But only should-be-hanged lawyers and consultants and such are going to be using work time to refuel their car. 24 hours of the day can't be counted or valued at the salary rate. The numbers Tesla put out were like an April Fool's prank.
"Earned it" is subjective at best. The rest, I will just hold back, just saying it might be hard to embrace theories from some backgrounds.
But only should-be-hanged lawyers and consultants and such are going to be using work time to refuel their car. 24 hours of the day can't be counted or valued at the salary rate. The numbers Tesla put out were like an April Fool's prank.
We can agree to disagree. Time is valuable and less driving to a filling station and pumping gas is that much more time you have, whether for more work or time with the family.
As an aside, I saw some emotorcons for a brief shining moment, then they vanished, as if a force of emotorcondylitis took hold again and scores of emotorcons were silenced...
Counting time at a filling station at $100/hr (and then claiming it takes 15 minutes per visit) and applying that to the operating cost of a car is simply shady accounting and nothing more. The only people who would disagree have rode the stock speculation wave and are afraid of the eventual end. And more work? Ha, yeah, that's what they are aiming for...going to the gas station interferes with my work! Time to end the undeserved subsidy.
The claims...deceptive or dishonest, fits well with a certain coddled demographic who aren't answering to anything right now as they make out better than at any time since the days of Gatsby.
I haven't seen emotorcons for a week or more. However, the old fashioned manual way still works. I hope Edmunds isn't paying much for support.
People are working on inductive charging systems for EVs so that owners won't have to spend time plugging them in, much less driving to a "filling" station.
The emotorcons were briefly here yesterday and still are around if you aren't doing a reply. They are at the top of the post box now though.
And you can hand type them and they'll show up. :-) :sick:
According to the USA Today article dated 8-27-13 "this survey was conducted on random phone interviews of 4078 consumers."
No mention is made of the age of the vehicles etc. This important because most Korean vehicles on the road are newer on average than domestic vehicles or Toyota or Honda. When was the last time you have seen 12-15 year old Korean car on the road?
I stand by my comment that the survey is virtually worthless.
The customers of 20 automotive brands were randomly seleted but 20 brands were covered.
-The ACSI has close to two decades of experience analyzing customer satisfaction with foreign and domestic automobile manufacturers serving the U.S. consumer market. Each year, the ACSI interviews hundreds of customers about recent experiences with their chosen vehicle.
The customer survey data serve as inputs to ACSI’s proprietary model, which embeds customer satisfaction within a series of cause-and-effect relationships. Key metrics include customer expectations, customer perceptions about the value and quality of their actual experiences, customer complaints, and customer retention.-
Both GM and Chrysler show mixed results in 2013, with two of three brands suffering downturns in customer satisfaction. For GM, both Buick and Chevrolet drop 6% compared to the prior year. The loss for Chevrolet places it in a tie for last with Chrysler’s Dodge, down 2% to 79. Chrysler’s Jeep retreats as well, down 4% to 80, but the Chrysler nameplate rebounds 6% to 83.
Since you are espousing the importance of the survey...I ask again..what exactly is it measuring? And for what time period? I think those are rational questions. Is it 2013 cars only?
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Dated 9-17-THIS YEAR. towed more better mpgs larger cargo bed more payload capacity lowest step in height easiest tailgate operation Comes in an even more efficient V6 alum 4.3 with 295 HP and 290 ft-lbs.
Counting time at a filling station at $100/hr (and then claiming it takes 15 minutes per visit) and applying that to the operating cost of a car is simply shady accounting and nothing more.
Compared to government accounting it is downright transparent!
If the grocery store is 15 minutes away, it will cost $75 to buy a loaf of bread. A late sleep in on a Saturday costs more than your mattress for the whole night's sleep?
They get their groceries delivered of course. Physically shopping in a grocery store is for suckers. For last minute needs, they get their dog walker to stop by the 7/11.
I don't know any "they's." The one Tesla owner I know, a friend, was smitten by the car's technology, performance and looks, but he and his wife shop for their own groceries. They use their '11 Ford Fusion hybrid for their store runs and other mundane tasks, saving the model S for weekends, mostly. Maybe that's because they made their money the old fashioned way.
The new Silverado/Sierra are certainly worthy of CR's top rating overall. Though for me the Ram was my choice. Mainly due to power, and looks inside and out.
That said, I didn't even bother to drive the Silverado. I looked at an LTZ and sat inside and it just wasn't for me. Not to mention every truck on the lot had 3.08 gears which are completely useless for towing. If that's how GM gets better gas mileage, no thanks.
No question the Ram's weakest area is towing/hauling, but what I tow and haul is well within the Ram's capabilities.
IMO, among the big 3, there is not a bad choice for a pickup, it simply depends on what you like and what your needs are.
I will say, I find it a bit amusing that some of the GM faithful are bragging about CR's high ratings of GM vehicles of late, yet completely disregarded CR's credibility when GM vehicles used to score poorly.
The ACSI automotive report measures annual purchase feedback from customers representing 20 nameplates. The auto industry follows the results of this survey very closely. The domestics did better in 2012 but slipped this year.
-The August 2013 ACSI report on automobiles is based on interviews with 4,078 customers, chosen at random and contacted via telephone and email between April 6 and May 22, 2013. Customers are asked to evaluate their recent purchase and experiences with automobiles manufactured by the largest companies in terms of market share, plus an aggregate category consisting of “all other” and thus smaller auto nameplates.
The survey data are used as inputs to ACSI’s cause-and-effect econometric model, which estimates customer satisfaction as the result of the survey - measured inputs of customer expectations, perceptions of quality, and perceptions of value. The ACSI model, in turn, links customer satisfaction with the survey - measured outcomes of customer complaints and customer loyalty. ACSI subscribers receive confidential industry - competitive and best - in - class data on all modeled variables and customer experience benchmarks.-
"I will say, I find it a bit amusing that some of the GM faithful are bragging about CR's high ratings of GM vehicles of late, yet completely disregarded CR's credibility when GM vehicles used to score poorly."
Similarly, I find it amusing when CR loyalists only mention their surveys but say nothing when a GM vehicle does very well in their tests.
I only reply to stuff here (much of it ridiculous; current respondee excluded). It's not the GM loyalists who start a post here with "Man, anything Toyota/Honda/Kia makes is a POS. I've never so much as sat in one, but that's the truth!". Or "I counted ten Chevrolets stranded alongside the road today on the way to work." LOL
(The only car I saw along the road this past weekend was a Camry...but it was an old one, no fair I know. )
I do find it amusing that the first-year Cobalt is considered more reliable by CR than subsequent years. That sure is conventional thinking, isn't it? BTW, CR says my daughter's '09 is as overall reliable as the same-year Accord.
BTW, very happy with my new, used purchase...high value quotient for sure.
Back to CR--this is more of an editing issue, but their 2013 Used Car Buying Guide links the Buick LeSabre and Lucerne together, but they only list the reliability chart for the '03-05 Le Sabre...absolutely nothing for the Lucerne. Same with the Venture and Uplander...there's the chart for the Venture; nothing for the Uplander. Duh.
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Can anyone else determine from the above post, just what time period, years, models, new or three-year-old, includes the sales experience or not, ad nauseum? I surely can't.
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Captain of Cool: I was ready to ask how your Cobalt bargain is going. You've answered that. The Cobalts on car lots are always priced up by a lot. Since you've bought yours, I did more looking on the online trading sites.
>"Man, anything Toyota/Honda/Kia makes is a POS.
Strange with all the ridicule of GM and Cobalts, that they are worth a lot on the used car lots. Seems like a lot of hypocrisy sitting there in the past with all the examples of how awful things were with GM. Guess they forgot the awful HyKia junk for years, only emboldening the buyers by offering a nontransferable 100000 mile warranty to buy them in. Reality is slowly coming home with the newer GM offerings as they can slowly afford to change their models.
>CR--this is more of an editing issue, but their 2013 Used Car Buying Guide links the Buick LeSabre and Lucerne together,
Just shows how naive CR is, or at worst, how they intentionally intend to mislead people with their slick. The leSabre is one car; the Lucerne to me was 3 different cars depending on the model chosen. I did not trade my leSabre for one when it was due for trade. I'm still driving it.
I looked at a Cadenza to see what HyKia was calling upline. Talk about earrings and lipstick on a pig; it looks like an Optima that went to a makeover beauty picture studio for glamour shots. Still looks like an Optima. The salesman was practically pulling my suspenders to pull me back so I wouldn't leave and I' let him sell me one of the 3 base models they were stuck with. I wonder how CR rates the Cadenza? They should have called it the parenthesis.
imidazo, I think I pretty-much stole my daughter's '09 Cobalt. The seller was, well, mostly a jerk. I won't reiterate where he is from.
He wouldn't answer specific questions I emailed him...I did email him a total of four times, as I'd keep thinking of things I wanted to ask...specific things. His reply was "I told you it's in good shape and maintained by fleet and GM standards." After my last email, he said, "I don't think you should buy this car". Normally I'd have said 's**** you', but I figured the auction had no reserve and ended on a weekday afternoon, good for me. I didn't have to like the guy to buy the car.
When I picked the car up, he had the wrong title, and the car had 6K more miles than advertised. I got money back from him on that. We drove the car home without the title anyway and he overnighted it to us later in the week, and we paid for the car (after deposit) after we got the title.
I will say, he trailered the car to OH for me, which I genuinely appreciated, and did it at no charge.
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So yesterday I popped into see a few Rams. There was a 2014 3.6, 8 sp, 4x4, 8' box, aluminum wheels, fr and rr chrome bumpers (really poor quality appearance-wise...who knows how long it will last) cloth seat and carpet floor. Price was just over 37k including 1695. destination fee from Mexico. With tax that truck was 41900. ! We're talking a very very VERY plain truck here. How plain? Well it had wind up windows, so..
So I went in to ask one of the salesmen when the diesel was due here. He said he didn't think till NEXT year. Their Jeep G Cherokees aren't here yet either but he said at least they are being built presently.
So I looked in a few windows of the majority of Rams they had there. 90% were 1/2 tons, all equipped with crew cab, short box 4x4, Hemi's, 8 sp and pretty well equipped. Prices ranged from 56 to 59k. Yup near 60 THOUSAND dollars. 67800. with tax. So then a bit farther up on the hill were the 2500's with the Cummins diesels. Some were north of 70000 thousand dollars. With tax, 79100 bucks. For a lousy pick up truck!
The 60k 1/2 tons were Laramies...but not all...there were some 55- 56k ones that still weren't Laramies. The interior of the Laramie did look really nice. I thought of dieselone's new Laramie and his comment about the interior. I also am really curious what HE paid in the US for his.
When I commented to the salesman that that basic white 4x4 V6 being over 37k was ridiculous, he said that there was over 7000. discount and that the near 60k ones had 12-15k off that. I thought to myself, well big deal, still absurdly overpriced...no wonder their profit margin is so high on p/ups. He said that he does get frustrated with some customers that chose to go to the US to buy and endure all the hoops necessary to go that route.
I think Chrysler is making a huge mistake by having such inflated window sticker prices. There will be the odd farmer/contractor who doesn't do internet or TV ads, and see that price with his wife window shopping on a Sunday afternoon, and simply say to themselves that they couldn't possibly get into a new p/u. If they knew that that 37k might get down to at least 30k (34k including tax), they might be able to buy it with the money garnered from the sale of their first born.. And manually lower their window to wave goodbye to the dealership when leaving for home.
After my last email, he said, "I don't think you should buy this car". Normally I'd have said 's**** you'
Well I have been on both sides of this in the past. I could picture you having that affect on me too, depending of course on just how those 4 particular emails went. Keep in mind that he already was pricing the car WELL below mkt. He took off an ADDITIONAL 500 bucks for the quoted mileage mistake, AND he transported the car at his own expense a good distance to accommodate you.
And for his trouble while you mention you appreciated that, you still called him a jerk.
It sounds like you really did get a steal, so I'm a bit surprised you have anything negative to recall at all about the deal overall much less call the poor guy (who obviously musta been in a financial distress situation) a jerk.
" I thought of dieselone's new Laramie and his comment about the interior. I also am really curious what HE paid in the US for his. "
My 2014 listed for something like $49,600 or so. Basically, I got $5k off of that and they showed me $10k for my '07 Expedition with 129k miles on it and in what I'd consider rough (well used) condition. Probably could have gotten a better deal if I'd shopped around more, but honestly, I don't have the patience for that.
No way would I want to pay $10K to 15K more for the same vehicle. That seems steep to me. Heck, it was steep enough as it is.
"Well I have been on both sides of this in the past. I could picture you having that affect on me too, depending of course on just how those 4 particular emails went. Keep in mind that he already was pricing the car WELL below mkt. He took off an ADDITIONAL 500 bucks for the quoted mileage mistake, AND he transported the car at his own expense a good distance to accommodate you.
And for his trouble while you mention you appreciated that, you still called him a jerk. "
My guess is the seller likely wasn't thrilled with the sales price. But that's his problem not Uplanders.
Yes, 49600 is still pretty sturdy to be sure..Was that including (how much for) freight? Ever since they started using Mexico as a place of manufacture, destination fees went up here about 400 to 500 bucks from already highs of 1200.
Looks like you have a beautiful truck though. And the mileage you are getting is truly impressive at 70 mph. Around here I do mostly 50 to 60. For interest's sake, and to show how our mileage rating stickers are out to lunch, they said 22 city and 33 hwy for the 3.6 and 8 sp 4x4. So 20% less than that of course on your gallon. I figure you are getting...was it 30 I think? our gallon at 70. And our tests never go 70, I think at best they touch 68 momentarily but spend the vast amt of time at 54 - 55. So that 33 seems possible in summer temps.
Yes, that included $1095 for freight according to the window sticker. My truck's final assembly was in Warren, Michigan. The engine came from Mexico and the transmission in Germany. Total domestic content is 66%
As for options. On top of what comes standard on a Laramie, I have leather bucket seats and rear heated seats, convenience group, trailer tow group, power sun roof, 32 gallon tank, Uconnect 8.4AN, parksense, and remote start.
Looks like hwy mileage is staying in the 20-22mpg range if I stay under 70 mph. I've already put 1,100 miles on it and am averaging about 15 mpg overall which is right at the city rating. That is probably 2-3 mpg better than my Expedition would have returned. Will know more with the next fill up and a hand calculation to see how accurate the computer is.
Well, I've bought on eBay before, and I never once had a guy who wouldn't/didn't answer specific questions about the item. He's expecting you to trust him on the description. Asking questions (there's a button on eBay for doing just that) should be expected.
And to say, "I don't think you should buy the car" is ridiculous.
I wonder if he really didn't wish to sell the car at no reserve.
He has a fleet of 30 Cobalts and mine was the first, so I don't think he was a down-on-his-luck guy. I think he wasn't a 'dot the i and cross the t' kind of guy.
And to bring the wrong title..come on, that's a thirty-second check before you leave home.
That said, I'd suggest anyone looking for a second car to watch his ads for the other Cobalts he said he'd be selling.
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Ya...he does sound like he was a bit too laid back for his own good really..I just purchased a steel roof for my place here, and I did not buy from the guy who seemed too casual and resistant to answer a few (what I thought to be fairly relevant) questions. So I bought from the company that made me feel a little more secure about my purchase.
As dieselone mentions (and what I was alluding to) I think he was less than thrilled for the low price he was selling at. His choice tho..
I have still never eBay'd. I would like to though...just have never yet made an acct. It seems like a terrific venue for potential deals. The honour system part of it I find a bit mind-blowing.. on one hand re-assuring..but mind-blowing at the same time.
I've bought two daily drivers, both for my daughters, from eBay, with good results (car better than the price would suggest).
However, I bought a Studebaker that had been on eBay but didn't meet the seller's reserve. I bought it outside of eBay, afterwards. That was a nightmare. He said "I'd drive the car from Wisconsin to Ohio". When the car came to me, off the trailer, I wouldn't have driven it ten miles someplace. He also stopped photos just short of significant rust perforation. I learned not to take sellers at total face value after that sale. I resold the car a year later to a collector in Australia, after sending him over 60 pics including all the bad areas.
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Price was just over 37k including 1695. destination fee from Mexico. With tax that truck was 41900.
I guess taxes are part of the killer there. What percentage would that be, anyway?! Here in Maryland, we pay 6% when we buy a car. And they tax rebates, too. I remember the tax on my 2012 was something like $1347, which would work out to a purchase price of $22,450.
Oh, and to ship that sucker from Mexico up here to DC was "only" $995! I remember it only cost $560 to ship my 2000 Intrepid from Ontario down here! :P
We do get h****..that Intrepid would have cost me about 900-1000 bucks dest fee, yet where was it built? Windsor? That's about a 5 hour drive from here.
They may be saving in numerous ways for assembly in Mexico, but they are just passing on the extra distance shipping costs to us all..US and Cda. It seems absurd to me that rail from Mexico should cost more than ship from the EU.
They may be saving in numerous ways for assembly in Mexico, but they are just passing on the extra distance shipping costs to us all..US and Cda. It seems absurd to me that rail from Mexico should cost more than ship from the EU.
The destination charges on the Monroney sticker only cover transport within North America. Ocean shipment of imports is built into the price of the car.
BTW - the price is the same no matter where the vehicle is shipped to. An Accord shipped to Illinois is charged the same as an Accord shipped to Florida.
All of the areas of customer satisfaction are targeted in the survey and here is what the Managing Director of ACSI had to say when asked "what is the relative importance of the car itself (quality, reliability, styling, features,...) vs. dealer experience (purchase, service) vs. price?"
Research shows that it's vehicle quality first, then price, then lastly the dealer experience. This makes sense because for the most part the three facets of experiences also rank the same way in order of duration. In other words, the car is what the customer experiences on a daily basis throughout the life of the purchase, in many cases several years. The price may or may not involve financing, which has its own duration, often not the length of ownership of the vehicle, but a significant period of time nonetheless, reminding the owner of the cost.
The dealer experience is the most fleeting of the different elements--by definition it actually precedes the period of ownership of the vehicle as it comprises the exploratory and purchase experience, after which, apart from the occasional service experience, it simply does not factor much into the ownership experience post-purchase. This is the nature of durables products experiences, which by definition have long timeframes of ownership. By contrast, the shopping/purchase elements become much more important to the overall experience with retail, for instance, where one shops the same grocer or general merchandise store regularly and encounters service as part of each experience.
The American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) is the most well known national customer satisfaction index model, a type of economic indicator that assesses the overall satisfaction of consumers in a country. The ACSI is compiled by the National Quality Research Center (NQRC) at the University of Michigan. While intended as a macroeconomic measure of U.S. consumers in general, many corporations have used it to measure the satisfaction of their own customers.
The heart of the American Customer Satisfaction Index is a set of three questions that assess satisfaction, each on a different 10-point scale:
Some organizations normalize and average the three ratings, like this:
This produces an overall score from 0 to 100 that can be used as an approximate benchmark to industry results published by TheACSI.org.
The true ACSI customer-satisfaction score is a weighted average of the answers to each of these three questions, using a proprietary weight for each of the three questions, with different weighting schemes for different industries. For instance, overall satisfaction is typically given a higher weight than expectancy, which is given a slightly higher weight than performance. The State of Ohio uses the following weights:
If you want the precise results for your industry, you will want to commission a custom ACSI research program with ACSI, for $50,000; this will include the precise question wording and survey methodology used for gathering the benchmark data. Otherwise the above question phrasing and calculation can be used for a Do-It-Yourself customer-satisfaction index and benchmark.
I have to laugh when folks here say how noisy and thrashy it is. If they ever drove one even fifteen miles, they'd come away with a different opinion. Seriously.
I'll say that the tires on our '09 are noisier than those on my '08. I bought the same replacement Goodyears that were OEM on the XFE model Cobalt which is what my '08 is. Decent wear and very quiet even as they wear. The '09 has pretty new tires but are low-buck Firestone models.
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I haven't driven or even been in a cobalt. But CR and almost every mag has mentioned nasty engine noise on a cobalt. I know a late model Cavalier was definitely a thrash box and I hated driving it. But I really can't comment on a cobalt except for the dopey styling.
Detroit just doesn't seem to me at least to build any really great 4 bangers. I've driven them from all three and haven't liked a D3 4 cyl drive train yet. I don't really understand why not. Or maybe they do overseas and just cut corners here? I think if you go domestic you want a 6 or 8 cylinder vehicle.
My favorite Asian cars in the looks department were the '02 Altima, and I believe the late '80's Maxima--simple, gently rounded styling with one big taillight across the back (or at least one big red lens). There was one in a pearlescent white where I used to work, and believe it or not, it turned my head as did that first "new" Altima.
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Comments
"Earned it" is subjective at best. The rest, I will just hold back, just saying it might be hard to embrace theories from some backgrounds.
More results of 30 years of trickle down/job creator lies
We can agree to disagree. Time is valuable and less driving to a filling station and pumping gas is that much more time you have, whether for more work or time with the family.
As an aside, I saw some emotorcons for a brief shining moment, then they vanished, as if a force of emotorcondylitis took hold again and scores of emotorcons were silenced...
The claims...deceptive or dishonest, fits well with a certain coddled demographic who aren't answering to anything right now as they make out better than at any time since the days of Gatsby.
I haven't seen emotorcons for a week or more. However, the old fashioned manual way still works. I hope Edmunds isn't paying much for support.
The emotorcons were briefly here yesterday and still are around if you aren't doing a reply. They are at the top of the post box now though.
And you can hand type them and they'll show up. :-) :sick:
Circlew,
According to the USA Today article dated 8-27-13 "this survey was conducted on random phone interviews of 4078 consumers."
No mention is made of the age of the vehicles etc. This important because most Korean vehicles on the road are newer on average than domestic vehicles or Toyota or Honda. When was the last time you have seen 12-15 year old Korean car on the road?
I stand by my comment that the survey is virtually worthless.
The customers of 20 automotive brands were randomly seleted but 20 brands were covered.
-The ACSI has close to two decades of experience analyzing customer satisfaction with foreign and domestic automobile manufacturers serving the U.S. consumer market. Each year, the ACSI interviews hundreds of customers about recent experiences with their chosen vehicle.
The customer survey data serve as inputs to ACSI’s proprietary model, which embeds customer satisfaction within a series of cause-and-effect relationships. Key metrics include customer expectations, customer perceptions about the value and quality of their actual experiences, customer complaints, and customer retention.-
Both GM and Chrysler show mixed results in 2013, with two of three brands suffering downturns in customer satisfaction. For GM, both Buick and Chevrolet drop 6% compared to the prior year. The loss for Chevrolet places it in a tie for last with Chrysler’s Dodge, down 2% to 79. Chrysler’s Jeep retreats as well, down 4% to 80, but the Chrysler nameplate rebounds 6% to 83.
towed more
better mpgs
larger cargo bed
more payload capacity
lowest step in height
easiest tailgate operation
Comes in an even more efficient V6 alum 4.3 with 295 HP and 290 ft-lbs.
Compared to government accounting it is downright transparent!
That said, I didn't even bother to drive the Silverado. I looked at an LTZ and sat inside and it just wasn't for me. Not to mention every truck on the lot had 3.08 gears which are completely useless for towing. If that's how GM gets better gas mileage, no thanks.
No question the Ram's weakest area is towing/hauling, but what I tow and haul is well within the Ram's capabilities.
IMO, among the big 3, there is not a bad choice for a pickup, it simply depends on what you like and what your needs are.
I will say, I find it a bit amusing that some of the GM faithful are bragging about CR's high ratings of GM vehicles of late, yet completely disregarded CR's credibility when GM vehicles used to score poorly.
-The August 2013 ACSI report on automobiles is based on interviews
with 4,078 customers, chosen at random and contacted via telephone and email between April 6 and May 22, 2013. Customers are asked to evaluate their recent purchase and experiences with automobiles manufactured by the largest companies in terms of market share, plus an aggregate category consisting of “all other” and thus smaller auto nameplates.
The survey data are used as inputs to ACSI’s cause-and-effect econometric model, which estimates customer satisfaction as the result of the survey - measured inputs of customer expectations, perceptions of quality, and perceptions of value. The ACSI model, in turn, links customer satisfaction with the survey - measured outcomes of customer complaints and customer loyalty. ACSI subscribers receive confidential industry - competitive and best - in - class data on all modeled variables and customer experience benchmarks.-
Similarly, I find it amusing when CR loyalists only mention their surveys but say nothing when a GM vehicle does very well in their tests.
I only reply to stuff here (much of it ridiculous; current respondee excluded). It's not the GM loyalists who start a post here with "Man, anything Toyota/Honda/Kia makes is a POS. I've never so much as sat in one, but that's the truth!". Or "I counted ten Chevrolets stranded alongside the road today on the way to work." LOL
(The only car I saw along the road this past weekend was a Camry...but it was an old one, no fair I know.
I do find it amusing that the first-year Cobalt is considered more reliable by CR than subsequent years. That sure is conventional thinking, isn't it?
BTW, very happy with my new, used purchase...high value quotient for sure.
Back to CR--this is more of an editing issue, but their 2013 Used Car Buying Guide links the Buick LeSabre and Lucerne together, but they only list the reliability chart for the '03-05 Le Sabre...absolutely nothing for the Lucerne. Same with the Venture and Uplander...there's the chart for the Venture; nothing for the Uplander. Duh.
Your vote will always go one way regardless.
Captain of Cool:
I was ready to ask how your Cobalt bargain is going. You've answered that. The Cobalts on car lots are always priced up by a lot. Since you've bought yours, I did more looking on the online trading sites.
>"Man, anything Toyota/Honda/Kia makes is a POS.
Strange with all the ridicule of GM and Cobalts, that they are worth a lot on the used car lots. Seems like a lot of hypocrisy sitting there in the past with all the examples of how awful things were with GM. Guess they forgot the awful HyKia junk for years, only emboldening the buyers by offering a nontransferable 100000 mile warranty to buy them in. Reality is slowly coming home with the newer GM offerings as they can slowly afford to change their models.
>CR--this is more of an editing issue, but their 2013 Used Car Buying Guide links the Buick LeSabre and Lucerne together,
Just shows how naive CR is, or at worst, how they intentionally intend to mislead people with their slick. The leSabre is one car; the Lucerne to me was 3 different cars depending on the model chosen. I did not trade my leSabre for one when it was due for trade. I'm still driving it.
I looked at a Cadenza to see what HyKia was calling upline. Talk about earrings and lipstick on a pig; it looks like an Optima that went to a makeover beauty picture studio for glamour shots. Still looks like an Optima. The salesman was practically pulling my suspenders to pull me back so I wouldn't leave and I' let him sell me one of the 3 base models they were stuck with. I wonder how CR rates the Cadenza? They should have called it the parenthesis.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
You certainly have to admit, that press release you posted leaves most every question unanswered.
He wouldn't answer specific questions I emailed him...I did email him a total of four times, as I'd keep thinking of things I wanted to ask...specific things. His reply was "I told you it's in good shape and maintained by fleet and GM standards." After my last email, he said, "I don't think you should buy this car". Normally I'd have said 's**** you', but I figured the auction had no reserve and ended on a weekday afternoon, good for me. I didn't have to like the guy to buy the car.
When I picked the car up, he had the wrong title, and the car had 6K more miles than advertised. I got money back from him on that. We drove the car home without the title anyway and he overnighted it to us later in the week, and we paid for the car (after deposit) after we got the title.
I will say, he trailered the car to OH for me, which I genuinely appreciated, and did it at no charge.
So yesterday I popped into see a few Rams. There was a 2014 3.6, 8 sp, 4x4, 8' box, aluminum wheels, fr and rr chrome bumpers (really poor quality appearance-wise...who knows how long it will last) cloth seat and carpet floor. Price was just over 37k including 1695. destination fee from Mexico. With tax that truck was 41900. ! We're talking a very very VERY plain truck here. How plain? Well it had wind up windows, so..
So I went in to ask one of the salesmen when the diesel was due here. He said he didn't think till NEXT year.
So I looked in a few windows of the majority of Rams they had there. 90% were 1/2 tons, all equipped with crew cab, short box 4x4, Hemi's, 8 sp and pretty well equipped. Prices ranged from 56 to 59k. Yup near 60 THOUSAND dollars. 67800. with tax. So then a bit farther up on the hill were the 2500's with the Cummins diesels. Some were north of 70000 thousand dollars. With tax, 79100 bucks. For a lousy pick up truck!
The 60k 1/2 tons were Laramies...but not all...there were some 55- 56k ones that still weren't Laramies. The interior of the Laramie did look really nice. I thought of dieselone's new Laramie and his comment about the interior. I also am really curious what HE paid in the US for his.
When I commented to the salesman that that basic white 4x4 V6 being over 37k was ridiculous, he said that there was over 7000. discount and that the near 60k ones had 12-15k off that. I thought to myself, well big deal, still absurdly overpriced...no wonder their profit margin is so high on p/ups. He said that he does get frustrated with some customers that chose to go to the US to buy and endure all the hoops necessary to go that route.
I think Chrysler is making a huge mistake by having such inflated window sticker prices. There will be the odd farmer/contractor who doesn't do internet or TV ads, and see that price with his wife window shopping on a Sunday afternoon, and simply say to themselves that they couldn't possibly get into a new p/u. If they knew that that 37k might get down to at least 30k (34k including tax), they might be able to buy it with the money garnered from the sale of their first born..
And manually lower their window to wave goodbye to the dealership when leaving for home.
Well I have been on both sides of this in the past. I could picture you having that affect on me too, depending of course on just how those 4 particular emails went. Keep in mind that he already was pricing the car WELL below mkt. He took off an ADDITIONAL 500 bucks for the quoted mileage mistake, AND he transported the car at his own expense a good distance to accommodate you.
And for his trouble while you mention you appreciated that, you still called him a jerk.
It sounds like you really did get a steal, so I'm a bit surprised you have anything negative to recall at all about the deal overall much less call the poor guy (who obviously musta been in a financial distress situation) a jerk.
My 2014 listed for something like $49,600 or so. Basically, I got $5k off of that and they showed me $10k for my '07 Expedition with 129k miles on it and in what I'd consider rough (well used) condition. Probably could have gotten a better deal if I'd shopped around more, but honestly, I don't have the patience for that.
No way would I want to pay $10K to 15K more for the same vehicle. That seems steep to me. Heck, it was steep enough as it is.
And for his trouble while you mention you appreciated that, you still called him a jerk. "
My guess is the seller likely wasn't thrilled with the sales price. But that's his problem not Uplanders.
Looks like you have a beautiful truck though. And the mileage you are getting is truly impressive at 70 mph. Around here I do mostly 50 to 60. For interest's sake, and to show how our mileage rating stickers are out to lunch, they said 22 city and 33 hwy for the 3.6 and 8 sp 4x4. So 20% less than that of course on your gallon. I figure you are getting...was it 30 I think? our gallon at 70. And our tests never go 70, I think at best they touch 68 momentarily but spend the vast amt of time at 54 - 55. So that 33 seems possible in summer temps.
As for options. On top of what comes standard on a Laramie, I have leather bucket seats and rear heated seats, convenience group, trailer tow group, power sun roof, 32 gallon tank, Uconnect 8.4AN, parksense, and remote start.
Looks like hwy mileage is staying in the 20-22mpg range if I stay under 70 mph. I've already put 1,100 miles on it and am averaging about 15 mpg overall which is right at the city rating. That is probably 2-3 mpg better than my Expedition would have returned. Will know more with the next fill up and a hand calculation to see how accurate the computer is.
And to say, "I don't think you should buy the car" is ridiculous.
I wonder if he really didn't wish to sell the car at no reserve.
He has a fleet of 30 Cobalts and mine was the first, so I don't think he was a down-on-his-luck guy. I think he wasn't a 'dot the i and cross the t' kind of guy.
And to bring the wrong title..come on, that's a thirty-second check before you leave home.
That said, I'd suggest anyone looking for a second car to watch his ads for the other Cobalts he said he'd be selling.
Bottom line, the domestics lost ground from last year, particularly Chevy.
As dieselone mentions (and what I was alluding to) I think he was less than thrilled for the low price he was selling at. His choice tho..
I have still never eBay'd. I would like to though...just have never yet made an acct.
It seems like a terrific venue for potential deals. The honour system part of it I find a bit mind-blowing.. on one hand re-assuring..but mind-blowing at the same time.
However, I bought a Studebaker that had been on eBay but didn't meet the seller's reserve. I bought it outside of eBay, afterwards. That was a nightmare. He said "I'd drive the car from Wisconsin to Ohio". When the car came to me, off the trailer, I wouldn't have driven it ten miles someplace. He also stopped photos just short of significant rust perforation. I learned not to take sellers at total face value after that sale. I resold the car a year later to a collector in Australia, after sending him over 60 pics including all the bad areas.
I guess taxes are part of the killer there. What percentage would that be, anyway?! Here in Maryland, we pay 6% when we buy a car. And they tax rebates, too. I remember the tax on my 2012 was something like $1347, which would work out to a purchase price of $22,450.
Oh, and to ship that sucker from Mexico up here to DC was "only" $995! I remember it only cost $560 to ship my 2000 Intrepid from Ontario down here! :P
We do get h****..that Intrepid would have cost me about 900-1000 bucks dest fee, yet where was it built? Windsor? That's about a 5 hour drive from here.
They may be saving in numerous ways for assembly in Mexico, but they are just passing on the extra distance shipping costs to us all..US and Cda. It seems absurd to me that rail from Mexico should cost more than ship from the EU.
The destination charges on the Monroney sticker only cover transport within North America. Ocean shipment of imports is built into the price of the car.
BTW - the price is the same no matter where the vehicle is shipped to. An Accord shipped to Illinois is charged the same as an Accord shipped to Florida.
All of the areas of customer satisfaction are targeted in the survey and here is what the Managing Director of ACSI had to say when asked "what is the relative importance of the car itself (quality, reliability, styling, features,...) vs. dealer experience (purchase, service) vs. price?"
Research shows that it's vehicle quality first, then price, then lastly the dealer experience. This makes sense because for the most part the three facets of experiences also rank the same way in order of duration. In other words, the car is what the customer experiences on a daily basis throughout the life of the purchase, in many cases several years. The price may or may not involve financing, which has its own duration, often not the length of ownership of the vehicle, but a significant period of time nonetheless, reminding the owner of the cost.
The dealer experience is the most fleeting of the different elements--by definition it actually precedes the period of ownership of the vehicle as it comprises the exploratory and purchase experience, after which, apart from the occasional service experience, it simply does not factor much into the ownership experience post-purchase. This is the nature of durables products experiences, which by definition have long timeframes of ownership. By contrast, the shopping/purchase elements become much more important to the overall experience with retail, for instance, where one shops the same grocer or general merchandise store regularly and encounters service as part of each experience.
The American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) is the most well known national customer satisfaction index model, a type of economic indicator that assesses the overall satisfaction of consumers in a country. The ACSI is compiled by the National Quality Research Center (NQRC) at the University of Michigan. While intended as a macroeconomic measure of U.S. consumers in general, many corporations have used it to measure the satisfaction of their own customers.
The heart of the American Customer Satisfaction Index is a set of three questions that assess satisfaction, each on a different 10-point scale:
Some organizations normalize and average the three ratings, like this:
(Satisfaction + Expectancy + Performance - 3) / 27 * 100
This produces an overall score from 0 to 100 that can be used as an approximate benchmark to industry results published by TheACSI.org.
The true ACSI customer-satisfaction score is a weighted average of the answers to each of these three questions, using a proprietary weight for each of the three questions, with different weighting schemes for different industries. For instance, overall satisfaction is typically given a higher weight than expectancy, which is given a slightly higher weight than performance. The State of Ohio uses the following weights:
((Satisfaction-1)*.3885 + (Expectancy-1)*.3190 + (Performance-1)*.2925) / 9 * 100
If you want the precise results for your industry, you will want to commission a custom ACSI research program with ACSI, for $50,000; this will include the precise question wording and survey methodology used for gathering the benchmark data. Otherwise the above question phrasing and calculation can be used for a Do-It-Yourself customer-satisfaction index and benchmark.
I still think it's interesting to note a less-than-ten-percent difference between Chevrolet (low-priced) versus Mercedes-Benz.
Nice response, but doesn't really address dieselone's original comment, which was legitimate.
Ex. The Cobalt scores well for reliability, but CR doesn't have much nice to say about it overall other than it's average in the compact space.
I'll say that the tires on our '09 are noisier than those on my '08. I bought the same replacement Goodyears that were OEM on the XFE model Cobalt which is what my '08 is. Decent wear and very quiet even as they wear. The '09 has pretty new tires but are low-buck Firestone models.
At least it avoids the 'insectoid' look (credit to lemko for that but I know exactly what he means!).
Agree on many Asian cars looking insectoid. Although IMHO the previous-gen Civic was a very handsome car and not insect at all.
Well, go back to the English dubbed B grade Japanese Sci-Fi films in the 50's and early 60's!