Citing customers getting irritated and frustrated by the performance of its Power Shift dual clutch transmission, Ford is trying to earn back the trust of its customers by initiating a set of “customer satisfaction actions” on models equipped with the DPS6 transmission built since the second half of 2015.
The move comes a month after The Detroit Free Press’s expose that showed that the American carmaker knew about the transmission’s defects even before the Focus and Fiesta hit the market. In order to appease their customers, Ford will extend the clutch warranty on certain 2014-2016 model year vehicles and reimburse repair costs that would have been covered by the warranty extension.
Applicable only to Ford Focus and Fiesta owners in the U.S.A., Ford will extend the warranty of its dual-clutch transmission from the current 5 years / 60,000 miles to 7 years / 100,000 miles. Additionally, they will reimburse customers who have paid for clutch repairs out of pocket. The initiative covers the 2014-2016 Focus built from July 4, 2013 to November 5, 2015 and the 2014-2015 Fiesta built from July 4, 2013 to October 15, 2014.
Furthermore, Ford will once again reach out to customers who haven’t had their transmission software updated. The update provides an enhanced warning if a transmission control module begins to fail. Where necessary, Ford will also replace the affected module for up to 6 months even if their warranties have expired.
With this corrective action, Ford is confident that Focus and Fiesta owners will have “transmissions that perform well and have competitive levels of customer satisfaction.”
While this results in a somewhat happy ending for irate Focus and Fiesta owners in the United States, there is still no indication whether other markets such as the Philippines will initiate a similar move. It’s worth noting though that the carmaker has already been levied a record fine in Australia and lost a class-action lawsuit in Thailand.
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