KIA
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Not 5 Star Service
ATT: KIA UK - Customer Services I hope you don't mind but I wanted to reach out to you and explain my frustrations with the service levels and support I have received ever since I fist bought a brand new KIA in 2020, not all of which have been with your dealership, but all are KIA dealers. I also apologies in advance for the length of this post, but as you will see if you can read it all, a lot has happened and not much of it is good from a customer service point of view. I purchase my New KIA EV Soul EV in Dec 2020 from a dealership on the South Coast, as they offered the best price, but when I collected the car and this was my first ever EV, it was not explained how to charge the car, what plug I should use, who I should use for charging until I could get a home charger or anything about the controls/settings except a 5 minute explanation about the basic controls. As such I was using the wrong charging plug for the next 2 weeks when charging at public charges and it was taking twice as long to charge even thou I was using a 50K charger!!! (I only found out when another EV user pointed this out to me) My next issue was when I had a flat battery after 3 months use and the car would not start, I called out the RAC who charged the battery so I could start but said I should gte this checked by a main dealer, so I took it straight away to a local main dealer (not Brayleys) and asked if they could look at it and they said if I had bought the car from them they would have looked at it straight away but as I had not they would only book it in for a future date!!!! I left and will NEVER go back to them or purchase a car from them EVER! I then after 6 months had an issue were the car seemed to only charge to around 220 miles and not the quoted 280 miles, I took it to Brayles Harppenden and explained this to the Service Dep and the main service engineer told me he could not explain why this was happening as due to COVID they had not had enough training on EV cars??? How can you sell cars that the service dep don't know how they work??? Then around Aug last year I was invited to a launch event for the KIA EV6, at a different local dealer again, I asked them at the event to come back to me with an offer to purchase the EV6 (without even having a test drive) and they never came back to me??? So when I could finally have a test drive in an EV6 I contacted Brayleys Harppenden and arranged one in Jan 22, when I arrived I was told there was a problem with contacting the insurance company Brayleys use so could a staff member come with me, I said no as I wanted no extra pressure while doing a test drive on a very technical car and then I was told OK you can go on your own??? But with 15 minutes of the test drive done and I was on the way back another sales lady called me on my mobile to ask how long I would be, bear in mind I'm test driving a very technical car and have not set up the hands free, how did she expect me to legally answer the phone while driving??? As it happened I have an Apple watch and answered the phone using this hands free and explained I was on the way back. On my return I found out another test drive had been doubled booked and the Manager had agreed to the Sales Lady calling me while I was in the middle of a test drive, I was very angry and explained this to the Manager on my return and he did not care......................... Despite the above I was so impressed with the EV6 I agreed to a cash purchase of an EV6 GTS in the next 24hrs and was told it would be available in Aug 22 (7 months), hopefully sooner. I then get an email in April 22 to say there is no record of me sending a completed/signed purchase contract??? I then send an email back showing I had in Jan 22 when I agreed the purchase and I was told it had now been found and was received in Jan 22................. This then leads to the email below that sets out to explain how there is now a delay to my new car to Jan 23, maybe longer, so 12 months+ after I agreed to the purchase and the links that are supposed to explain this have quotes from lots of car makers, but none from KIA??? And comes also after I have just been told my signed contract has been found??? I should also point out that I expressed my up-set with this to Brayleys Harppenden and they did agree to give me a set of Mats and a Boot Liner FOC due to the delay, but I would prefer the car as we had planned a trip to France in Sep to enjoy it! The last thing to mention is that in Dec 21 I was diagnosed with Prostate Cancer and this was a main factor in me agreeing to purchase the EV6 in Jan 22 to enjoy it while I can, so any delay to it arriving may mean that I will have little time to enjoy it. Sorry again for the length of the email and I have even left some things out, but any help that could be given to getting my car as soon as possible will be greatly appreciated. If you have any questions or need any more information please contact me. Very best regards, Lance Monery