Citroen/DS 3 stop drive recall

Clcatt91

Arunmor said:

OP your driving an old car, it is your choice how to deal with the situation until they can fit you in.

I realise that. I was hoping to find more solutions than either driving it knowing the risks, disabling the airbags, or just waiting 4 weeks without a car. 

chilifoxy25

I'm seriously unimpressed with Citroen Customer Care. Having found that my car is affected by this recall I left a message for my local dealership to contact me. No response. I call again and get the first available appointment - in six weeks time. Along with a statement that I don't drive the vehicle in the interim. 
Impossible! I live rurally, solo and have one car.
Advised to call the national line . . Dealer supplied wrong number - a WHOLE HOUR on hold. Then all the telephonist did was take my details to pass to Citroen HQ aka Big Black Hole. Along with a statement that HQ is coming up with a plan and 'they would contact me by day end'. A day passes  . . SILENCE. 

This is unsatisfactory on so many levels. CITROEN, WHERE ARE YOU??? 

WellKnownSid

Recalls are like that.  They aren't going to be able to fix every car at once, people have to be realistic.  If 50,000 people phone up with the same query, is it realistic to get a personal callback from HQ?

When my Toyota had a recall they gave me an A4 piece of paper showing me how to spot the tell-tale signs that my car was going to imminently burst into flames and kill us all, and said they would be in touch because the part was on backorder.

After about eleven months they booked me in for a slot 8 weeks later.  So more than a year from when they pointed out my car was about to catch fire and it being fixed.

Car was then taken in and sorted, no fuss.

dawnofthedave

Totally disagree with some of the harsh “oh you have an old car, deal with it” kind comments on here. People don’t have the money to just deal with it (funny enough, they often also tend to be people with older cars) and it is the fault of other companies selling seriously dangerous and defective products - the responsibility lies with them. They need to be prioritising recalls based on need, not based on who got there first. So if your case you’re facing not being placed in the queue fairly and you can’t access work and risk serious financial loss and livelihood disruption and you’re being placed behind people for whom that isn’t the case then that’s despicable. Read the riot act, don’t give up. 

dawnofthedave

This recall has already been out since December and it’s now a stop drive order so people cannot drive their cars without invalidating their insurance. Yes recalls take time but companies also take the absolute p**s. Snails pace is best and cheapest for them = oh well for the out of pocket customer. Always what’s best for the shareholders only - consumer always pays the price. Fight, don’t give up. 

flaneurs_lobster

dawnofthedave said:

Totally disagree with some of the harsh “oh you have an old car, deal with it” kind comments on here. People don’t have the money to just deal with it (funny enough, they often also tend to be people with older cars) and it is the fault of other companies selling seriously dangerous and defective products - the responsibility lies with them. They need to be prioritising recalls based on need, not based on who got there first. So if your case you’re facing not being placed in the queue fairly and you can’t access work and risk serious financial loss and livelihood disruption and you’re being placed behind people for whom that isn’t the case then that’s despicable. Read the riot act, don’t give up. 

I can sympathise with your sentiment around how these recalls are organised but I'd hope that you can see that expecting a car company (or their agents) to start prioritising the fixing queue according to "need" would be utterly impractical and simply open them up to legal challenges around why one set of circumstances is more "worthy" than another. 

The OP gives valid and compelling reasons for needing their car fixed soonest, but I bet I could make up a much better story.

facade

It is just mis-management on the part of the manufacturer.

When my Nissan had the airbag recall, the recall letters went out in batches, presumably to match part availability, so as long as you could book a timeslot the part would be available.

The airbags were done one at a time, I forget the timescale but it was over 12 months between the driver and passenger one. (The passenger one was during the C-Word and naturally I didn't risk my life getting it done immediately, so Nissan sent a series of letters, each one ramping up the hysteria on the dire consequences of a hailstorm of metal fragments in the face!)

However when my Suzuki had the fuel pump replaced (because some people were using e10 and seizing the pump) they obviously relied on what the Japanese call "Just in time", implemented here as "Just too late" and ordered the part to come in the day before fitting. No surprises that it didn't! (It came the day after.......)

They really shouldn't send out 10,000  Stop Driving Orders at once unless they actually have 10,000 parts available! 

Unfortunately there is nothing much you can do, except never give them your custom again, and maybe complain to BBC Watchdog or whatever their consumer programme is called now. I doubt if they have to compensate you for an out of warranty car being off the road because it has gone years beyond the original recall.

paul_c123

My truck doesn't have an airbag, it doesn't render it undriveable. There is always the option to disconnect the airbag and then its not going to explode. You'd need to drive carefully, of course.

Mildly_Miffed

facade said:

It is just mis-management on the part of the manufacturer.

I'm not so sure.

These cars were recalled ages back. I know people with these cars who definitely received those recall letters.
Many had the airbags replaced. The people I know acted on it, and have had their airbags replaced already.
Some have not either received the letters (sent to the registered keepers at the V5C addresses) or not acted upon them.

There was a fatality on the Autoroute near Reims the other week, directly attributable to the car having been recalled but the work not done.

The French government ordered the stop-drive to be implemented as a result of that death.

https://www.lefigaro.fr/societes/airbags-takata-pourquoi-la-victime-de-l-accident-a-reims-n-avait-pas-recu-de-courrier-de-rappel-20250618

Arunmor

dawnofthedave said:

Totally disagree with some of the harsh “oh you have an old car, deal with it” kind comments on here.

Of course the OP has to deal with it, either continue to drive it or not.  Only they can decide what to do and what precautions they should take.  Not ideal but that is where he is.