and they still are taking another whole day to deliver it. Refused PDI and whatnot. Total shit show. Father had to take another 2 days leave just because the dealership couldn't stick to their word.
Opinion cemented: Breathe fire down the necks of the dealership and salesperson if you want to buy a Tata car

[wbd8779]

-at the stockyard itself which is at Sector-37, Botanical gardens which is 14 Kms away from the Sector-5 showroom.

Some of the bits mentioned by you are not correct - the distance is not 14kms but 3.8kms , and I am not sure why would you book 2 cars from the same dealer - they have the same dealer code , just different outlets .

[Clown Prince]

Originally Posted by Mustang Sammy

I feel your pain. Had a similar (not as horrendous though) experience with Mahindra dealership when I got my ScorpioN.
They and Tata make good vehicles, but their dealers are still stuck in the Truck sales era in terms of quality of service (not that any kind of customer deserves this)

No. In some aspects they are even worse than Truck sales. But Sales experience I can bare upto an extent. It’s the ASS that makes me stay far away from both of these brands. Buying Experience is important but matter only to the point where I don’t take car out of the showroom, Service experience is for way longer period.


I don’t know why you (OP) got angry with the Sector 5 salesman. No salesman will say they are providing you the product because it got rejected by some other customer. I know you have a terrible experience but for this point you can’t blame the salesman or dealership. You booked same car with same dealer but two different showrooms. It’s not like they are sharing customer information . You can try to control your anger, it adversely affects your own health only.
On a side note, It’s a great post. Many of points will help the ones out to purchase a new car and make smart decision or make their point known to dealer. I also agree that this shortage is artificial.
Anyway Congrats on your new car. Happy miles ahead.

[ashokabs]

There was a news report that Tata dealerships made profits for the first time after many years. Hence, it is not surprising that they tried all means to maximize their return from each car sold. Obviously it was going to be something underhand and so there are many stories of shady dealings with Tata dealerships. I hope with the company reviving this will change. It is possible that the dealers might now be used to making extra money other than their commissions thanks to years of experience of double dealing.

[HartBandit]

Originally Posted by NorthernStar

I paid the booking amount and was given 16 weeks of waiting time. I did the same for both Sector-5 and Sector-63 branch.

Now the fun began. I waited for 3 weeks and started pestering the dealership about the car. I also made them abundantly clear that I had made 4 bookings (in reality there were just 2) from different dealerships and will cancel my booking immediately if I receive the car from somewhere else. On 18th May (6 weeks after booking), I received a call from sector-63 that my car has arrived and I can make payment for the same.

Can someone help me understand the logic for this?

If you have been given a 16 week waiting period and you have not cancelled your booking (meaning you are OK with it), why would you start "pestering" the dealership in 3 weeks? How did they "waste 7 weeks of your time" when they never promised to give you your car in 7 weeks?

And then you paid and got someone else's car who had been patiently waiting for theirs.

Thank you for sharing the PDI list and things to do - I appreciate that very much, and your experience hasn't been great, but you have not painted yourself in a great light either. Also, the two dealerships are of the same dealer - you knew that information - so why would you shout at them for sharing the yard and selling the same cars?

[Ltinsane]

My family booked a Tata Nexon XZ on 24th of July 2021, with quoted delivery of 12-16 weeks. Although salesperson assured, we would likely get delivery around Durga Puja but his statement lacked conviction. After hounding him for months, we finally got delivery after 21 weeks on December 2022. We did receive some messages from Tata motors in early December regarding that vehicle has been sent into production and later that it has been dispatched from the plant. Salesperson was interested in PDI as well, but after much hounding he agreed to have someone take us to their stockyard. Thankfully all went well with PDI and we agreed to pay and get paperwork started.

We needed specific number type of number about which salesperson has no idea. He quoted a staggering 2lakhs so we asked him to just get the 'title guy' at the dealership. Our number requirements were met with the official RTO fees of around 1000 and some change.
Since it was a XZ model and doesn't come with alloy wheels, we had negotiated for alloy wheels (paid above the car price) to be equipped while taking the delivery of the vehicle. Come paying day, we enquired about alloy wheels which is mentioned on the booking form and salesperson has blank face. He calls the 'parts guy' who let us know that if we pay upfront, he can order alloys for us and have them delivered in 40 days. After lashing out again to salesperson, the parts guy miraculously arranged a set installed on the delivery day.

On delivery day, we reached at the time promised by salesperson, of course the car is not there. Salesperson assured that everything is in order, and the car is at the workshop getting wheel alignment after having alloys installed.
After 30 minutes car arrives at the showroom, but OfCourse seat covers, and number plates are not yet installed.

Finally, we get car handed over 3 hours later. And yes, salesperson asked for 10/10 rating.


We went with Nexon because I liked the car but was also interested in the I20. Initial showroom experience was worse with Hyundai. I wanted to test drive the car, I booked an online appointment, got a call from a salesman telling me that it won't be possible on that day. So I suggested another day, same thing. So another day and still no car available for test drive. So I asked salesperson to suggest a day and time when car is available. He gave a weekday at 3:00 PM. I took early leave from office to reach showroom on time and lo and behold there is no car available. Although my family and I are offered some coffee and water but there was no straight answer as to when the test vehicle is coming in. After several probing, we just left the showroom at 4:45 without looking at the vehicle.