Time to say goodbye :-(

It pains me to say it, as I'm LR through and through, but their quality is rubbish has been for years. I just can't bring myself to buy German, I would go back to the Hyundai Santa Fe.

I got a bit of a blow today, turns out my Disco Sport will come with the out dated and uneconomical PSA 2.2 diesel. The new ingenium engine won't be in full production so is reserved for the new Jag XE.

I have to agree with both Tony and J77, even compared to my last Evoque the new one has more rattles and in places I never had them in the old car which was one of the earliest cars produced. The finish and rattles would be unacceptable in a Skoda costing £13000 ( wouldn't be there on delivery either) so they simply should not exist in cars costing between double and four times the cost. They even more inexcusable in a car that has been in production for three years. One really does wonder if Land Rover management gives a monkey's cuss about customers feed-back - they certainly don't seem to have learned anything whatsoever in the last 10-15 years. It's about time each executive at LR had a deduction from salary equal to the cost of repairing build issues for every car that has to be returned to a dealership for quality and poor build issues because it is at the factory that the problems need to be sorted and not at the dealers.
Land Rover and Range Rover cars are now being sold at a price point where these issues simply should not be there when the customer takes delivery, if production has to be slowed or even stopped until they get quality and finish right then so be it, but this customer is getting fed up with having to return brand new cars to dealers to have quality issues fixed that should never be there in the first place - rattles, software out of date in months issues and tat quality fittings issues need fixing asap otherwise customers will abandon the brand very rapidly. It's time LR built the cars up to the price they charge for them.

(12-07-2014 08:57am)XFullFatTim Wrote:  I have to agree with both Tony and J77, even compared to my last Evoque the new one has more rattles and in places I never had them in the old car which was one of the earliest cars produced. The finish and rattles would be unacceptable in a Skoda costing £13000 ( wouldn't be there on delivery either) so they simply should not exist in cars costing between double and four times the cost. They even more inexcusable in a car that has been in production for three years. One really does wonder if Land Rover management gives a monkey's cuss about customers feed-back - they certainly don't seem to have learned anything whatsoever in the last 10-15 years. It's about time each executive at LR had a deduction from salary equal to the cost of repairing build issues for every car that has to be returned to a dealership for quality and poor build issues because it is at the factory that the problems need to be sorted and not at the dealers.
Land Rover and Range Rover cars are now being sold at a price point where these issues simply should not be there when the customer takes delivery, if production has to be slowed or even stopped until they get quality and finish right then so be it, but this customer is getting fed up with having to return brand new cars to dealers to have quality issues fixed that should never be there in the first place - rattles, software out of date in months issues and tat quality fittings issues need fixing asap otherwise customers will abandon the brand very rapidly. It's time LR built the cars up to the price they charge for them.

Tim, I thought you were generally happy with your 2nd Evoque build quality wise.

I will do a good and bad comparison with photos in a couple of days in the correct discussion topic when its been back to the dealer.

Synically I think LR high prices are to cover the cost of all the warrantee claims.

Tony, mechanically I am very pleased with it. The general finish is faultless BUT it still has rattles and cheap and flimsy trim that should have been cured in 2012 with the changes then, LR had enough to read about dissatisfaction from owners then and appear to have done little or nothing except give management ever fatter pay cheques on the back of unjustified price rises. It used to be said that the best built Land Rover cars were those built at Halewood, now I would say the Solihull has left Halewood in the shade as Halewood pushes more and more cars downthe production line in less and less time and it seems to me that longer build time on the line and more time spent taking care and pride in what is built would not go amiss. I will not be replacing my current Evoque with another Halewood built Land Rover if this is the best that they can do. But like J77 I also would consider a Korean car over a German car these days, the Germans build such boring and clinical machines.

(12-07-2014 10:59am)XFullFatTim Wrote:  Tony, mechanically I am very pleased with it. The general finish is faultless BUT it still has rattles and cheap and flimsy trim that should have been cured in 2012 with the changes then, LR had enough to read about dissatisfaction from owners then and appear to have done little or nothing except give management ever fatter pay cheques on the back of unjustified price rises. It used to be said that the best built Land Rover cars were those built at Halewood, now I would say the Solihull has left Halewood in the shade as Halewood pushes more and more cars downthe production line in less and less time and it seems to me that longer build time on the line and more time spent taking care and pride in what is built would not go amiss. I will not be replacing my current Evoque with another Halewood built Land Rover if this is the best that they can do. But like J77 I also would consider a Korean car over a German car these days, the Germans build such boring and clinical machines.

I agree on the Solihull build quality. We px'd our old Evoque and due to a bit of a dealer cock-up our new car was not ready so we were loaned a FFRR Vogue for a week. For such a large car with only the cooking 250+hp V6 diesel it was supprisingly quick and agile, wonderfully smooth and totally quiet - not a hint of a squeak or rattle and on the 125 mile runs either way to Inverness 42-43 mpg. Every aspect of the car said quality, did not want to hand it back but I cannot afford nearly £80k on my pension.

As for German cars being boring, I expect that would depend on how powerful an engine you can afford, I nearly went for the SQ5 just for the engine, unfortunatly not an option with the Evoque. As for clinical - I can live with that. When ours is back at the dealers next week we will be at BMW 500 metres down the road trying the new X4.

I'm over two years into a three year lease on my Evoque and every time I look at it or see another the styling and overall impression is fantastic, but I wouldn't buy another.

My car has been niggled by electronic issues, underwhelming aftercare service and a lack of customer service. As a car that costs nearly £50k it's a shoddy performance from LR.

I recently completed a survey for LR which asked in some detail about thoughts, perceptions and real issues with the Evoque. I gave them the history and it was a balanced view as outlined in the above paragraphs. I then got a call from their PR company who wanted a phone interview, as part of a UK/US project, to discuss in detail my issues and thoughts. There were the questions on what cars are you looking at in the future, will you buy another Evoque and what can LR do to persuade you. They also paid me £50 for this. Additionally, I've just had an email from LR/Lookers about my next service and being part of an exercise where they record and rate the whole experience. This also get a fee paid.

So, LR are looking to improve but I feel its come too late as my early Evoque has the issues and problems and only now is LR thinking about these. As I mentioned to the PR company LR should have been pro-active, rather than re-active and put the customer first rather than revenue and profit. Things do go wrong but not, in my opinion, on the scale I've experienced. I also contrasted this with 14 years of driving Mercs and only one Merc-related issue (worn part) and the quality of car, build and service was fantastic.

My first experience with a new British car is that the styling and general appearance is excellent; dig down a bit further and, sadly, the niggles are there and they just shouldn't be. Not at this price point and not in the 21st century when much of what has happened has been poor testing and poor build quality.

LR loses me as a customer early next year. It'll take 3-5 years for me to look at LR again or perhaps never. Surely, that should set alarm bells going at LR HQ?

Tony, I too have had drives in new FFRR and new RRS and totally agree with you about your findings, but I also think that they are heading into the "overpriced for what they are" realm even if build quality is first rate. I was also very impressed with the lowest powered FFRR, one thing for sure it didn't feel like a small engine in a large car!

(12-07-2014 04:21pm)XFullFatTim Wrote:  Tony, I too have had drives in new FFRR and new RRS and totally agree with you about your findings, but I also think that they are heading into the "overpriced for what they are" realm even if build quality is first rate. I was also very impressed with the lowest powered FFRR, one thing for sure it didn't feel like a small engine in a large car!

Tim, agree on the overpricing, whilst they are on a role and can get away with it they will jack up prices and not give a thought to total quality across the range BUT it WILL come back and bite them. Poor quality on one model will reflect on the rest of the range, with forums such as this and other internet media a bad reputation will spread around world markets like a virus. LR should take note of all that is being discussed and put their house in order.

How hard can it be? Surly there is a supplier out there with good quality plastics.

My Evoque faired pretty well for it to be an early model. Now though the quality doesn't match the badge or the price tag, it's a fantastic looking car, great to drive but needs those interior plastics improved. I configured one and I'm amazed at how much of a price hike there has been . Even little things like the alloys, when I bought mine it was £400 upgrade for style 4 I think 19" now it's £900.

I'm waiting patiently for prices and specs for the Disco Sport (why that name )It's looking like a start price of £30k, it's poor show from LR at this stage with the Evoque I had the car specced, build date and delivery date. I'm intending to spec this one well, as it could be my last for a while as the price for LR products is heading in the wrong direction.

I've had mine on auto trader for 6 weeks but no takers yet,I ordered an SQ5 after driving everything else in the class,BMW/merc/etc...nothing else came close to the performance and I actually found it quieter,more comfortable and more economical than the evoque.
Looking forward to decent performance and having a panoramic roof that actually opens,only things I will miss is the looks and interior materials as the Audi dash is functional to say the least.The Audi infotainment system is not touch screen but the display is HD compared to land rover standards!
I know when the going gets tough the LR product is where I'd rather be but price wise the evoque has done itself no favours based on what it has to offer plus the dealers were offering me £1000 less than we buy any wreck.com which again is a ridiculous situation,dropping the range rover sport se was the final nail in the coffin for me as overnight it placed a new sport out of my price range.