I just purchased a 2015 Soul after a long day of negotiations, finished up at 6:00PM and stopped on the way home for dinner and called it a night.
Car had 54 miles on it when I shut it off for the night.
Following morning wouldn't start, it appeared to be a dead battery, so I attempted to jump it,no good. Checked the battery voltage 12.7 Volts.
Called the service dept. they said call Kia roadside assistance. So it gets towed back to the dealer and 3 days later they still don't know what's wrong.
Kia engineers are not sure what to do to solve it, so nobody does anything. I sincerely wish I had my trade-in back at least it ran.
Everybody has choices in this life and unfortunately I made a very bad one.
I've never seen a LL that was enacted for a first time issue, no matter how major. If this was the third or fourth time for the same reoccurring problem then it would fall under LL territory.
OP- sorry to hear about your bad luck. I hope it gets resolved quickly.
@ 54 miles and no sight of a fix I would be demanding another vehicle if not response from General Manager time to call Corp. Head Office and talk to Pres or VP you will get action!
I've taken those steps on a few things of un related matters and always got action!!! like right now! it works.
Welcome to the forums. Too bad about your car. I don't think you made a mistake but every car line produces some problem cars. Follow the advice given so far and you may be satisfied. I wish you good luck, please keep us informed of your progress.
just thinking out loud:
1. Was this vehicle even PDI'd
2. If it has problems starting then why wouldn't the dealership know of this from when it first arrived on the lot? Also the vehicles are started frequently from the time it leaves the factory, goes on the ships, at the port, onto trucks, stored at compounds, loading back on trucks, off at the dealership, shuttled around the dealership before sold. I can't believe every time this vehicle was started it was jumped-start and he said that didn't work.
3. How can they not know what the problem is? There are procedures to go through to test various problems as you slowly eliminate the possibilities.
As was mentioned I would be talking to the dealership manager or owner to get this resolved quickly. I still suspect a ground problem as he said the battery was good, eliminate that problem first or a perhaps a loose connection - but then why wouldn't the garage spot or check these things?
Lots of questions but not enough answers.
As painful and frustrating as this experience may be, you have to give the dealer an opportunity to resolve this.
If they simply parked it out back and refused to address it, then escalating it would be your next move.
A loaner car is also part of this equation and they should be happy to provide one.
Nothing sours the new car buying experience like shop time, especially from day 1.
When all is said and done I think you will be pleased with your purchase and hopefully able to put this rough start (pun intended) behind you.
Perhaps they can give you a soul as a loaner and you can start to recapture that feel-good feeling that attracted you to the soul in the 1st place?
Personally, and I don't know here...I don't think dealerships are intimidateD by folks throwing around L.L. threats.
No need to alienate yourself from your dealer so early on in the game!
Would I be pissed, absolutely!
Would I be disappointed...fer-sure!
Would I start throwing around terms that might distance myself from my dealer this early on...probably not.
Best to come at them softly with "what do you think is wrong" and "do we need to get Kia corporate involved" and see how they respond. (I.M.O.)
I agree, starting off on the wrong foot with your dealer is not a good idea, however I do not understand how they just took this person's car without as much as a loaner. Dealers are no different than ordinary human beings, some are very nice and accommodating and some are jerks.
The dealership did give me a loaner after I went to the manager and now they say
it was a one time event. It started right up for the mechanic, but showed no faults on the computer
diagnostics, I guess that means it can't fail again.
It is still my problem to deal with if it won't start again. What a cluster f**k.
Great forum, wish I had joined before I bought the car.
Are you saying they could not provide an explanation of why the car failed to start or their eventual resolution to the problem?
You did state in an earlier post that they could not find the problem so I ASSume it failed to start for them as well?
Be sure to get documentation each and every time the dealer has you car for this and subsequent visits.
At least, if all else fails and the condition persists, you can pursue L.L. or present a case to corporate Kia if further measures need to be taken.
No, I would not accept that, not in a brand new car. A new car should not continually fail to start. You should at the very least DEMAND a NEW battery if it happens again, and you should get KIA corporate level involved. Don't accept another runaround.
5 bucks says it's a grounding issue... take off the negative battery cable where it connects to the body and sand away the paint under it and reattach it.
Well, the dealer got it started right up and checked everything twice? The suspect is the switch in the shift lever
Mechanic says if it happens again just bang the crap out of the shifter and if it breaks, no problem.
That's what I like with a new car. Self diagnosis still works best.
The positive thing the dealer had it for 3 days and I had it for 12 hours.
Wow, I have a story for you. The reason we are in a new Soul + is because we experienced the exact same thing with a new 2015 Sorento. We have had 3 KIAs and the comment above is correct....every manufacturer produces a problem child every now and then BUT that doesn't help those of us that were unfortunate to be the recipient of these Lemons. We picked up the new Sorento and within a couple of weeks, it started periodically not starting. The problem was you never knew if it would start or not. We went through the service, had a loaner for two weeks (a new 2014 Soul + Red zone white) This was over Thanksgiving and we put almost 2K miles on that car. (note, that was out first time in a Soul) Took it back, they said the problem was with the remote start, replaced that and things were good to go for about 2 weeks. Then it started happening again. Another week or so in the shop. During this time, I did call KIA and had them on this case from the beginning. In all fairness, the service department did all they could simply because they couldn't get the car to duplicate the problem and all the readings looked normal. They called it a "gremlin" and told me they can be hard to discover. Ok, but that really doesn't do us any good. So more calls to KIA and they said they would dispatch a High Level tech to take car of this problem. We later found out that the HL tech called first, had the local techs do a battery of tests and everything showed up as ok. So, took the car back and for two months no problems. Then all of a sudden, it began again. We have had this car since end of Oct and now it is end of Jan. and there is only 1700 miles on the car. Made some calls to the local dealer and the service advisor made me feel like he would like us to take the car somewhere else.... out of their hair....so to speak. KIA was called again....talked to a new person and formulated a plan to get this taken care of.......In the meantime, I decided to go to the dealership top management with a honest but unhappy email. (this is a large dealership spanning many states and we have purchased from them 3 times over the last 3 years) Within two hours, the GM of the KIA dealership called and agreed to buy back the Sorento and trade us for another one. We agreed and went there with the idea that we would just swap out cars but the fun we had in the Soul won us over and we traded the new Sorento for a new Soul. KIA called back a few days later following up because they had made arrangements for us to take the Sorento to another dealer to see what they could do. The other dealer had called to set up an appointment also....KIA said they needed to start there and then if that didn't fix the problem, then go from there. This is a long story but the point is.....you purchased a new car and nobody wants a car they aren't sure isn't going to start. I have found that KIA doesn't want that either and neither does the dealership (especially a new car with very few mile on it) It is frustrating and time consuming but keep pursuing because you will prevail. PS>>>> funny thing, I see the Sorento on their website for sale....hmmmm....did they find and fix the problem???????