The Soul has Electronic Power Steering, so, the first thing to check would be the Fuses. Well, I would, anyway.

Good Luck with that.

PS: How did that Manual Steering work out for you?

 

Thank you! I have to drive it to the dealership tonight so they can take a look. They said Kia would refund for rental fees if they find it is a Kia factory issue. How could it be anything but. Thanks

 

Ever hear the saying "Sh** Happens" ?
I bought a brand new, right off the truck, 2009 Suzuki SX4 and only got a mile from the dealership before it died and refused to start. My new car was towed back to the dealer, and I went home in a SX4 Loaner.
Five days later, they called me to come back and get my NEW car. They had finally found a loose connector under the battery box, that prevented the alternator from charging. I never had any problem with that car again, in four years.

We all know that every new car is supposed to be perfect, but then life takes over.....and "Stuff Happens".

Be careful, and be safe, driving that car with Manual Steering.

 

There is a service action SA409 for the electric power steering logic. What you may have experienced could potentially be remedied by going to the dealer for service and having the updates installed. There may be another issue on your car but it is always a good idea to have your car regularly serviced and checked for any updates that can save you headaches down the road. It would be wonderful if we lived in a perfect world where our phones, computers or now our computer controlled cars never required any updates to fix bugs but unfortunately that is not the case. Hope your issue is resolved right away.

 

For over 40 years, I've worked on Personal Computers (PC's). No computer needs attention worse than a brand new one, right out of the box. After a complete Setup, to include tweaking and tuning, which can take over an hour to complete, a PC can then run for a year to more without an additional Tune-Up. For many years, I've provided my customers with annual Tune-Ups at a very nominal fee, to including cleaning and updating.
Today, our cars don't get Tune-Ups like they did years ago. I always did my own.
Most people today, will trade off their cars before they even need new spark plugs.

Cheers Mates,

 

Still using Windows operating systems here on the PCs. Every update/upgrade is done immediately, largely for security reasons but also for performance reasons.

Service updates on automobiles should be performed faithfully and without question.

 

Heaven forbid, that our Soul upgrades work as bad as Microsoft updates. I've taken MANY service calls on PC's that were hosed by a MS update gone awry. For that very reason, I disable all MS automatic updates. Better safe, than sorry.

So far, the KIA Soul updates seem to be of good quality.

 

Is their an update on this, what did they find?

 

Bought a "second-hand" 2020 Kia Soul EX with 40,000 km on it from the dealer (It had been a rental). Last winter "communication errors" started occuring and eventually required replacement of part of the steering wheel (3 months to get the part from Korea). Yesterday, after servicing from the dealer - same symptoms as last year - stiff power steering and the warning light came on. I called the dealer this morning and was told to monitor.... might have been a glitch. hmmm.

BTW - my wife loves Kia Soul (it is our second).