Complaints remain high, Mercedes-Benz GLC is caught in "fracture door"

Mercedes-Benz encounters "breakage door" again

On July 14, a Mercedes-Benz GLC owner posted on a forum that his new car had broken after driving 7,000 kilometers. After communicating with the Mercedes-Benz manufacturer and dealer, he did not receive any compensation. This post caused the Mercedes-Benz breakage incident to ferment and caused strong dissatisfaction among many car owners.

It is understood that the owner bought this 2018 Beijing Benz GLC 260 4MATIC luxury model in April this year. In the first two months, the owner did not drive the car often, and the mileage was only more than 1,000 kilometers. Because he drove to the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, he drove more than 5,000 kilometers on the road. On the evening of July 14, the left front axle of the car suddenly broke, and the mileage at that time was 7,257km.

The owner of the Mercedes-Benz said that he did not hit any potholes on the highway, and the SOS system that Mercedes-Benz claimed could call for rescue via global positioning could not be connected. He finally waited until after four in the morning for rescue to arrive and was able to escape.

From the above picture, the shock absorber of the Mercedes-Benz car is broken into two pieces. After the manufacturer towed the accident car back for diagnosis, it gave a reply: the main reason for the shock absorber in the picture to be broken is due to external force. This means: the owner drove too roughly and broke the shock absorber, and the cost of repairing the car needs to be paid by himself. At present, the owner's Mercedes-Benz GLC is still being prepared for appraisal, and the owner is also in litigation.

This is not an isolated case of the Mercedes-Benz "breakage scandal". Car owners have been complaining about the breakage of shock absorbers since 2017. However, the 4S dealership did not admit that the breakage was caused by quality problems, and the insurance company refused to pay compensation because it was not covered by insurance.

What's even more exaggerated is that a car parked in a Mercedes-Benz 4S store also had a broken shock absorber, but the 4S store did not give any explanation.

Years of "poison gas scandal" have resulted in disastrous consequences

In addition to the "break gate", Mercedes-Benz's "poison gas gate" has never stopped in recent years.

As early as 2013, more than a thousand Mercedes-Benz C-Class and E-Class car owners complained to Mercedes-Benz because of the "strange smell" in their cars. According to media reports, the "strange smell" not only caused many car owners to suffer from decreased immunity, red and swollen eyes, coughing, vomiting, lung abnormalities and other symptoms, but also caused fetal malformations and miscarriages for some female car owners who had used the car for a long time.

At that time, Mercedes-Benz's official response was very indifferent. It delayed releasing relevant recall information, refused to acknowledge China's test results, attributed the source of the "odor" to the carpet in the car, and firmly denied the claim that the "odor" harmed the health of car owners.

Mercedes-Benz owners collectively defend their rights at the Shenzhen-Hong Kong-Macao Auto Show in 2013

Five years later, the "odor" problem has reappeared, involving many Mercedes-Benz models. Not only have owners of old Mercedes-Benz cars complained that the odor in the car lingered for a long time and have failed to protect their rights for many years, but many owners of new Mercedes-Benz cars have also complained that the odor in the car is unbearable and seriously affects their health.

In addition to these, there are also endless cases such as "steel door" and "tire blowout door", and these problems have not yet been reasonably solved.

Quality issues behind the sales champion

Mercedes-Benz, Audi and BMW have always been the top three luxury brands in China. Mercedes-Benz ranked first in sales in the first half of last year, and Audi won the championship last year with more than 10,000 units sold by Mercedes-Benz.

Half a year later, Mercedes-Benz returned to the throne and became the sales champion of luxury brands in China in the first half of this year.

Mercedes-Benz (including smart) sold 348,000 vehicles in the first half of the year, up 14% from 304,000 vehicles in the same period last year, setting a new record for the first six months. Among them, Beijing Benz sold 252,100 vehicles, accounting for 72% of the total sales in China, up 19.56% from 210,800 vehicles in the same period last year.

Looking only at sales, Mercedes-Benz performed well in the first half of the year, but as sales climbed, the number of faults and complaints also remained high.

In a new car quality report published by a well-known domestic website, the number of faults of Mercedes-Benz brand new cars reached 233. In the market segment, the failure rates of domestic models Mercedes-Benz C-Class, E-Class, GLA, and GLC are all higher than those of competing models. Among them, the number of faults of Mercedes-Benz GLC is as high as 348, far exceeding other luxury brands.

In addition, the 2018 Vehicle Reliability Report released by JD Power, an internationally authoritative automobile quality rating agency, shows that the probability of Mercedes-Benz problems is higher than the average level, with an average of 147 problems per 100 vehicles, making it the worst in vehicle quality reliability among the three German brands BBA.

Mercedes-Benz once ranked first in new car quality in the 2013 JD Power New Car Quality Study. In just five years, the quality of Mercedes-Benz cars has plummeted to below the average. The speed of decline is shocking.

Behind the sales increase, in addition to the high complaint rate and high number of failures, what surprised many people was the sharp decline in profits. In the first quarter of this year, Daimler was the only German luxury car company with a decline in profits, down 11% year-on-year. The latest financial report shows that its group net profit in the second quarter fell 28%, which is the largest profit decline Daimler has suffered in a decade.

The reporter found on a domestic automobile complaint website that from January to July this year, there were 408 user complaints about the Mercedes-Benz brand. The complaints were still concentrated on tires, engine failures, abnormal gearbox noise, setbacks, odors in the car, stalling during driving, poor after-sales service and other issues. Both new and old Mercedes-Benz models were involved. However, there were very few cases that were "accepted by the manufacturer", and most of the complaints did not receive a response.

Faced with such a situation where the problem has not been solved for a long time, professional lawyers believe that legal means should be chosen to solve it. However, after experiencing various unpleasant experiences with dealers, most consumers believe that they would rather accept the problem and repair the car themselves rather than go to court, which would consume more energy and material resources and is not cost-effective.

When the reporter called a Mercedes-Benz dealer to inquire about after-sales issues, the dealer said that after-sales service depends on the specific situation. When asked why the complaint rate of Mercedes-Benz is so high, the dealer did not respond.

As problems such as "poison gas gate", "breakage gate" and "tire blowout gate" are intermittently exposed to the public, user concentrated rights protection incidents also occur from time to time. Complaints from Mercedes-Benz owners and their dissatisfaction with Mercedes-Benz's after-sales service are often seen on car platforms and forums.

Without "high quality" and "high-quality service", no one can guarantee how long such high sales can be maintained.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.