cpapashley said:
Amen to that Seacam,
I think I feel the same way just with the terrible petrol engine in the original Carnival/Sedona downunder was such a debacle that it is going to take a while to move back to them.
Interesting article today in the Newspaper, stating how KIA sales have gone down.....Just seems to me if you shoot your customers in the foot is it any wonder customers don't come back....
Kia's Board of Directors decided to provide 10 year 100,000 miles warranty in 1998; thereafter, Kia sufferred with lots of repairing cost, but the manufacturing were able to catch those frequently happened problems and correct them.
In 2002, when I was looking to buy a new van, I search thru 14 available van in the US, and JD Power ranked Kia Sedona 2002 and Honda Odyssey number 1, so I started shopping for these two models.
Somehow, Honda Odyssey had a policy not to have too many vans available at dealer and need to order (in computer, it is called "page fault", the main memory does not have the program page to run when need to and need to go to disk to fetch over, the performace will drop an order of magniture). Japnese cars had this "just in time" inventory, and that's why I tried to avoid since my last Nissan Van of 1994. Why? too many "page faults". e.g. I got my left side mirror hit at NYC Chinatown that year, then went to Nissan Dealer, no part, come next time, and the 2nd time I went, sorry, ordered wrong side, come again next week. So, I decided not to go Nissan Dealer any more. "Just in Time inventory" causes all these problems; they may save car dealers, but cost customers a lot. However, the parts is NOT cheap. e.g. my auto insurance of Kia Sedona 2002 EX is much lower than my Nissan Quest 1994, and I have found out both Nissan and Mitsubishi parts are much more expensive, and therefore auto insurance.
However, Kia Sedona 2002 EX had many ready to drive home at dealer, so I just bought a Kia, and in 10 minutes. I was even able to pick a color WHITE, at no extra cost, which is normally not true for other brands. Why "white"? According to Austrilia research, color white is the safest color of any car, the darker the more dangerous, given the car accident data for past 20 years. And this also translate to your higher auto insurance implicitly. Kia auto insurance is low because fewer accidents, and when involved, less likely to have injury nor deadly injury.
I think I made an educated decision, my Kia Sedona 2002 EX has been wonderful for 70,000 miles, besides I paid $10,000 less for this van than Honda Odyssey 2002. Even if I trade in now, the gap between two Vans would be smaller than $10,000; that is to say, mine with less depreciation, not to mention my $10,000 CD has been generating interest to cover my maintenance cost.
So, if I would buy a used Kia, I believe Kia on 2002 or newer should be very reliable like my Kia Sedona 2002 EX. That is to say I would keep my Kia for many years to come as I did with my Toyota Corolla 1990 and Nissan Quest 1994.
As to the sales, I just checked
Fobes and saw Kia in fact had sales up in July 2007
I did not use Kia Customer Service much, in fact, I only called twice for the same instance, and I would give the lady 100 points or an A+. I called in and roadside service showed up in 20 minutes; I did not have my Kia series number, but the nice lady on the other end found it for me. I did not know the address where I was but just saw a starbuck and cross street, and the lady found the address for roadside servcie for me.
I am not quite sure other place, but we are at New Jersey of USA, so, at least, Kia Customer Service in this area is fine.