Can Jeep succeed in Australia?
 

<p align="justify"><img src="https://img-s-msn-com.akamaized.net/tenant/amp/entityid/BBIL9ud.img?h=506&w=728&m=6&q=60&o=f&l=f" alt="Jeep compass Oz" width="235" height="150" hspace="10" border="0" align="left"/><strong>The Jeep Compass launched to the media this week in Australia and the brand is excited, but is Jeep doing the right things in Australia to win back trust?
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THE JEEP COMPASS was launched to the media this week, although it’s been on-sale since before Christmas. And while Jeep is excited by its all-new compact SUV, there’s still the lingering smell of consumer disappointment with poor servcing experience on other Jeep models and poor quality.

So, even before journalists got to turn a wheel on the new Compass, Guillaume Drelon, Head of Jeep Brand, Australia was in the firing line. Drelon has spoken in the past of Jeep’s efforts to improve the customer service experience and that he believes the quality of Jeep product has improved greatly… here’s how our quick Q&A went.

DM: How can you address customer dissatisfaction and poor public perception issues with the Jeep brand in Australia? It’s got to be more than just a five-year warranty and a There & Back guarantee?

GD: “You’re right. I think a five-year warranty is not enough. I mean that’s why we designed this package, not only a five-year warranty, we’ve got also the five-year capped-price servicing and the lifetime roadside assistance, which is a package that brings a lot of value and peace of mind.

“It’s still not enough; what we also do is work on the customer satisfaction. We’ve done massive actions to go back to our customers, fix the issues and make sure that we can properly take care of them, and that’s the strategy of the company.

“So it goes through how can we care properly for our customers, how can we provide the right product, the right price and the right service. It’s a journey, because we need to build that, we cannot build that overnight, so it’s something we are in the process of doing.

“We have done a lot of things, in terms of parts availability, in terms of customer training, aftersales training, and we’ve seen a big, big improvement in our customer satisfaction already, so I think it’s a very good sign, it’s very positive and that’s the trend we follow.”

DM: What about the vehicles themselves? Has there been a measurable quality improvement?

GD: “Yeah, totally. We see it through the number of recalls, the number of technical issues we might have and how quickly we can fix a car, so these are the metrics, more or less all the OEM stuff, and we are doing good, we are moving really in the right way.”

they have a long way to go with after sales service, parts availability and pricing of parts . That's why mine is serviced by my own mechanic

Yep talk is cheap, \\

They need to put the runs on the board first.

Yep, alternators spring to mind

FCA are still a long way from 2012 numbers when they were selling 1,200 JGC a month, surely they must know that consumers vote with their feet by now

They need to find dealers that have "it's a Jeep thing" mentality

Bob

And what did the Journo' expect him to say..... "no its all a big whitewash" ?

The public image problem will not be quickly solved by an advertising campaign, quality must improve, the dealers credibility restored and Jeep Australia and Jeep USA need to stop "F'ing" around customers.

None of these are quick fixes....... and I question if Jeep are more than superficially committed to the required changes. It took a total collapse in sales for them to even think about the problems..... if it wasn't for the scandals, ACCC legal actions, almost continuous bad press and effects on their bottom line they would have happily left all the problems unaddressed.

I love my Jeep...... when I'm not threatening to "burn" it - but currently I'd never buy another one unless things changed massively and over a number of years.

Exactly and with even more proprietary techno wizardry appearing in the coming models I can only see FCA's grip on its customers balls getting tighter. You have to ask yourself wtf is there intention with that front axle electronic disconnect, how can that be a better option than auto or manual hubs to deliver fuel savings. I see shit like that and think awesome my car is going to be locked up in the stealership for months on end and I'm going to have to have hundreds of conversations with someone there who probably doesn't even know what an axle is to try and get it resolved. No thanks

A typical Jeep lazy engineering fuel economy thing...... they used the identical mechanical system on another model and it wasn't a great concept ( the vacuum actuator was the final straw ) so use it on the JL as re-engineering the unit bearings for locking hubs is hard.

Hope its better sealed than the @#$%^ "SmartBar" you can speculate at how tightly it will be integrated into the vehicles electronics so a failure could be a showstopper. And replacement with a one piece axle will likely cause all manner of electronics challenges.

For a company that can't even design a clockspring, flatly denied it was an issue then fought tooth and nail against fixing it - more electronics is a big question mark.