Hello All,
I'm very excited to be part of Team-BHP and this is my first post. Finally got the time to register and be part of Team-BHP family, after being a passive reader for close to 8 months.
I would like to thank moderators for approving my membership and also all you fellow BHPians, whose valuable contributions to this forum keeps folks like me informed regarding the latest happenings and unbiased reviews / ownership threads. In fact this is one of the thread which I closely follow and also compelled me to be part of Team-BHP.
I started my hunt to purchase my first car in India about 8 months ago (returned back to India from overseas). I had no specific make/type/segment in preference and to be honest, I didn't know what to expect from a Indian car (after driving Automatic's for about 7 years overseas and had never driven before in India). I restricted myself to 12 lakhs as the budget limit (which by the way was 6 lakhs to begin with). After lot of sleepless nights, burning the midnight oil reading multiple reviews, blogs / forums, watching online video reviews - finally narrowed it down to Ford EcoSport Titanium+ TDCI (from the list of cars offered in India within my budget).
Now that its close to 8 months of car hunt, even I'm in the same dilemma as below - should I wait for 2017 model or go with the current one?
Quote:
Originally Posted by VMG Pl let me know about 2017 model launch date in India. |
Quote:
Originally Posted by satz581993Mille Well, the 2017 model will take at least an year to reach the stockyards of dealers I guess. Also, I'm pretty sure that there won't be any mechanical changes to the engine as well as the gearbox. So even if a new version ends up coming after your purchase, at best most of the changes will be cosmetic. If you could live with that even if somehow ford launches the new model before an year, you should go with the current one. |
Quote:
Originally Posted by ecosport rules If you can live with the cosmetic changes you miss out and the lower resale value of the current one, buy it. |
The only major turn off in EcoSport is the interior dashboard design - mainly control units and display screen. I think it resembles the age old Nokia phone with plethora of buttons. It might look futuristic to many, but looks ugly to me. I read somewhere online that, new version of EcoSport would get a new dashboard design which would include a touch screen as well. Most likely would resemble the Ford Endeavour's dash to some extent (I'm sorry that I don't recall the source and cannot quote it here). I just wished the recent face lift included a fix to the dashboard design and also added retractable ORVMs.
If its going to take another 1 year to get a new interior design, then I don't think I will wait for it. I can live with all the other CONS listed as part of official review and just hope that the looks of dashboard will grow on me, as time passes by (just like the car - initially EcoSport didn't appeal to me but over the last 8 months, after reading more of this thread, the looks kind of grew on me).
After visiting the Ford Dealers, I had few questions and request inputs from fellow members regarding below:
1) Below were offered on Titanium+ TDCI (not the black edition)
Common for all 3 dealers:
- Wait times around 3-4 weeks
- No discounts
- Corp offer: 4th year warranty upto 80K (or 100k)
Dealer 1:
- Basic accessories for free (up to 10k value which includes car cover as well)
- 10% off on accessories that I chose from
- Can opt for insurance from outside (quoted about 47K)
Dealer 2:
- Can opt for insurance from outside but no discounts - period.
If I opt for insurance from dealer (worth 47k), then below are on offer:
- Car color matching rear wheel cover for free (worth 13k)
- Basic accessories for free (up to 5k value which doesn't include car cover)
- 3% off on accessories that I chose from (Yes, its Three%
![Frustration](https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/images/smilies/Frustration.gif)
)
Dealer 3:
- Never got back to me regarding any offers
Considering that there are about 241 Ford dealerships across India (from cardekho.com) and sales figures of about 3000 Ecosports/month, I guess the dealerships are happy selling approximately 12-13 of them per month without discounts/freebies.
I guess no further room for bargaining available, so should it be (dealer 1 or 2) that should be receiving my million+ rupees?
2) In the day/night mode IRVM, rear camera display cannot be integrated with the 2016 models Titanium+ models. Looks like we will loose the day night mode and need to just settle for regular IRVM with rear camera view integrated. Is this correct?
3) What would it take cost wise, to have retractable ORVMs? and would this impact warranty in anyway (there is no official Ford accessory to have this as a feature)
4) Any option to opt for official Ford accessory for the headlamps (to have them changed to projector headlights). Seems like the SA or their manager or general manager, none of them are aware. On a lighter note, I was more aware of the car features than anyone in the dealership,
![LOL](https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/images/smilies/LOL.png)
thanks to team-BHP reviews and ownership threads.
Off-topic: I also test drove the petrol / diesel Tata Tiago and came back mighty impressed with the diesel variant (top end), which I think is ideal for City conditions (mileage claims are insane). Probably would have booked this over Ecosport but current wait times are running at 3+ months. Also absolutely no discounts which are understandable, even corporate offer is Three (3) K cash discounts only.