Plastics falling to bits on 2 year old C63
Discussion
I've got a 2018 C63 estate as I (like many of you) have a particular fondness for fast wagons.
Unfortunately build quality hasn't been overly encouraging and bits have been routinely breaking for the past 9 months and - most upsettingly - Mercedes don't seem to carry any burden of responsibility to fix the problems.
It's mostly switchgear - every single window switch in the car is either like a wobbly tooth or it has fallen out. The same for the boot release switch - that broke off after a couple of uses. The passenger sun visor vanity mirror cover fell off on what I believe to be first use 2 weeks ago, the plastic had gone brittle and just snapped at the hinge.
The car was due in at Mercedes because of a check engine light so I'd asked them to resolve these niggles, and thought little more of it.
I later get the call that they perceive all of these breakages to be "outside influence" and therefore wouldn't seek to address them under warranty. I'm not remotely heavy handed with the vehicle, nor have I had any similar problems in the myriad of vehicles I've owned previously. For a vehicle of this value I'm surprised they took such a stance.
Furthermore, the price to replace these items was eye-watering. The broken vanity mirror cover? £135. All told fixing the broken switches was going to run to £600.
I declined the work and decided to write to Mercedes Head Office. Short of taking to every item in the car with a clawhammer I'm not entirely sure what they were accusing me of doing, but if the franchise wasn't able to assert these problems as warranty related, then I needed the OEM.
Sadly, head office sided with the franchise and insisted that they couldn't even influence the price of the job.
So I'm now obtaining the bits from breakers yards on eBay and replacing them myself at about a sixth of the cost.
I can't say that I'm enamoured with the brand after this experience!
I was going to consider upgrading to an E63, but I think I'll rethink that plan entirely. Don't fancy having more wobbly teeth switches!
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Unfortunately build quality hasn't been overly encouraging and bits have been routinely breaking for the past 9 months and - most upsettingly - Mercedes don't seem to carry any burden of responsibility to fix the problems.
It's mostly switchgear - every single window switch in the car is either like a wobbly tooth or it has fallen out. The same for the boot release switch - that broke off after a couple of uses. The passenger sun visor vanity mirror cover fell off on what I believe to be first use 2 weeks ago, the plastic had gone brittle and just snapped at the hinge.
The car was due in at Mercedes because of a check engine light so I'd asked them to resolve these niggles, and thought little more of it.
I later get the call that they perceive all of these breakages to be "outside influence" and therefore wouldn't seek to address them under warranty. I'm not remotely heavy handed with the vehicle, nor have I had any similar problems in the myriad of vehicles I've owned previously. For a vehicle of this value I'm surprised they took such a stance.
Furthermore, the price to replace these items was eye-watering. The broken vanity mirror cover? £135. All told fixing the broken switches was going to run to £600.
I declined the work and decided to write to Mercedes Head Office. Short of taking to every item in the car with a clawhammer I'm not entirely sure what they were accusing me of doing, but if the franchise wasn't able to assert these problems as warranty related, then I needed the OEM.
Sadly, head office sided with the franchise and insisted that they couldn't even influence the price of the job.
So I'm now obtaining the bits from breakers yards on eBay and replacing them myself at about a sixth of the cost.
I can't say that I'm enamoured with the brand after this experience!
I was going to consider upgrading to an E63, but I think I'll rethink that plan entirely. Don't fancy having more wobbly teeth switches!
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