Our Jetta
Today I was perusing website so I could price the cost of a new O2 sensor for our Jetta. We’re not 100% sure that’s the problem, but I wanted to be prepared for the cost in case that is the problem. Over the five years we’ve (my husband and I) owned the Jetta (a 2001 Jetta GLS) the problems we have encountered have been numerous, and VW has been less than helpful. My friends can attest to the number of times I have complained about the car, warned them never to buy a VW and wondered how my 95 Geo Metro has had less problems than our nice, fancy VW. Anyway - as I am perusing I stumble onto consumeraffairs.com. Intrigued, I go to the site to find a list of complaints about Jettas. To give an indication of just how long this list is, look at the bar that allows a person navigate up and down on a site. Mine’s not too small since I have not posted too much. The bar on the consumer affairs site was very small. I spent close to 30 minutes to an hour reading through everything (and I’m pretty fast reader). I was astonished at just how bad a car Volkswagen makes. I had thought, for the past five years, that we just got a bad car, or a lemon (although it didn’t qualify as such under state laws). But apparently VWs=lemons. I was quite surprised. It’s supposed to be such a nice, classy car - but it’s just junk dressed up nicely.
For the past hour I’ve been dreaming of class action suits and buying a billboard in various states with warnings to never buy a VW. I’ve thought of email campaigns to warn people not to buy a VW. And then it occurred to me - VW doesn’t care about their customers. Various times on the C.A. site it was mentioned that the VW company did nothing (neither did the dealerships). I even sent a letter to their headquarters expressing my displeasure with my car - they never responded. Of course, if I made such shoddy cars, I wouldn’t want to own up to it either. In the end though, it all boils down to the almighty dollar. How does the consumer make VW suffer for their bad cars? Obviously by never buying another one. It’s a matter of getting the word out. Perhaps I should buy a billboard or start a mass email campaign. But I fear that too many people have been sold by the classy look and only realize too late the feces that lie beneath.