Warranty was not 23,999 or 24,001-- it's 24,000. And certainly not 29,000. What's not clear?
The car left me stranded in 100-degree heat. It's not a faulty relay or a trim piece falling off. It's the fuel pump. It's an unusual problem for any car in this day and age. They need to step up and discuss it with me. It's just good customer service.
Oh, and did I mention it's $650 flippin' dollars to repair?
BTW: my 265,000 Mercedes has its original fuel pump. Just sayin'
Here is your problem now.
Your car is not at the dealer and has a bad fuel pump.
How do you intent to sell it? Who will purchase a non working car?
And FYI, it's not going to be cheep. smart Car - Faulty Fuel Pump
Also, My Versa had two bad fuel pumps within the first 30K. But in that car it was covered and a lot easier to get to than the smarts
Best of Luck, and thanks for letting us know about another Fuel pump that went out.
Thanks for a positive response.
I'm going to pay $650 to have it repaired, then it's going onto Craigslist. And yes, it could take 2-weeks to get the part. Add another $40/day for a car rental, that's now over $1,000 fuel pump!
Sorry to hear about your Versa. Perhaps Nissan and Daimler by their fuel pumps from the same company? (probably magna)
When did you get your Smart? I know the early made second generation cars in the early months in 2008 had a load of issues. BTW sorry to hear of the fuel pump issue, hope it gets fixed soon.
This is why I paid extra for the extended warranty - especially because I'm 200 miles from my nearest dealer (600 when I bought the car). It's a new model of an established car in a new land of opportunity and geographic challenges. Dust, road patterns, all sorts of things make it so the parts work different over here and there will be quality issues.
I believe if someone has the expectation it should "just work" for 50K miles, they should shell out for a 50K warranty and not complain when "stuff happens." 35k smarts have been sold, and I've only heard of two fuel pumps dying - this sounds like random chance, not a problem in the design or manufacture.
Only deny the extended warranty if you're a gearhead that's willing to pay for and learn to install the parts yourself and consider that "fun." The factory warranty is designed to stop coverage at mile 24,001. Anything beyond that is generosity on the side of smart; covering $650 after an additional 5k miles would be denied by any company.
* Catalytic converters are covered longer than the factory warranty; federal regs require something around 80k-100k miles and I think CA is longer.
* Brakes are never covered unless caused by a failed factory part; that's why the rotor problem was covered.
* BMW covered a brand new engine 10k past warranty? That's a serious bit of goodwill they extended and highly unusual.
* Smart should have called you back at least once.
Yeah I hate smarts customer service they really suck my cars 3 weeks old and can't even get a call back from anyone nor an email they really are not good at custormer service they need to step up and stop there bull sh**!!! I love my brabus to DEATH but HATE there custermer service!!!!
* BMW covered a brand new engine 10k past warranty? That's a serious bit of goodwill they extended and highly unusual.
Not really in this case - there are known issues with some BMW V8s that are/were quietly being fixed out of warranty for owners with a replacement - I'd be curious to know what year it is.
Point being - the OP was given a chance to buy an extended warranty and did not. The OP drove his car out of warranty, had a premature failure of a part. Should it have failed, no... that being said, for every 10,000 pumps produced - you have to expect there to be a couple that fail prematurely.
Dealers don't *have* to do goodwill work. If an owner comes in with a bad attitude - I can definitely see a dealer refusing to push for goodwill work... much of it is about presentation.
Honestly, I don't expect it to be free, but they should do something. And the reality is, I've had plenty of automakers repair things out of warranty.
Do you think they just do this out of the kindness of their own hearts? NO, of course not. These 'good will' repairs as they are generally referred to are expenses that are passed on to, ummmmmmm, ALL OF US in the higher price of cars, service work, etc.
smart USA and the smart center network are trying to keep to a minimum, their expenses as they are working on a very thin margin of profitability. "If" the 2/24 month warranty (short by most standards) was a concern, then you should have purchased an extended warranty. The smarts sold in Canada for instance, have a longer warranty period but also COST MORE. Here in the U.S., they could have factored in warranty repair expenses and raised the cost of each smart sold by $500-1000, but why? As you pointed out yourself, the smart center said that fuel pumps just don't generally 'go out' at 29,000 miles. Why should I and thousands of others pay more for OUR car because YOUR smart had a defective fuel pump, made by the way, by another manufacturer....NOT smart or MB?
For years we as Americans have paid through the nose for warranty work that we 'think' is free. The 'Limited Lifetime Powertrain Warranty' that Chrysler came up with a couple years ago is a prime example. If you owned one of those vehicles, do you think you're not paying for those repairs? It's just like insurance.......some have accidents and most of us do not. Those of us that DON'T are paying for all those people that do. And when they do, our rates go UP, even though we didn't even have an accident.
The bottom line is don't let them charge you 'storage fees', pay them the $650 to fix your smart. It's worth next to nothing if it doesn't run. Then sell it. Make yourself happy and buy a VW. Just keep in mind that the first out-of-warranty repair on your VW they 'ok' and cover, YOU and every other VW owner ARE paying for it. Just not at the cashiers window when you leave.
Fuel pump issues are one of the most common fuel system problems there are. Some manufactures are notorious for them. I remember watching a documentary on the development of the current generation Corvette, and in the middle of an endurance test cycle the car just died. The engineers traced it back to a $.10 part in the fuel pump. This stuff happens more often than the manufactures like to admit.
I agree with the others here, you bought the car knowing that it had a 2/24 warranty. YOU chose to take the risk that nothing would happen after that. I didn't buy the warranty either, and I have absolutely no expectation that my smart center will cover anything now. I have 37K on my car, and if it breaks, I'll fix it.
It's too bad your fuel pump failed. That does suck, but man up and face the facts that it's your baby to take care of.
A couple of years ago, my son told me he was getting an Extended Warranty / Maintenance Plan. When I found out how much he was going to paying each month for it, I just about choked.
I told him he would be better off just sticking the money in a savings account and he would soon have enough money in the bank to cover anything that might break on his car, and he would have the money for anything else he might need it for too, instead of loosing it to the warranty company.
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