Car problems / recall material - manufacturer does not admit real fault

Good evening all,

I hope all of you are well. It will be a long post so please be patience.

I`m going through a bit of a rough one with my dad.

Long story short, he bought a car, brand new Ford Ecosport in May2019
In July 15 he took in under warranty for cold start problems. It would not start from the first turn of the key. Folks over there gave it back the same day with "no problems" detected.
24.07 took it again for the same problem. no information given on any status update, problems found etc

August - he sends a letter drawn up by an attorney at law notifying the dealership to fix the car in the next 5 days or give him his money back (15.600 euros paid in cash)
No response until the end of August when a letter is sent by a GM (mr .CVP) from Ford in which we are informed that the car is being worked on, have patience. No idea still about what is wrong, what they are looking at etc.
28.11.2019 after I contacted directly the nr.1 person in the plant we got an updated that the car was repaired. AFTER 4 monts.

Now we already have brought to court the manufacturer and the dealership by this point. Because the car presented a hidden fault. And according to the contract if it has a hidden fault contract becomes null. Plus that on the invoice sale the car is of an older date and a higher emissions number compared to the proforma invoice which states a newer less polluting car.

31.12.2019 - dealership delivers an internal memo send by the manufacturer which states that the Ecosport and another car line that has the same 1L ecoboost engine, are to be recalled ASAP without taking into account current service bookings to fix the "cold engine start problem"

10.04.2020 Ford delivers a note in court agreeing to pay the car in full and close the lawsuit (Did not happen)

More closer to present times, the car has been SORN (removed from circulation), keys and papers delivered back to the dealership and all their demands meet in what we thought would be the starting of the closure process. Did not happen .


At the moment the whole law suit is in the stage where we are asking them to show us proof of what the car had (they say it was a software issue and a software update fixed it). They brought an expert which claimed that all the problems were from the bad gas (funny how no other car has this).
We went against his statement as he clearly has no expertise in software related issues and eventually he declined his competency and is not part of the lawsuit.

Now, from my part, I have instructed the lawyer and my dad to ask for the root cause analysis findings and implementations. Because they use 8D documents, the CP should be updated, FMEA also etc etc.
The official response is that it is intellectual property and they don`t want to share it...
From my point of view the fault lies within the fuel pump system. But we will wait and see.
Since the engine is incapacitated because of this problem, does this not brake safety standards?
Do Ford not have to look into it "properly" and make sure that the problem gets fixed? and if so don`t they register this in the live documents? because I`m sure that all the documents that I modify and update on each customer complaint gets the same treatment over there.

What other things can I ask in regards to safety standards, safety regulations to be brought up?
Is there any regulatory body I can address this (We are talking about 2 carlines with this serious fault)?


Thanks

 

We did sue them. The legal lawsuit is over 1 years old. But, I work as a quality eng for some time now. I know the type of documentation that gets modified and the proof of the fault finding. I have requested CP, FMEA, 8D root cause findings to be brought forward. But they reject it as it is classed as intellectual property...

The engine fault covers critical safety issues. What other things I can call out in regards to safety critical components? I would like to press it home and put them in the spot light.

 

my brother is an attorney at law ..so we got that covered .. but the other taxes for the lawsuit have been a bit steep in some cases. plus the fact that you have your money blocked for the past 2+ years