Kia faulty car

treasach

Hi Guys, 

 I really need a bit of advice or help

 I bought a 2017 Kia Sorento 2.2 manual on the 14th of March with around 12,000 miles. I noticed a brief power loss on the drive back home, like limp home mode but no lights on the dash. I thought it may be just it’s not been driven for a while. 2 days later we went into full lockdown so it wasn't driven again for a couple of weeks. Once I drove the car again to take my daughter to the hospital for her regular checkup, the intermittent power loss became apparent and was immediately reported to the Kia garage I purchased it from on the 31st of March

 They have not been very helpful and now they generally won’t respond to emails or return my calls even if I give them a deadline. I made them aware that I urgently needed a solution to the problem as I need to take my daughter to hospital every couple of weeks. They initially said they had put me at the front of the list with the Keyworkers to get this looked at due to the situation with my daughter, but they have since advised there was nothing they could do due to Covid. I asked for my money back on day 31 after purchasing so I could buy something more reliable, but was told “it’s not that simple” over email, from what I can tell, it was that simple and they miss informed me.

 They opened back up in June and I had to chase them again 2 weeks in after no contact, they advised I can take the car over to them to look at, but they can only provide a courtesy car for 1 day and if they don’t find the fault on the day, would mean I would be without a vehicle which I can’t be.

 To try and resolve the issue, I took it to a local Kia dealer but they were also completely unhelpful. They had the car for half a day, drove it 2 miles and advised they couldn't find a fault with it. They put it down to me been in the wrong gear and I “should look at the little arrows on the dash board telling me to gear up or down”, I didn’t accept that, so they said it could be the clutch slipping and finally when I didn't accept that, they said I'm putting poor quality fuel in it and to change where I fill up.

 As the fault isn’t showing on their computers, I’m now logging times and dates when it does it and have video footage of it happening.

 I’m now sat with a very expensive car on my drive and Kia don’t seem to want to investigate the issue. I’ve been advised that these garages won’t get paid to do the diagnostic work which may explain why they have no interest in looking into this further. I believe once they find the fault and fix it, they can then charge Kia for this?  

 Any help would be gratefully appreciated, I really don’t know where to go from here

 Thanks

Si  

JJ_Egan

AA/ RAC report on the vehicle is what i would do as you seem to be going around and around .

treasach

Thank you, the car had one owner and was bought / serviced 3 times at the garage I bought it from. They told me they checked their records and they've never had the car in for that fault but I don't believe them. I reckon if I could somehow track the previous owner he'd tell me this was going on and on so he part x'd it to get shut , but thats just me surmising 

ComicGeek

Diesel with average of 4000 miles per year, doesn't sound like a good buy. Did they check the dpf, have you been able to drive it enough to do a regen?

We have a 2017 Sorento 2.2 diesel auto from new, but have done at least double that mileage consistently each year with regular long trips. We're selling ours shortly as there seems to be lots of issues with electronics with this model - lights turning themselves on when parked, boot randomly opening when parked, clock disappearing etc. 

mattyprice4004

While they haven't been great to deal with, I also think some compromise is needed - when they have the car in for the work, it's not reasonable to expect a courtesy car for the whole time unless agreed with them otherwise. 
It's a courtesy car, which is exactly that - a courtesy. When you send off a laptop or phone for repair, you're expected to be able to make do for a couple of weeks, and with a car it's the same unfortunately. 
I also have to make regular trips, and my car was off the road for 2 weeks recently - I just had to make other arrangements (taxis for the most part). 

To be clear though, they do need to resolve the fault - it sounds like they're not convinced the fault actually exists. The video footage you get should be enough for them to see it does, and they should be able to tie this in with the faults stored on the vehicle's ECU. 

treasach

Possibly not a good buy, just thought if there any issues from the low mileage the 4 year warranty would cover me so I'd be safe. I've been saving / looking getting one of these for a couple years as it looked the best out of the 7 seaters available and what I'd heard was Kia's aftercare is really good...... 

I've given it several runs down the motorway but no issue, whats weird is you can sometimes force the issue at the same roundabout near my house, for what ever reason if you approach this certain round about in 3rd and make it labour ever so slightly, the turbo drops out. 

I just wish they'd given me my money back when I asked, not sure where I stand legally with what they did 
One thing is for sure, this is my first and last Kia 

treasach

I completely understand the compromise bit, but I also need to be a bit selfish here as I have a child I need to get to hospital. At the end of the day, I've spent 20,000 on a car thats now sat on the drive and I have lost all faith in it, the car lost all power at busy M1 junction whilst I had my family in the back and I struggled to get across lanes to safety, I think asking for a courtesy car is pretty low down on the list 

pinkshoes

treasach said:

I completely understand the compromise bit, but I also need to be a bit selfish here as I have a child I need to get to hospital. At the end of the day, I've spent 20,000 on a car thats now sat on the drive and I have lost all faith in it, the car lost all power at busy M1 junction whilst I had my family in the back and I struggled to get across lanes to safety, I think asking for a courtesy car is pretty low down on the list 

Is the power loss only when you accelerate? Or is it completely random?

A colleague had something similar with a CMax (diesel) that would lose power up hills or when accelerating hard (e.g. overtaking). Turns out it was some dodgy fuel and once she'd had the tank drained and filled again it was fine! 

Have you put any new fuel in since you bought it?

treasach

It can be when your accelerating but you don't have to be accelerating hard, its really random but I'd say most of the time it's when you moving back down the gears to come to a stop, although when it did it Sunday just gone, I was in the middle lane sat at 70 and it dropped out and only gravity was taking me forward until I hit about 40mph, then it maintained the speed but I was in third at 3000 revs and it had nothing left to add,

It basically feels like the turbo has packed up, so you have very very slow acceleration, I've filled up at few places, after Kia's advice I ran it down to the light coming on and filled back up with Shell but it still does it 

treasach

Also, when you hit 3000 revs, the car slumps, it won't push past 3000

photome

I had a  2012 Kia ceed diesel with similar issues kept going in to limp mode,. went in  to garage many times over the 4 years I had it. I can’t remember all the issues but it was either fuel problems or EGR valve,  

one of the problems could be the lack of mileage tho ,as it’s done very few miles ,having said that mine was doing 30000 a year