What a let down
that was. Your power has been
advertised recently all over the place as if you were some supernatural being who
could perform miracles for consumers.
The Times carried a whole page with your stern
looking image peering out of it and we were told, Ripped off? Fight back. Megan Power. Batting for you.
We were assured your Power Report in the Sunday Times each week would be championing our rights as consumers and exposing the bad.
Featured
this week it said, would be defective
new cars, shoddy repair jobs and appalling service.
All very impressive. People must have rushed out
to get the paper in which you were going to tell all about how you sorted out
these rip off artists in no uncertain terms.
Perhaps I’m being a bit naïve. I always thought
the main purpose of a consumer column was to ensure, as far a possible, that
consumers got justice. And with the huge circulation of a paper, like the Sunday Times behind you, suppliers would be more likely
to come to heal rather than risk further bad publicity.
But that means they have to fear being
named.
That brings me to that let down I mentioned in the
beginning.
Your first report after that massive promotion in
The Times (the Sunday
Time’s little sister) consisted of a litany of complaints against SA’s top car brands and leading dealerships and involve
new, and mostly very expensive cars.
After that build up complainants had every reason
to believe that your power would
result in having their problems sorted out.
They must have got a shock because all you did
was to list a dozen anonymous complaints about nameless vehicles and dealers. If
that’s all the power you’ve got you should team up with Eskom. It also specialises in keeping people in the dark.
You told us things like how dealerships had
reneged on promises to replace a R275 000
car, after it was stolen while in for servicing; damaged a car worth R250 000
while in for repair; driven a customer’s vehicle into another one while it was
being serviced and done a shoddy repair and
so on.
BUT NOBODY WAS NAMED AND
SHAMED, Megan.
I know you are only as powerful as the paper your
work for so I have to asked: Hasn't the Sunday Times got the guts to allow you to name all these dealers and top car brands?
Or is it that your power has been short circuited because your paper doesn’t want to
offend them in case they might cancel million rand, colour adverts in your
paper?
All you ended up doing was passing the buck. Your
article concluded by telling readers they could take their grievances to the Retail Motor Industry Organisation, but only if the
supplier is one of its members. Last time I contacted them I was told to pay a
fee of several hundred rand for the privileged of lodging my complaint.
You also suggested the Motor
Industry Ombud or the National Consumer
Commission and you added that patience
is required when dealing with these organisations.
That’s exactly why people contacted
you because they were hoping that the Sunday Times had the
power to help them quickly, especially as patience
is not a virtue that is easily cultivated when you haven’t got wheels.
Yours watchfully,
Jon, Consumer Watchdog and Poor Man’s Press
Ombudsman.
P.S. Please lodge this as a complaint.
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