I have mentioned on other threads that my business partner's MB S-550 has been in the dealer's hands for just about all of his time owning the car with the exception of approximately a week. Well the update is a new car is being built for him, but this time with all of the option boxes checked. This is courtesy of MB corporate. They even offered to fly my partner and his family to Germany to take delivery of it there free of charge. He isn't going to take that offer and will have it delivered here locally, but the manufacturer is treating the current car as a lemon voluntarily. I think that is an excellent example of a manufacturer treating their very high end customer with extreme levels of respect and value. Granted this is a machine well north of $100,000 purchase price, but never the less I applaud them for stepping up. It also shows true brand loyalty that my partner while having these issues with the brand's flagship, purchased a new MB GL-CLass SUV with just about all of the options too. It is also the 12th MB my partner has purchased over the years.

Acura could learn from this experience...

Also my neighbor just purchased a new Audi A6TDI and loves it.

 

Okay...that's it.

You're fired.

 

 

Sir, thank you sir!

 

I hope the redo works out better for your partner. I know several people who have had similar MB experiences and decided simply to say good-bye rather than deal with them further. Unfortunately, in one case, the lady purchased a Range Rover. Haven't asked how that one is working out.

 

hard to catch these things have to "exorcise them out"

 

Love the picture. Just perfect for this thread!!

 

Love that image!

I agree that Acura has a lot to learn from this experience, especially if they really expect more people to spend $65k on a RLX hybrid, or close to $60k on a fully loaded MDX.

THAT is customer service.

OTOH, we as Acura owners are less likely to suffer similarly to RLXSH's friend in the reliability department, so there's that.

 

That's great that MB stepped up on your colleagues S-Class, but this is not always the case.

My dad had his MB CLS550 replaced last year, but MB charged him $10k. His 2012 CLS550 was his 3rd MB (prior he had E and S classes). He had just 15k miles on his 2012 and almost since new the CEL could not be turned off due to excessive emissions. The car was constantly going back to the MB dealer. My dad was happy with the arrangement, but I told him they sold him a defective car and owed him a good one at no-charge.

Meanwhile my mother is looking to replace her trusty Lex LS460 with a new S550. I warned her of the current S-Classes last in class reliability ranking.

Unfortunately, it appears all auto-makers are experiencing tech issues and Honda/Acura are no exception. The Lexus LS and prior gen Acura RL's set a very high bar for reliability.

 

Considering how complex most cars are these days, some more than others, it is not surprising that we see more recalls and "issues" just based on all of the computers, electronics, integrated systems and such. In the old days of non-fuel injected engines before seat belts, air bags, MID displays, high powered audio systems, and the myriad of safety and performance systems, an issue would be a wiper motor that died, or smoke coming from the exhaust which required a tune of the carburetor. Not anymore. Everything is more complicated and thus prone to more problems. We have become a replacement society within the automotive world, as we can't "fix" cars now the way we did years ago. If something is broken it is cheaper to replace the non working item than try to fix it.

 

Too true. Going through this with a 7-year-old DLP TV. It's no longer turning on. I'm more likely to spend $300 on a new TV than the same money to get the old one fixed.

 

This really scares me these days. Honda/Acura was famous in the past for having very reliable vehicles. Not just the engines, but essentially everything worked on the car until it was brought to the junkyard, because the body rusted away. But that was when cars were a lot more simple.

Manufacturers know that tech sells and people want the latest gizmos... however, those gizmos just do not seem to stand the test of time- and to be honest, I'm not exactly sure why.

So Honda/Acura started cramming double screens in their cars, VTEC gauges, automatic this, automatic that, wires here, there and everywhere, computers controlling everything, etc, just to keep up with the Jones' when it comes to building cars. But they also try to do it as cheap as possible to stay viable and profitable in their share of the market.

Well something's gotta give eventually. The issues the TLX is showing were unheard of 10 years earlier when the 3G TL came out. And the issues the 3G TL had were unheard of, 10 years before that. The scariest part is that you can lump all auto manufacturers into the same pot. Who isn't doing it these days?

 

Where is that avatar from tacoBello? looks like maybe from some TV show? or it is just a picture someone drew?