Hi everyone, I live in Greece and I have a problem with my Fiat Grande Punto, which I bought new in March 2008. It has done 32,000 kilometres and has been regularly serviced. Coming home from work yesterday, after driving 20 kilometres, we stopped for 5 minutes to buy bread, and the car refused to restart.
It only made a very weak whirring sound. A car mechanic friend came and took a look at it and diagnosed dead battery. We managed to jump start it and get it the 300 metres home but now it does not start. Surely if there was a problem with the battery, the car would not have started in the morning when we left for work, or it would have stalled before starting. Or it would not have started before leaving for home, after having been parked for 5 hours. The car has never had any problems starting. This just happened suddenly. The only other things that have happened are that the parking sensor only beeps when it feels like it, and that recently the seat belt beeper has not been functioning. I have called Fiat Service and we are taking it in on Tuesday but I just wanted to hear if anyone has any ideas? Any comments would be welcome. Thanks.

Could be the alternator is not charging the battery. A simple test with a multimeter could help here. Start with checking the battery connections - a simple check here could save a red face and a bill at the dealer.