How (not) to treat a customer?

It's Christmas after all, so I thought I share a few bit's about how it is to be a Ferrari customer in Sweden, myself in this case. First I like to start with the fact that I truly do love cars from Ferrari. I guess it is a bit like Chris Harries once said when he presented he's 599GTB once upon a time. Love the cars and all that ;-)

It just seems to be impossible to keep the car in 100% mint condition. It is after all mechanical nothing wrong with my FF, it is just well a lot has happened when it is at the dealer... mostly regarding the paint...

Why you ask? That is a good question.

There is only one authorized dealer here in Sweden, Autoropa, and they are having a rather hard time keeping my Ferrari FF out of problems. I for sure did not sign up for all that has happened, when I ordered/bought my FF. But it has happened a few times by now, and I see no end to this.

So far during about 42 months (3.5 years) of ownership, my FF spent a bit over 6 months in Autoropas hands, to fix things that, well, Autoropa them self has caused onto my Ferrari.

Let's be clear here, because one thing is 100% sure, all problems I had with my Ferrari FF, is due to things that just sort of happens at Autoropa. Time and time again. One time might be a sad mistake, however that is not the case.

So I will start this with the story (#1 of #4) of what happened after about 500 km of driving. I would call my car at this stage as brand new. So what happens, well I had a few minor things that needed to be sorted out like the missing net in the trunk that needed to be mounted at Autoropa instead of at the factory (the factory also missed to install the lift system on my FF - happy to report I have not needed it yet, so I don't miss that feature). So I drop it of in the morning at Autoropa service department, and then when I am at my work, I get that strange phone call from the service manager. It started with something like this "I am sorry but your car has been in an accident" - "okay, is everyone okay" I asked - some things comes first - "Yes but not your car".

So what happened? well the mechanic reversed my Ferrari into another (none Ferrari, I think it was a Toyota Yaris) car, with the end result of a broken rear bumper and a paintwork on the rear parts:

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https://www.instagram.com/p/B6P6THNnYsn/

Autoropa was of course sorry and said they should take care of everything. And then it took about 3 months before I got the car back. During this time I had no car at all, nor did I get any offer from Autoropa for a car during this "happening". Anyway I got the car back, and when I dropped it of at my car detailer I got another phone call: "there is a lot of paint dust on the leather interior". Right well it is clear why, Autoropa has replaced the rear bumper and painted the hatch, so it was not a surprise of course. Yes all paint dust did of course get removed, but it should have been done at Autoropa - however as history will tell, this was not the first time (and I do not think it is the last time either) when this was missed.

There is also a bit of a side story on this. It turned out that Autoropa had tried to use my insurance to pay for the work they done - of course I got a call from the insurance company, where they told me what had happened, and they did send over the papers that indicated what Autoropa had tried to do. This was of course completely wrong doing. Anyone, in Sweden at least, that reverses a car onto another car is 100% guilty. There is no way I would accept to take the blame for the wrongdoing of Autoropa - and the insurance company of course agreed. So in the end Autoropa paid everything them self (or used there own insurance I simply don't know nor do I care).

So in the end I thought well bad start - it could not get any worse now could it?

 

Interesting to read the rest - but it always puzzles me when an official Ferrari Dealer messes up the simplest things. Mechanic crashing the car happens. But fixing the customer car with a backyard garage level of quality is where it hurts. You would think they would go above and beyond to make you feel happy after crashing your new FF. Fix the bumper, repaint what needs to be repainted following the proper standards and then offer you a full detail in and out....

 

I would like to start, yet again, with the statement that I do love Ferrari Cars - make no mistake about that!

So after a rather odd start with the rear bumper, I started to use my Ferrari. After all how could it get worse?

In the 2nd half of 2018 I lost my father to cancer. I am just so super happy that I managed to give him one last ride in the Ferrari to his favorite restaurant in the Stockholm Archipelago and enjoy what I now know his last day out in the sun. I knew he had it though, I could see that in his face, and for some reason he said nothing, he just enjoyed the drive (about one hour in either direction) and smiled all the way. If one can ever make someone happy about something as simple as a ride in a Ferrari, then I will continue to do so. Like when I gave my 2nd cousins son a ride with his girlfriend when they graduated from school!

Anyway, after my fathers death, I decided to go back to a cab/roadster/spider kind of car. I used to have a Mercedes SL500 (SL550 in US, R231) and it was always a nice thing to start each year with the roof down when spring arrived here in Stockholm - I kind of missed that. So I set up an consignment with Autoropa to sell my Ferrari. And let them set the price and all. I had to run the car thru a checkup test, it was supposed to be a 110 checkpoint, but ended up with a bit over 200 checkpoints by mistake by the service department on Autoropa. Anyway clean sheet except I got a new flywheel for no known reason. Anyway they also did some "super fine polishing" - ehm... Okay, it was supposed to produce that extra shine on the car? Anyway I did sign for that so nothing about it right? After a while it come clear that any offers did not get to me anyway, I simply don't know why nothing happened, so I decided to have a walk by and check up on my Ferrari.... Okay after that I was 100% sure why no one was interested: I got a rear flat tire all of a sudden, and more important the ppf that Autoropa once installed before I took delivery was in a simple word destroyed. Some one had use a polish machine against the "half" set ppf that was installed, and pushed a lot of polish in under the ppf (paint protection film or stenskottsfilm as it is called here in Sweden) - and the micro scratches on the hood and other parts was just to visible. I would never my self even have a 2nd look at my own car - that how bad it was!

On the ppf I think I need to mention one minor detail: I ordered my Ferrari with FULL ppf protection - all areas. I however got only half, you know how that looks, when the plastic film stops half way up on the engine hood and well it does leave a strange "conversion" form plastic film to paint, the edge if you like - all dust always seems to gather exactly after the ppf film and makes it even more visible due to the half kit ppf. I actually complained about this when the car was new, however for some odd reason Autoropa refused completely to correct this. The argument was, from the service manager at Autoropa: "You normally do not apply the paint protection film on all painted surfaces since that will give the paint a bad finish and give the impression of a bad paint work" - right. I now understand why they refused. They already knew what they had done, and was trying to escape the mess they done by hoping that I would never find out....

Anyway back to the point when I collected my Ferrari and we decided to wait to after the new year and about march month to do a new try, this time without the ppf and maybe a adjustment of the requested price - now do remember I let Autoropa decide the requested price, and it seems they were wrong I guess.

So the decision on removing the ppf was simple, the edges of the ppf film was already destroyed, non recoverable (I tried to recover the ppf, it failed). And for a new try to sell my Ferrari I got the message from Autoropa that I needed to removed the ppf anyway. I booked a time at my cardetailer, and requested that he remove the ppf. This was 1st of March this year. It only took an hour or so before I got, by now, that famous unwanted phone call that told me that not everything is going according to plan. It started rather simple with a paintchip that for some reason showed up on the engine hood when that part of the ppf was removed:

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I never noticed anything on that ppf that suggested that I actually had any kind of damage on the engine hood ppf part. So to my surprise it showed up - strange? well since I have very limited experience with ppf I simply can not tell if this is normal. I guess someone can correct me if I am wrong in this: I think that chip might have been there before my Ferrari had ppf applied - like a delivery paint chip, if that is even possible? Anyway as the history will tell us - this was only the beginning of a nightmare that still goes on...

 

The crappy polishing is inexcusable. Pulling PPF can and will remove clear coat or color on body panels especially non-metal bumpers with tight shapes so I would not believe this item is entirely on them. The crashed bumper is something I would not get over though. That dealer would be dead to me.

 

So after the discussion about the paintchip, the real reason my cardetailer called me emerge: When Autoropa installed the ppf, and Autoropa uses Hexis (Bodyfence), the managed to screw everything up so bad. In short: The cut the paint protection film on the cars different parts - not precut parts, they used a sharp knife and then cut thru the film into the paint and all the way to the base of different parts:

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This is completely and utterly the biggest nightmare so far. In total there was cuts in 8 different parts:

1. Engine hood, on the middle
2. Left and Right front fender, on the middle
3. Left and Right headlight, as a sharp cut into the headlight glass about a cm from the edge
4. Front bumper
5. Left and Right external mirror house

Yes my car had a half set of ppf installed. I ordered a full set, and I got a half set. The annoying thing about this is that I actually did try to get Autoropa to actually change from this half set to a full set, but they refused - I wonder why? Anyway the reason I got was: "The transparent protective film is usually not put on an entire car. This is because so large surfaces can make it look like the car's paint has a poor finish. It is usually only put as a cover on front surfaces, details and thresholds." - right, so instead Autoropa made deep cuts into the paint to make sure they damage the paint...

Now I really start to wonder why on earth anyone uses ppf at all - if this is needed, to use sharp knifes against the paintwork, then why bother in the first place?

Na it can not be that simple, Autoropa is just that bad on installing Helix Bodyfence on Ferrari / Maserati / Bentley / Mclaren - If anyone owns any of those cars, or are looking to buy a used one, be damn sure to double check the ppf and what happened on installation, to avoid anything even close to my experience:

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The end result, and yes you all guessed it by now, is that my car had to be repainted AGAIN. And just like last time, it was gone for a large amount of weeks / months, and the car had paint dust all over the interior again, and this time also on the panoramic glass roof. However the even more disturbing thing was that the cleatcoat was somewhat off sprayed on the doors, especially the passenger door (right door). All this needed to be addressed of course, and no Autoropa did not do this either, so I made sure this all was corrected to the right level.

I am happy to say that the cars paint is after all this okay - it is not as new, how could it be, and I do have multiple layers of paint. Am I happy about this? Hell no!

Ferrari needs to think about why they use Autoropa as the only supplier in Sweden. And this is why:

I have now owned this Ferrari for 3.5 years, it spent more than 6 months at Autoropa so they could repaint and repair what they them self have managed to damage on my Ferrari. I now know that it is just a matter of time, from a statistic point of view, before the will damage the car again (and again). Why on earth should I even consider another new Ferrari when I know the risk of getting damage from Autoropa is well easily above 50%! Yes I own my dream Ferrari, Yes I hate the paintwork that has been done on my Ferrari against my wish (well it needed to be repainted, the damage needed to be taken care of) and the 2nd hand value has taken a serious hit just because Autoropa simply do not respect my car.

So for the interest of everything, I did look into getting a new Ferrari (stay with me now!), since well I got an offer for "goodwill" and I thought I check it out. In the end though that "goodwill" was about 5% of a new Ferrari as compensation - that in my mind is not goodwill, nor is it compensation at all. And this goodwill as Autoropa calls it was ONLY available if I get a new Ferrari - and let them ruin that one too I guess?

I would estimate that the current value for my Ferrari is about 60.000 euros less now, instead of the mint super condition if would have been in if Autoropa had not completely failed on how to treat a customers car. I have had costs around 7500 euros, just to clean up some of the mess that Autoropa has made of the car. And the usability is low since well I actually missed two out of four summers in the car, since that is the time it spent at Autoropa for being repainted.

And no, this is not the end of this story - it continues on, and I'll get into that after the holidays!

Again, please remember that I still LOVE Ferrari cars. I am still in love with the V12 sound, and I do enjoy driving my Ferrari. There is not many cars that make me smile like I do when I drive it. It is just that the 50 Shades of tdf Blue that makes all this really sad!

Merry Christmas!

 

Clarification: The number of 60.000 euros in value decrease is Autoropa's own numbers - I have nothing to do with that...

 

Well at least the mileage is a little lower than it would have been ...

Hope 2020 will be a better year!

 

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I am so sorry to hear all this. I thought I had it tough as the closet dealer to me is 3 hours away in either direction!
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In my experience, I have learned that the people who work on the car are, by far, the most likely to damage it. This, alone, is why I dread taking my car in for service.

 

So I after all that happened to the paint, and repaint twice and all, that I was going to start to enjoy my Ferrari.

Ehhhmmm NO!

The last addition to the story, for the moment (I just as well add a reservation here - I don't think Autoropa is capable to keep my car in perfect order or shape, from a mathematical point of view it is just a question of when and not if), is that I found that the rear trunk guiderails (that keeps the rear shelf in place) are torn off from there places. Now I have not used them at all, there is NO wear or any marks at all, and now they just magically drops off:

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Autoropa's response is of course that I have to pay for that since my warranty is not valid anymore (it's older than 3 years, and well the factory warrant is only 3 years here in Sweden) and I did not get an extended warrant (I was NEVER offered one either - Autoropa seems to just forgotten to tell me about it).

Now that sad part is of course that to manage to tear this guiderails of you need to use excessive force, and well I have taken off the rear shelf two times. Neither has been any strange, well except the last (2nd!) time when I found out about the guiderails plastic parts (there are 4, part 66 to 69):

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However they could provide me with a cost estimate to replace the parts themself has broken...

And just to get everything correct here, this is when I decided to share this experience. In swedish we have a saying "Liten tuva stjälper ofta stort lass" - I have no idea how to translate this, so I used google translate so be warned it may sound a bit strange: "A small tuva often steals large loads.".

So there will be more after this, be sure for that....

 

Happy New Year to each and everyone!

And let's se if 2020 will be the first (!) year that Autoropa manages to NOT break/damage/destroy something on my Ferrari, so far Autoropa has each and every year manage to break / damage something (2016-2017-2018-2019). So is 2020 the year they start to behave like pros? The odds are against that though....

 

Let's start the new year with a scratch, I mean after all, why not?
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This is the driver door window, and yes this was done at Autoropa....

 

My dear God man... This seems like a never ending nightmare. Aren't there any fellow swedish Ferrari owners that might give you some advice? Why not take the dealer to court? All the best from Amsterdam!

 

At some point, you may have to abandon the brand due to the only dealer available to you. Sad, but some times a fact of life.

 

That's a bad story.

Ship your car elsewhere for service etc; who says you have to use the dealer in Sweden?

 

I had a big issue with a Ferrari and some of the problems happened while the car was at the dealer. One day without warning the gear-box started jumping gears and I took the car to the dealer for a diagnose. It took them together with Ferrari one month just to diagnose that the problem was a faulty sensor on the DCT. Under the existing extension warranty the dealer was ordered by Ferrari to removed the transmission, open it, substituted the sensor and put everything back in place. When the job was "finished" I had been already more than three months without the car. The day I went to collect it upon my arrival I was told there was a problem. They said that after the repair was made when the key was switched-off the gear-box wasn't activating the parking brake. They apologized for the inconvenience but said that they couldn't let me take the car with this problem and would report to Ferrari for instructions on what to do now. A couple of weeks passed without any decision being taken until Ferrari finally instructed the dealer to remove the transmission a second time. They repeated all the operation that were done the first time and when I finally collected the car more than four months had already passed. While driving home coming from the dealer I noticed the radio wasn't tuning any station and the GPS was giving a position on the map that was somewhere in the Atlantic ocean 1000 Km from where I was driving. I then did half a turn and went back to the dealer and ended up leaving the car there again. They told me that they would start immediately trying to diagnose the two problems but two weeks later neither the dealer or Ferrari were able to tell me a solution for the faulty radio and GPS. By then almost five months had passed since I left the car at the dealer for the first time and my nervous system and patience were close to total exhaustion. I then decided that I've had enough and the same day I wrote a complaint letter directly to the dealer's general manager. I gave the dealer a dead line ending three working days later and if by then they didn't send me a written calendarised solution to the problems I would file a formal complaint directly to Ferrari customers service. By the end of the third day I received an e-mail from the dealer with a letter signed by the general manager expressing his sincere apologies for everything that happened and presenting a detailed solution for each of the problems. The plan had a three weeks execution time and just to diagnose the causes of the problems all the inside of the car, upholsteries, etc had to be removed to open the access to the CAN cable that runs from the back to the front of the car. They then detected that one of the problems had to with the fact that the CAN cable was dented near the boot and had to be substituted. A new GPS antenna had to be installed as well because the old one wasn't working despite everything being in order when I left the car at the dealer for the first time. Three weeks later the dealer finally delivered the car with the repair made.

By the time this saga ended I was so fed-up with this Ferrari that I decided to sell it. Three weeks later the car wasn't mine anymore and already had a new owner. Now when I return to the same dealer to service my present Ferrari I often ask if the other car has had more problems since. They always tell me that the new owner is extremely happy with the car and it has been flawless since I sold it. .