And it will also need to be working correctly if returning a car at the end of a pcp or contract hire agreement, otherwise you could be hit with excess charges
. There's really no excuse for a FIAT dealer delivering a car with S/S not functioning correctly. If I were buying a new car today, I'd insist on an acceptance test drive at handover, and would refuse to accept it if the S/S wasn't working.
I agree that dealers should be making sure that things like stop-start are functioning correctly prior to handover. I also think they should make more effort to explain all the cars functions - from the questions asked on this forum, some dealers must be terrible in this respect. Trouble with stop-start is that to test it's functioning the battery would need to be fully charged, which when they've just come off a boat or from sitting at the docks for a couple of weeks they may not be. I can't see dealers putting batteries on charge before handover just to get them totally full enough for stop-start to kick in.
However, i'd like to see Fiat try & charge excess charges for stop-start not working at the end of a PCP agreement - it's one thing charging someone for dents & scratches, but if a cars electronic systems are dodgy then i can't see how the owner can be penalised unless they interfered with the electrics themselves (ie fitting a new stereo, home servicing etc).
There's no way i'd be paying any excess charges for something like dodgy stop-start.
As I've pointed out before you do have a couple of years of the initial warranty to get it sorted in.
It's a strange one, people are so used to technology which works the same each time you press the button or do whatever it is you do, to have a bit of technology that relies on so many different factors which can stop it working as the user might expect it to, though not necessarily as it should do is a strange one and I can see why people get frustrated.
Agreed. It's similar to the point i was trying to put across, that there are too many variables to determine for sure if the way a persons' stop-start is functioning is right or wrong. I dare say our stop-start stopping and then saying 'unavailable' & me needing to re-start with the ignition isn't 100% right, but it's done it once in 2000 miles & stop-start works the rest of the time, so in the grand scheme of things is it worth the hassle of driving the 2 hour round trip to the dealer? For me, no. It works roughly how it appears it should. It's a small car, with a small battery, with too many electronic bits to go wrong, so there's only so much someone can expect.
That's not to say the OP doesn't have a problem as i think their car sounds iffy, but some of the stop-start comments on FiatForum are just because people expect miracles & it's probably these same people that make a mountain out of a molehill & complain bitterly to the likes of DriverPower Survey saying their Fiat is an unreliable piece of junk just because the stop-start doesn't kick in when it should. All i can say is i wish my life was otherwise so hunky dory that i could afford to waste days worrying about whether some electronic trickery on my car is behaving 100% as it should.
Anyway rant over, and this is aimed collectively at those who go on and on about stop-start, not the OP as i do agree their seems to be a problem in the case of their car.