KIA
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7 year warranty not worth paper it's writen on
On the 27th march 2018, the engine or our 4 year old KIA Carens (37000 miles)started making an unusal rather loud noise so we took it to the KIA dealership Evans Halshaw in Hull. It was exmined by the Assistant Service Leader,who believed the timing chain had jumped. He said the car could not be driven. The servicee manager booked the car in for diagnostics which he said would cost £50 pounds if the fault was not covered under warranty. As the last service had been carried out by an independant garage thay asked for details which we provided. Over the first 3 weeks Evans Halshaw had the car the only way we got any information is if I rang them. Intially they said they believed the oil filter had collapsed and then tried to argue the wrong oil had been used even though it met the required classification has stipulated by kia. Over the next 2 weeks Kia asked Evans Halshaw to strip various things 1. Remove the sump to check the oil strainer as this was a potential problem. 2. Remove the cylinder head as no oil was getting to the top of the engine. 3. To measure the psitons and cylinder bores. 4. To strip the oil pump as it had heatmarks. Not once were we asked about stripping the engine and all instructions had come from Kia with no recourse to us. On the 23rd April we were told a Kia engineer was visiting Evans Halshaw on 27th April to examine the engine. Following the engineers visit on 27th April, managed to catch the service manager, before he left and was told the Kia engineer had found foreign bodies in the oil gallery which they believed to be blue paper. He asid it was likely the result of the service. He also said he could not tell me if repairs would be covered by the warranty or not as he had to wait for the engineer's report, but said in his opinion it was very unlikely to be covered. He thought the paper had got in at the service, either through the oil filter or the oil filler at the top of the engin. This is extremely unlikely and appeared to be a cop out. Evans Halshaw e-mailed me a copy of the engineers report on 30th April and said fault was not covered by warranty. Indicating the a failure was due to these foreign bodies blocking the oil galleries. The report also indicated scoring of the oil pump but did say how this could have been caused. Evans Halshaw had previuosly said there were heat marks on the oil pump but this was not mentioned in the report I forwarded a copy to the independent garage who had carried out the service. Like me they did not agree with the findings. Although they disageed with the findings, the indepndent garage, because of the hassle and cost of taking it further, agreed to put the car right at their expense. When they collected the car, the dismantled engine much of it in card boxes and the gear box had been put in the boot. Once the car was off loaded from the transporter they noticed one of shock absorbers had failed due to the weigh in the boot. On opening the boot they were alarmed at what found. The engine had there abouts been completely dismantled and the parts thrown into carboard boxes. All the bolts were mixed together the pistons still had the conrods attached but the tere was nothing to indicate which cylinder they were from everything was areal mess. To ensure we got the car back quickly they replace the engine with a secondhand one engine (done 9000 miles). Once the car was ready they contacted Evans Halshaw who after some arguing agreed to replace the shock absorber. We have been down to the garage to look at the state of the engine. After examining it and seeing pieces of paper over various parts of the engine, the only conclusion you can come to it's origin, is small peices of paper being torn off when Evans Halshaw were wiping the oil from various parts of the engine as they dismantled it, not as a result of the service. We have have sent several e-mails to Kia, detailing what as gone with photos attached. But all they say, is we will talk to Evans Halshaw. They seem to only partially read the e-mails as they seldom answer questions asked. The main question asked was why the engine was completely dismantled, at their request, to diagnose what was wrong. We have not had an answer. In another e-mail regarding the state in which the engine was put in the boot, the reply indicated there was some miscommunication between Evans Halshaw and our customer services team (Kia) regarding the reassembling of your engine. My wife had told Evans Halshaw that we wanted our car to be put back to how it was when we first went in with it. But this was ignored. Kia did offer, as a gesture of good will, to refund the diagnostic fee of £60 (£50 + VAT) but we have not accepted this as we believe this does not adquately address all the issues, especially the cost the indendent garage incurred. In all we were without the car for nine weeks and no courtesy car provided. What we were intillay told that the timing chain may have jumped seems to be a problem with this particular engine in Kias and Hyundis. Kia say they pride themselves on their 7 year warranty, but it appears they will try to wangle out of it if they can.