This time BMW was named at the March 15th Party. It was also the first time in three years since the March 15th Party that it once again paid attention to the quality and safety issues of car companies. The last time a car company appeared on the 3.15 exposure platform was back in 2021.
author | Iron Hand
editor | Nut
cover source | unsplash
After three years, the March 15 party once again named car companies, and this time it was BMW that was exposed.
According to the CCTV March 15 party report, many BMW 530 li owners discovered that the vehicle body had abnormal noise problems with the drive shaft during use of the vehicle. After feedback to the BMW 4S store, the official reply was only a compensation of 2,000 yuan. coupon and replace the drive shaft.
As for the car owner’s request to return or exchange the car, the BMW 4S store said it was unable to satisfy it. After the
incident was exposed, some media reporters called BMW customer service. The other party responded that they would conduct technical inspections and confirm whether the phenomenon would cause safety hazards. If the problem can be solved through maintenance, BMW will also bear all related maintenance costs, and the specific situation will be improved later.
Just after the March 15 party, the BMW Group also responded on its official Weibo: In response to the "abnormal noise of the transmission shaft" problem raised by some BMW 530li users, we have previously conducted technical verification to confirm this phenomenon. It will not affect driving safety and can be solved through maintenance. BMW will bear all related maintenance costs. We will further carry out technical review and in-depth analysis to give consumers satisfactory answers.
This time BMW was named at the March 15 Party. It was also the first time in three years since the March 15 Party that it once again paid attention to the quality and safety issues of car companies. The last time a car company appeared on the 3.15 exposure stage was back in 2021. At that time, two major problems were exposed: the rust of the Ford gearbox and the frequent failures of Infiniti QX60.
Interestingly, BMW was also on the list in another way during the March 15 party in 2021. The first episode of the party that year exposed the installation of facial recognition cameras at the BMW 4S store in Wuxi to capture customers passing by. , this move was accused of seriously threatening users’ property security and privacy security.
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BMW suffered another blow
Judging from the details reported at the March 15 party, the problem of abnormal noise in the transmission shaft of the BMW 530 li model exists in a wide range of areas, but as a manufacturer, BMW has not solved this problem through a unified recall. , instead encouraged sales and after-sales personnel to explain this problem as "functional noise" in an attempt to fool consumers.
After consumers clearly pointed out vehicle problems, BMW's compensation measures also seemed to lack sincerity. It was only willing to provide 2,000 yuan in voucher compensation and help car owners replace a new drive shaft.
But for car owners, the new car they just bought has to be returned to the factory to replace core components. This not only affects the price of the vehicle when it is resold in the future, but is also difficult to accept from an emotional point of view.
According to the sales report released by the BMW Group, the BMW Group delivered a total of 824,932 BMW and mini cars in the Chinese market in 2023, a year-on-year increase of 4.2%. Total sales continued to lead the Chinese luxury car market segment.
The BMW 5 Series product that was exposed this time is one of the star models of the BMW family. In January this year, the sales volume of the BMW 5 Series reached 10,197 units, second only to the entry-level 3 Series. Although
has good sales in China, quality complaints surrounding BMW have also emerged in an endless stream in the past year. The "Top 30 Model Complaints Ranking in September 2023" released by the Passenger Car Association has shown that the BMW 5 Series, Three models, including BMW x3 , BMW 3 Series , have all entered the list. Moreover, these three models were all among the top 20 models in the complaint list that month.
refers to the experience of the car companies on the list in the past 3.15 years. The sales of BMW-related models will inevitably be affected, and if BMW wants to restore its brand reputation, it may take a long time.
What is more embarrassing is that in the past 2023, BMW experienced a major image crisis, and it took almost half a year to smooth out the negative impact.
On April 19, 2023, at the Shanghai International Auto Show, BMW mini booth held a free ice cream event. Because the staff were suspected of treating Chinese and foreign visitors differently when distributing ice cream, they were accused of discriminatory behavior by the outside world and triggered caused huge negative public opinion.
The "ice cream incident" even affected BMW's stock price. The next day, the closing price of BMW of Germany plummeted 3.62%, and its circulating market value evaporated by 2.421 billion euros, equivalent to about 18.3 billion yuan.
After nearly a year of accumulation, Volkswagen finally forgot about "BMW Ice Cream". As a result, the "BMW Drive Shaft" was directly exposed at the March 15 party. Now, both in terms of brand image and vehicle quality, BMW has You will be completely put into an unfavorable situation.
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Car companies were once frequent visitors to March 15th
In the past decade or so, car quality issues have become the hardest hit area exposed at the March 15th party, and car companies have almost become "permanent guests" at the party, whether they are joint venture brands or Independent brands have all appeared on the exposure stage of the March 15 party.
In 2013, the CCTV March 15 Party exposed the problem of the Volkswagen DSG gearbox losing power while driving. Volkswagen subsequently announced a voluntary recall to solve the DSG problem. A total of 384,181 defective vehicles were involved, which was also the largest incident in mainland China at the time. Car recalls.
At the same time this year, the quality problem of JAC Tongyue sedan was exposed, with paint bulges and rust. Later, JAC also announced the implementation of a vehicle recall plan, with the total number of recalled vehicles exceeding 110,000.
In 2014, Haima Motors appeared on the March 15th party due to fraudulent fuel consumption. However, Haima claimed afterwards that all models on the market met relevant national technical standards, so media reports about the company were not true.
In 2015, the March 15 party even exposed four car companies: Dongfeng Nissan, Shanghai Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz and Land Rover. Among them, the first three car companies all had 4S shop repairs for minor problems to make huge profits. Land Rover is experiencing frequent quality problems with its Evoque model's 9-speed gearbox. After the
party, Dongfeng Nissan, Shanghai Volkswagen, and Mercedes-Benz successively issued official statements and apologies. Jaguar Land Rover announced the recall of some Evoque models, totaling 36,451 vehicles.
At the March 15 party in 2018, it was exposed that there were major design defects in the engine of the Volkswagen SUV model Touareg. Volkswagen also announced the recall of some Touareg series vehicles, involving a total of 33,142 vehicles in mainland China.
The March 15 party in 2020 was postponed for four months due to the epidemic, but there are also car companies on the list. SAIC-GM-Wuling Baojun 560 was exposed due to automatic transmission stall failure. Baojun Auto issued a statement saying that it has been established The special working group launched an investigation into the matter and apologized for the trouble caused to users.
In 2021, Ford cars were named at the March 15 party. Due to design defects, the gearbox was flooded and rusted. However, the 4S store and the Ford manufacturer did not truthfully explain the truth and deceived the car owners to pass on the responsibility.
also exposed the confidentiality agreement of Infiniti this year. According to consumers, after they had problems with their vehicles, they went to the Infiniti 4S store, but were asked to sign a confidentiality agreement, which required the car owners not to release corresponding problems to the media or through other means.
Judging from these past exposure cases, most of the car companies involved have been sincere in admitting their mistakes and have basically provided corresponding solutions. Of course, there are also "strong" car companies like Haima Motors.
In addition to the March 15 party, car quality issues are the hardest hit area by consumer complaints. According to statistics from the China Consumers Association, in 2023, the National Consumers Association accepted a total of 41,550 complaints about cars and parts. Although it has declined compared to the previous year, it still ranks 4th among the product segments that have been complained about.
On some social media platforms, it is common to see scenes of car owners holding banners, climbing on car roofs, and even smashing cars on site to defend their rights.For car companies other than BMW, perhaps they shouldn’t feel lucky to have escaped exposure at this year’s March 15th party. In the current era of pervasive social media, no quality issue can be ignored. It’s just a matter of time before it is exposed. .
