A tale of F-Type ownership

I know many of you on this forum are aware of my being a champion, alongside others on this board, driving for improvement in the F-Type audio installation. My F-type issues go beyond this and are a case study in poor customer experience.

The F-Type is a wonderful car in its segment, but for me the negative experience is something I felt compelled to share. I’ve written up my full story to give individuals looking to select an F-Type the inside track on what ownership experiences can be like and the culture and attitude you will hit should you be unfortunately impacted by problems with your car. I do recognise others have had better, maybe even perfect experiences, but it’s my belief no customer should have such a poor ownership experience.

And of course, an F-Type is not about transport. As Julian Thomson, one of the designers of the F-Type once said about the Lotus Elise he also designed “It has to be something you love owning, like a beautiful watch or a motor bike.” So do take my views in this context. This is something Julian, and I guess, Ian Callum truly understand, but as you’ll see from my story – its an understanding that is sadly lacking across the rest of Jaguar.

Throughout this story, you’ll see multiple contradictions coming from JLR which I will allow the reader to make their own assumptions over.

Placing my order…
In late 2012 Jaguar unveiled its CX-16 and I knew immediately it was a car that had the potential to be truly special – a keeper. Months later, after the initial reviews confirmed what the first photos promised, I visited my first Jaguar dealer with debit card and deposit at the ready. Walking into the dealership I was truly excited. The receptionist led me to the waiting area and I served myself a drink. 15 minutes passed. “A sales person will be right with you.” 30 minutes passed. “Someone will be right with you.” At 40 minutes I moved on…

The next dealer was accommodating and even brought an F-Type to my house for the test drive. He got the order and 12 weeks later – on September 1, 2013 - my car would arrive factory fresh. In the weeks prior, we had one disagreement over them trying to sell me a Tracker at over the list price.

I left the dealership with my new car beaming. I arrived home and showed my family the car before heading out for a drive. As I leave the drive way, I hear something from the back of the car. The number plate had fallen off. It transpires the dealership technician had screwed the plate into holes that were not designed to retain number plates. The worse part is that it leaves a noticeable mark in the paintwork. Later that day, I also realise that the electric folding mirrors were not installed in my car as the paperwork had indicated.

Jaguar apologise for their mistake and the Dealership offers to repaint the rear panel. Unfortunately, Jaguar do not ship factory painted parts and so whatever the outcome, I had no choice other than to have a local body shop paint the parts on my 2 hours old car. In my experience, parts back from a body shop never colour match, fit is never perfect and of course neither the dealership or the body shop have ever taken an F-Type apart previously. I decide with gritted teeth I have no other choice and grudgingly live with it. Jaguar and the dealer between them contribute 50% to the 5-year service plan.

After 3 weeks in late September 2013, having lost confidence in the supplying dealer’s technicians, I report what I think are small warranty faults on the car to another local dealer; a speaker vibration from the left door and a faulty cruise control switch.

The dealer has the car for the day, tell me they’ve fixed the speaker and have had to back order a replacement switch for the steering wheel. They highlight to me that they have spoken to the factory and that a service advisory has been issued on the sound system due to a high number of warranty claims on non-faulty speakers. Unfortunately, the speaker vibration remains.

Its now late October 2013, and I’ve still not heard back from either dealer on the warranty parts order or the service plan they’ve offered me. They both promise it will soon be sorted. Even after a month, the dealer is still waiting on JLR for spare parts.

We reach November 20th and the service plan is finally sorted. And, I finally have a booking for the warranty work during the first week of December.

I take my car in to get the speaker and cruise control switch replaced. On arrival, the service manager says, “Sorry Mr. Wheeler, we don’t seem to have a booking for you.” It then takes a further week before they can fit me in again.

Two and half months later I finally have a working cruise control. However, despite this second attempt at fixing the speaker issue, a solution continues to elude the master. I think to myself, sort it out after Christmas.

Its first day back at work on January 5th. The car has been parked up in the garage whilst I’m away for two weeks. She fires up normally and we cruise gently away from my house and then as I pull into the main road the car starts to jolt violently, clears a little and then with every depression of the accelerator the car has a major mis-fire. I manage to get the car to the dealership and whilst there I ask them to also look at the speaker.

This time I decide to get in contact with Jaguar’s CRC. I’m also swayed by the fact that I’ve just read about a V6S engine failure in Autocar magazine as well as two others on this Forum. My luck with this car has not been good and so its time to make sure its on the record with headquarters. We speak several times that week as they correspond with the dealer to understand and record the issues. Despite physically recording and typing up all of these conversations on their customer response system, Jaguar will later insist that all these dealership attempts at a fix have not ‘officially’ occurred, because they are not recorded in their technical team’s system. Their correspondence says “I am aware that on one previous occasion the concern was raised to Jaguar technical by the retailer.” Despite my 3 prior visits to the dealership being recorded on both the dealer systems and Jaguar’s CRC system, it transpires these count for nothing unless the dealer has been through a formal escalation with Technical.

They route cause the engine miss-fire down to a faulty coil pack and also replace all the spark plugs to be sure. They declare after this third attempt at addressing the speaker that they’ve fixed it, but its still no better.

Its early February now and I rebook the car for a forth attempt. This time there is some improvement, but its still not what you’d expect of an upgraded system in a £75k ($112k) vehicle. It still vibrates on mid-tones from spoken voice and music. Remembering its dark at this time of year, I find a number of marks – including screw driver scratches to the trims surrounding the door. And the stainless steel door panel has lost its protective blue film and is marked. I point these out to the CRC to ensure they are on record for the next time it has to go in.

I’ve had more than 15 telephone conversations with Jaguar’s CRC. We reach an impasse where I’m asking them to send an audio engineer down for the fifth attempt at fixing the door vibration issue. It seemed fair enough; 2 different dealers have now given it their best shot over four separate occasions and four weeks and both dealers along with others have voiced their frustrations to Jaguar. They refuse point blank. I receive this standard line over email several times “As I have previously advised, in order to address your specific concern, your vehicle would need to be diagnosed and resolved at a Jaguar Approved Retailer.”

Meanwhile, I see many fellow owners on web Forums share the same issue. And over several months, the topic becomes the most viewed subject reaching over 50,000 views by early 2015. My discussions with JLR continue via their social media team. They reply saying “I am unfortunately unable to take into account the number of views a post has had as evidence of a concern. As the manufacturer, we do however look into the number of documented and reported concerns that owners of the vehicles have reported to Jaguar Approved Retailers.”

Its now August 2014 and my car is due its first service. I take the car to the dealership that is an hour from the office and I’m provided a loan vehicle. I’m told to be back by 4.00pm and the following day. At 3.55pm, as I’m just two corners from arriving at the dealership they call to tell me the car is not yet ready as they’ve had to order parts. “Come back tomorrow at 12.00pm.” The next day, I arrive at 1.00pm and I’m told its still not ready. Now having travelled to the dealership 3 times, over 3 hours going back and forth, at 4.00pm its finally done. However, I find the vehicle’s right front wheel has a large gash to its outer edge. Having lost all trust in the dealership I get it repaired myself, for which the dealership later refunds my costs.

As the months pass, I continue to engage the CRC over 16 emails, tweets and other routes of engagement to try and connect them with the market insight, customer feedback and dealer information, none of which seems to be getting through to Technical apparently. Verbally they consistently say “We have not received any complaints consistent with speaker vibration from the door.” In fact this line was used as recently as 8th June 2015 by their representative in the Executive office. Meanwhile, I have sight of an official Service Advisory Dealer document outlining procedures a dealer should take for customers reporting speaker vibrations.

While the web traffic on the subject has been staggering, an article now appears in Autocar magazine where they report the same fault. I forward the article to Jaguar and their stance remains the same. After having got in contact with the journalist, he goes on to highlight in a second article the plight of customers where in a poll of nearly 60 customers, 35% all report the same fault. I continue to forward each article to JLR.

Out of the blue I receive a call from the Executive office where following the call I am led to believe the impasse is over. Having provided her all the details of the vehicle from Autocar magazine, she commits to going away to have the JLR press car examined. I hear nothing for two weeks and chase but my emails are ignored. She finally calls back sheepishly to apologise that they cannot find the car and the impasse is re-established. I find the car as it gets tweeted in a photo of another journalist from Autocar magazine who has been loaned the car for her wedding. She is a great journalist, so I’m glad she can leave the church in V8 style.

Its June 2015 and I grudgingly agree to let a dealer have one last attempt. On my way to the dealership, my engine reports a fault which gets diagnosed to two faulty oxygen sensors. The dealer works hours carefully foam taping every cable run within the door and removing all the work of previous failed attempts. On my way home I lower the soft top and see a large 4.5cm scratch along the trailing edge of the passenger window. I know immediately that the technician has clearly cut some tape and in so doing marked the window with his knife.

The car is now booked in again for a replacement passenger door window on June 19th.

Jaguar are equally frustrated and surprised on learning of the latest issue. After 10-days they come back to me with an offer I cannot refuse. They offer me a £2,000 discount on a new car if I consume 37% depreciation on the current car. Jaguar seems surprised that I would turn down their offer. 7% of the mileage of the vehicle is from going to and from the dealerships and every mark and scratch on the car has come from their retailers poor workmanship.

My saga continues. But only until the point at which I move into my next car which as I’m sure you would understand is unlikely to be a JLR product.

That’s my story. Buyer Beware.

 

Sorry to hear. But this happens to every car manufacturer, some more than others. A guy on the Porsche forum had some major problems, became very vocal and eventually Porsche North America bought back his car. He ended up getting a BMW M4, but after a while I think he's back with another Porsche. It's one of those luck of the draw things....

 

Unfortunate, for sure when it's you this kind of thing happens to. However, you can find a similar story on every car forum for every make.

It would be more accurate to say, "buyer beware of any new car." It could be one of the unfortunate few lemons.

 

The mistreatment of your car be dealers is frightening. I have been very pleased with my dealership experience. I hope you can get the service you and your car are entitled to.

 

All I could say is "wow", talk about being unlucky!!! So sorry to hear of all of this, and I cringed reading each and every line of your story.
Good Luck!

 

Sorry to hear about your bad experience with the Jaguar dealers. I just had my Air Condition fixed for the 2nd time. Under Florida's lemon law if the dealer cannot fix the same problem after 3 attempts the car can be declared a lemon. All that is needed is if you can document the attempts to repair and not whether JLR documents in their system.

I must say however, that my dealer has been great during the repairs. Like you, I live an hour from the dealer. I drove my car to the dealer as I had business in that area anyway although the dealer offered to pick it up at my house. The dealer gave me a new XF as a loaner and called me at the end of each day they had the car to provide me a detailed status. When the car was ready, they called me and explained in detail what the problem was and what work had been performed and then returned the car to me, fully detailed - not just washed, in an enclosed flat bed truck and put the loaner car on the truck for the return to the dealer.

While having issues with a brand new and expensive car as well as being without the car for several days is no fun, at least my dealer makes the process easier to live with. My dealer is also the area Aston Martin dealer, and only purchased the Jaguar dealership about a year ago, so maybe this is how they treat their AM customers and now the Jaguar customers are reaping the benefits.

 

I'm envious. Just had a poor dealer experience, but the reviews of other Jag dealers in the area aren't good either.

 

Look cars have problems, but the dealer can make all the difference. He didn't manufacture the car but has to act like he did. Also they are supposed to know everything! Most of the time they're on a computer looking for info on how to make repair, and if manufacturer is slow to respond he gets the heat. I have a Maserati Ghibli, a car made by people that take 2 hour lunches with wine, I believe the robots are lubed with wine! I have a great dealer with long term Ferrari experience and they get frustrated with Maserati all the time. They get no answer, the wrong answer, or a delay in approving the repair. Also most parts are in Italy shipped about once a week. But he hangs in there and gets the job done, though it takes a little longer than usual. My Jag/Porsche dealer seems to have the same attitude so Im lucky! I'm about to get the chipped paint fixed and they've been great about it. It is already approved and is not their first. Service manager had to verify and take a picture, so Jag makes him jump thru hoops any way! Or he's covering his ***, either way!

 

I have to admit that my dealer is awesome and trying to do the right thing by me always. I have zero complaints about their service and trying to fix things.

Tomorrow, I go back to the dealer and meet with the North American Audio Engineer. JLR has kindly sent him to meet with me, set up the loaner, and together we will listen to some "tunes". It won't take long for him to hear the sounds, and hopefully we will get to the bottom of it. They have a loaner set up, and will keep the car until this is resolved. I do trust my dealer to do the right thing, and although not naive, I trust JLR wants to satisfy this issue for me as well. Along with this they will fix the chips, re-flash the software for the "flashing D and having to restart at lights" (happened twice to me).

Other than this, I am pumped to get this hopefully resolved. All else is awesome with this car, but when I say this I feel bad after reading the originating post, where several strokes of hard luck have hit, that should not be the case.

Will let you all know what they find out and the remediation planned. Fingers crossed....and the positive is that this is forward progress.

 

OP has certainly had a frustrating experience, but as far as car/dealer horror stories go, this one's fairly benign. We're talking cosmetic damage and imperfect sound versus safety, performance, and other more significant functional issues (like being stranded). Yes, any issue sucks and it is frustrating when that issue sticks around.

However, if this is the worst the OP has experienced with a car brand, he should count himself extraordinarily lucky. Nothing wrong with moving on to another brand. Just remember that the grass is very unlikely to be greener.

 

I totally agree on the issues being non impactful. I got left stranded in both a 911 and a BMW one time. The point I'm making is less to do with the reliability and build of the car and more how Jaguar and their dealers look to turn a negative experience into a neutral or positive. And based on what I've endured, JLR performs far less well than any other auto brand I've experienced over the past 25 years including; BMW, Audi, Porsche, Lotus, Volvo, Honda, Volkswagen and GM (Vauxhall).

Actually, of all of them Volvo, Lotus and Honda were standout experiences. Audi and Porsche alway felt most polished. Lotus in particular understands their enthusiast customer base. Volvo just looks to do the right thing without having to be asked - they are still the only brand that I'm aware of that will update all onboard software at a service without being asked or charged.

Jaguar on the other hand is neither polished or in my experience has the best interests of the customer at the centre of what they do. Take a look F-Typical's latest post in the known issues thread. This is the Jaguar normal...

Having spent hours on the phone with JLR head office and multiple individuals; its cultural and lives in the 1970's era of bad British car making.

This week Jaguar told me they were do everything possible to look after me "by providing me a warranty."

 

Mawheel
A vote of optimism for you!!!! I truly understand your frustration and turn of events, however let's look at the glass half full with your warranty offer.

Yesterday, I met in the AM with the NA Engineering Tech at my dealer. When I walked into the dealership (was early), there was a bit of confusion in the area. I come to find that the dealership was just purchased by one of the strongest dealer networks on the east coast of the US. These folks don't make strategic moves like this unless there is a great "brand future". They are just too damned good. So a positive vote for them from me, and they did their homework on this investment, one they wouldn't make without a strong potential ROI.

Secondly, the tech rep that I met was awesome. Straight out honest, to the point, no BS. We sat in my car, and immediately he said....wow, I hear what you are saying. We listened to a variety of songs that gave a "bouquet of resonating sounds" behind each and every instrument. I did say that the ones that didn't resonate sounded brilliantly, and I only have the 380W system!

He said "we will fix this for you, and I have several ideas already on what to do in order to get this right for you. I don't have it back yet, as I said please take your time to do this right. I also had them flash the software for the stops at red lights, and the "flashing D".

Last night he called me and stated that they have it fixed. We jotted down the same songs that I played for him as the baseline. He said he played each and every one of them, and also chose the worst culprits. At high volumes, and the same settings he stated "you will be very happy with the result"!

Summary is that if you have the right attitude, the right guy, and the attention (which you have now yourself), you could have the correct result. I will let you know what I think next week, but JLR did the right thing by me in NA. I only hope your persistence pays off equally as well Europe.

I look forward to getting my wheels back next week, and will give you a full detailed report back. They are regaining my trust back, but still have a long time to go...., and again if Paul Miller Automotive Group bought this dealership to tag onto it's Audi, Porsche, Bentley, Land Rover, BMW dealerships.....they are stating Jaguar has a strong future.

Have a great weekend all!

 

On this forum, I have noted that here in the US, even if the owner is having difficulty getting an issue resolved, the dealer is generally doing everything in their (perhaps limited) power to address it. Is it possible that the horrendous dealer service is specific to the Jag dealers in the UK?

 

The same thing crossed my mind. In my experience, most U.S. import dealers of cars I've owned have been more than willing to "go to war" with the manufacturer to keep me happy.

 

I agree that the dealers sometimes have to go to war with their manufactures, stupid but true.

 

While I don't have a new Jag I have been into the local dealer multiple times. Yes they are expensive for service out of warranty, but for my extra cost it's always fixed right the first time regardless of how obscure the fault. They now even give me a discount on parts when I'm able to do a DIY fix.

 

Its really good to see that in North America JLR are sending out their own troops to start taking customers seriously. I have been asking JLR in the UK to do the same since February 2014 and they've point blank refused. Had they been bothered at any time in the subsequent months my own relationship would likely be extremely different.

I am in discussions with the Dealer Principal at Jaguar Ascot who is a good guy. He is speaking to the factory this week and hopefully he might knock some sense into them. He also has other contacts at the Executive office who I hope are more helpful than the individual I've been talking to.

Part of my problem is my own doing; having lost trust in the supplying dealers technicians I started using another dealership and so each is saying they only had a few opportunities each. However, I felt no choice really after seeing the damage done.

I'm glad to hear these more positive stories. I'm especially keen to hear how the JLR guy has performed the fix. If it helps, you can point him to a full set of analysed photography on my car is now with the technical team. Unfortunately, despite the best efforts on this 5th attempt, I can still get my door to vibrate at 140-190Hz.

 

Stay tuned, as I pick it up Monday or Tuesday. Will let you know what I think. We also tested it thoroughly, and will apply the same pre-test specs, songs environment to the post. If fixed I will be happy.

 

Does your dealership happen to be Madison Jaguar?

Mike

 

Hi Mike
Yes it is.
Joe