I have seen this print ad earlier. GM India’s head striking a pose and promising to the car buying public, guaranteeing certain maximum maintenance expenditure otherwise they will refund the excess spending, though last time they had an Indian President and Managing Director.

It struck me as funny that time too but didn’t have enough time to actually analyse the thing. Now that I am out in the market looking for a new car, I have given it some thought and here are my conclusions.

The ad promises maximum maintenance expenditure for 5 different models over a period of 3 years

Spark                          Rs. 12999.00             *approx = 13000.00

Aveo – UVA               Rs. 14999.00             *approx = 15000.00

Aveo                           Rs. 15999.00             *approx = 16000.00

Optra Magnum          Rs. 17999.00             *approx = 18000.00 

SRV (Petrol)              Rs. 17999.00             *approx = 18000.00

* approximate figures are my own.

The company still believes in optical illusions which makes 12999.00 appear as 12000.00 to people like us with deep pockets but shallow brains, but that is a different point altogether.

In fine print the ad also mentions that the expenditure does not cover accidents, natural disaster, racings, tyres, batteries etc…standard list of disclaimers that any self respecting company gives. 

Anybody who has kept a tab on maintenance expenditure should know that the maximum maintenance expenditures excluding the disclaimed list mentioned are too high. I have been running my 7 year old fiat palio and after 7 years it has yet to run up a maintenance expenditure of more than Rs. 2 -3 thousand in any given year, other than the disclaimed list of course.

Can you imagine a new vehicle like let us say Aveo- UVA running up a maintenance bill of Rs. 15000.00 in three years.  The company’s marketing honchos have in the same ad mentioned that the vehicles are covered by a 3 years/  100000 kilometre warranty.

Note that both the warranty and maintenance expenditure promise are for 3 years and run concurrently.

This leads me to wonder whether.

1.  Warranty does NOT cover anything so in spite of such a generous policy you can still run up a bill of Rs. 15000.00 in 3 years??

2.  The car is so shoddily built that it needs maintenance to the tune of 15000.0 other than what is already disclaimed and other than what is covered by warranty??

  

So what are they trying to accomplish here?? They have promised something, which they know will never happen so they will never need to pay, so without paying they can bask in the glory appearing to be such a caring company, a company confident about the quality of its products.

If what they say is true and you actually need to spend say somewhere around Rs. 14999.00 on maintaining an Aveo-UVA (other than disclaimed list), while the warranty is also running, then God help them and the poor guy who fell for the promise.

When will these guys grow up and get over the fine print and convoluted logic and promises, which don’t mean anything other than showing lack of ethics, knowledge, education and basic human decency? I wonder if they thought that a nice white American face promising us the sky will make us dance with joy and queue up at the nearest GM showroom.

Frankly they don’t have bad cars. I loved their Opel Astra and my friends who have bought Aveo are also happy, but get over it, come with something new and honest.

We have a rabbit at home. He is called, quite naturally Bunny. We got him by accident.

We already had a tortoise, which is a very low maintenance pet, as in it eats and sleeps in hidden corners and does its things out of sight. We call it (we don’t know its gender) Tooky 2. 2, because this was our second tortoise. The earlier one was called simply Tooky. It was the sprightliest and restless tortoise I have ever seen. We used to leave it around in the house and it would roam around nooks and crannies exploring things. One day when we were having a siesta, it climbed right on top of me without me feeling a thing. Since it was a curious one, it found an open door one day and made a run for it. It was never seen again.

So hoping that our second one will turn out like Tooky 1, we got another tortoise. This one was a total disappointment. It doesn’t move around. If we leave it alone, it will go into one corner and stays there for hours altogether, until we take it out for feeding. Tooky 1 used to eat out hands. Tooky 2 is very shy.

We needed something more energetic. This was the accident.

We just went out for a ride and passed a row of pet shops. My wife instantly fell in love with one chestnut coloured rabbit who was sitting nonchalantly a bit away from others, who were clambering on one another to get to a small bowl of food. I was totally opposed to having rabbits as a pet. I have grown up with dogs and I know they can be disciplined and they show affection and respond to simple commands. But rabbits I thought were dumb animals grown mostly for food here in Kerala, they smell a lot and create a lot of waste.  I could not convince my wife, since she was already in love.

Anyway we brought it home. Initially we thought it’s a girl bunny and used to refer her as such. First few days went in experimenting and searching the net about rearing bunnies. Finally by trial and error we came to know that she loves cabbage, carrots and grass. Initially we kept her in a large cardboard carton, which she promptly started jumping out of. She loved marking her territory, in and around the house using both liquids and solids at her disposal. Liquids we used to clean up quickly as it would start smelling, but solids were slightly difficult as they have a tendency to roll and get into unreachable corners.

Bunny was cute but was difficult to love as she didn’t respond to us like a dog or a cat does. She will sleep and eat. If you let her out she will make a beeline for the most chewable objects like wires, hanging linen etc. Then she will go around decorating the house. I hated her initially, chewing the modem wire, mouse wire, mobile charger wires and then I found that my wife will not clean up after her, so that came on my head too.

She was growing bigger and was regularly out of her cardboard box. We thought she needed some containment and brought her a large cage which was padded with old newspapers and wherein she could lie and eat and use one corner as a toilet. This was a very comfortable arrangement for us. She could not get out and all her waste was collected in the cage which we used to clean up once a day.

One day my wife decided that she was smelling quite bad and decided to give her a bath. The moment she got wet, she revealed her true identity and turned into a boy rabbit. All this while her (now his) secrets were hidden under his dense undercoat.  

This came as quite a shock to us but we decided to continue with the name Bunny.

So that is how Bunny was revealed; in a bath.

Bunny has been with us now far the last 6 months and over the period he has grown on me and changed all my perceptions about rabbits. Of course they are not likes dogs or cats, but they are smart and engaging in their own way. They are highly gregarious hence they love company and hate to be left alone, except when they wants to eat or sleep.

Bunny stays in his cage most of time, eating and sleeping, except in the evenings when he is let out in the yard to get some fresh air. Yard is his favourite place where he loves to jump around and frolic for no apparent reason. He also loves to nibble at different plants that grow in the yard. Other time he is let out is after we have had our dinner. Rabbits are the worst beggars, even worse than dogs. We cannot eat in peace if he is out at that time.

He just loves to run around the place with a few high and long jumps thrown in between. His favourite game is to jump over me, climb up, give a little bite, a little scratch and run before I can catch him. He can repeat this ad-nauseum, unless I catch him and start stroking his ears

He loves to be stroked and groomed, especially on the ears and the jowl. He loses control and goes into a virtual trance when we do this. He is very fair when it comes to mutual grooming. He can almost time it to perfection. If I stroke him for 2 mins, he will lick back my hand for almost 2 mins exactly, and then he will become restless again for more stroking. He has a very small and very hot tongue, which he uses liberally, though he does not slobber like a dog, neither is he rough as a cat. He will intersperse his licks with small nips here and there.

After all the grooming and biting is over he loves to just lie by my side with his back comfortably resting against me. He does this only with me and not my wife. Probably because I feed him and rarely chase him away from the kitchen.

He has also developed good toilet habits. Once out of the cage he will go straight to his bathroom and do his things in one corner and come out. I was surprised at the sheer amount of urine this 1.5 Kg being can carry. Sometimes he will get into his ‘marking rage’ and will try to make his marks by dropping little puddles everywhere, especially where we sit. But I forgive him his rages, for the sheer joy of watching him do his things, eating, sleeping, jumping around, grooming himself or just plain lying around. There is so much innocence and gentleness about him. His eyes are his most attractive feature, all round, deep and soulful.

Of course he is very soft and very warm, which make him all the more loveable. He hates to be picked up. He is I think afraid of the heights or the vertigo that he experiences when I put him down.

He is fastidiously groomed. Even though he sleeps near his own pee and potty, he never smells bad. He will spend hours licking himself thoroughly, even his ears. He will lick his paw to make them wet and then roll them over his ears.

 The joy of having Bunny is watching him, more than cuddling or petting him. He does not obey, he does not sit or roll when we tell him to. Sometimes he pees whenever he wants, wherever he wants. He plays when he wants, rests when he wants, but there is an air of dignity about him, with which goes about his business of life, an air of superiority by which he has accepted us as part of his burrow.

Normally I do not approve of starting another column with same topic, but here I would like to make an exception.

As I came back from work I found my wife happily going through my blog and sniggering away at something that somebody had responded to. On closer inspection it turned out that my earlier column has been noticed by the Whirlpool guys and here was no less than Customer Care head responding to my small column.

 He writes, “Dear Customer, Could you please let me know your name and telephone number so that we can arrange to address your complaint asap. Thanks!”. 

Anybody who has gone through the previous article will immediately know that the events in question have already happened and the refrigerator in question has also been repaired. But here is this highly educated gentleman who refuses to understand that. I do not blame him. He has probably tried to get the general idea of the nature of this useless column by reading the first few lines and concluded that it’s a complaint as usual….Ha how boring!!…why don’t people die before they complain……. He probably is heading the ‘Customer Care’ department, which is understaffed, overworked and underpaid and simply does not have the time to go through the full 1000 words.

Anyway he is apparently quite powerful as I received no less than 4 calls one after the other starting from bottom to the top man, the head of Customer Care of Kerala itself. It was fun to listen to their polite concern about the general health of my refrigerator and whether it has affected my emotional balance.

Apparently none of them had read the full article and were groping in dark what was actually that I had written and where. It seems Delhi did not send in the complete picture.

Anyway if they had actually intended to do something about it they should have responded to my Complaint posted on their website 2 months back or at least installed telephones that go to somebody’s desk.

So this is the end…..my friends of the whirlpool story. Let me pick some other ‘Customer is the King/ queen’ company to bash next time.

  

I was on a lookout for a new refrigerator as my old one was proving to be too small. So we decided to purchase a bigger model and promptly decided to make use of Onam season discount sales that we have here in Kerala.

Since Whirlpool is a highly advertsied brand  and we liked the looks and the price so we brought it home.

It was working very nicely for a week then suddenly one day the door hinge broke. I mean the DOOR HINGE, not anything even remotely high tech such as a compressor or the condensor. I would have felt better had some technology gone phut on me. No here was a measly door hinge.

Anyway I promptly called up the service franchisee here in Kottayam and they promptly sent a person to check up who promptly informed me that the spare hinge is not available and it will take 20 days to recieve it. I blew my top but since I am inept in Malayalam abuses I could not convey my true feelings. In present age of overnight couriers it is funny that a spare part should take 20 days to come from anywhere.

I decided to send a feedback directly to Whirlpool India and called up their Gurgaon numbers mentioned on the warranty card. I got sick of calling but I could not even manage to get an operator. I went high-tech and opened their website and lo and behold, they had a consumer feedback and complaints form, which I filled up and submitted with a lot of anxiety. As was expected I did not recieve any reply and am still waiting.

Anyway I was now totally on edge and decided to take up the matters locally and called up the service franchisee and poured all the venom I could manage in English and Hindi. He understood that if nothing is done he will face a court case and will get beaten up.

Next day the service fellow sent the spare, but which he did not fix properly, so that cool air was leaking between door and body. Again after some bouts of shouting, the fellow came again and refixed it, this time correctly.

So after suffering 4 days with a broken Refrigerator, I had my peace of mind.

Not attending to complaints and giving all sorts of excuses may be an indian trait, where consumer rights movement is not very active. But an american multi-national ignoring such a thing is a bit too much. They would have had to probably pay compensation to the customer for causing injury in US or Europe. I should have filed the case but I decided to save my 500 Rs. and some court time, the lazy bum that I am.

Probably they spend so much money on advertisements, branding  and salaries of their fat executives that nothing is left after that to do customer service.

Conclusion : Do not buy a whirlpool Refrigerator. At least if you are in India.

You can also read the second part of the experience here

UpDate : Inbetween the same door hinge broke again. And on 23.08.2008 the same door hinge broke again for a third time.

Arsenal is the best team in the premiership. For once we have a team in EPL that plays with the flair of the Brazilians, without too much fuss about style and selflessness and precision of the Germans. Otherwise till four years back when Arsene Wenger’ efforts started bearing fruit, EPL was mostly watching burly guys trying to push each other off the ball.

Arsenal has refreshed English footfall and turned the tables on people who thought bending like Beckham was the best thing you can do to a football. Now you have diminutive guys like Hleb and Rosicky scooting past large bodies in their path.

Only concern is their goal scoring ability. Many a times they are the better team but are coming of with silly draws at the very last moment. All praise to them for not loosing cool till the last moment, but why not convert some chances. Again they have started relying too much on one person, which is Fabregas, like last year when Henry used to score most of their goals

Of course as a ‘keyboard’ player, manager and a very active fan I am well within my rights to comment on how they should play.

The General has done it again, his second coup. For a country used to martial law and presidents wearing uniforms the reaction has been startling to say the least. We have these lawyers, judges, educated middle class and chic women dressed in equally fashionable hijabs hurling stones at police and army. In fact in most of the coverage on international TV you see only the intelligentsia of the country taking to the streets. Poor and generally downtrodden types are conspicuous by their absence or have they resigned themselves to their fate, which will remain the same, whoever is in the government?

A cynic that I am would think that the protests are stage managed and meant to give post General mileage to the protesting high heeled guys. But keeping that aside I really admire the zeal with which the educated middle class, the professionals, who would think ten times about getting their hands dirty, people who would carry on with the business trying to ‘Manage’, finding a middle path,  have come out enmass to protest against the General’s high handedness.

Actually General did this at a wrong time. I think Pakistanis have evolved. They got an education, have travelled, are on the net and learnt about the world more than Mullahs would allow them to, right under the noses of the Military-Mullah combine.

Compare this to Indian intelligentsia, educated middle class, Business class and professionals. Comfortably going about the business and even profiting from the rank corruption that is pervading our daily lives. Not a day passes when I do not see an instance of somebody making a quick buck out of somebody else’s misery. We are no better than a dictatorship or maybe a dictatorship of say something like Old Iraq, Cuba or even China is better than the stifling polity that we call democracy. The whole thing has become an ugly symbiosis of sorts. You scratch mine and I’ll Scratch yours.

A doctor who overcharges and over-prescribes is happy to pay a politician or a babu to get his measly clinic certified as a research centre. A businessman who has never paid any taxes is also too happy pay police to lathi charge his own workers. Not to speak of politicians, who it seems were born without souls. Corrupt lawyers, judges, babus, police, even some in the army….where does it all end. When was the last time we saw educated middle class protest against anything other than price rise?

Why should I blame others when I myself belong to the same group?

This column is about how to get more mileage out of your Fiat Palio. Why Fiat Palio. Because I have one and I have perfected the art of getting Maximum mileage out of the machine. The tips here apply to most other Indian Cars also.

Fiat Palio in India is a much maligned model. To top its gas guzzling reputation the dealers and company left the customers in a lurch. Last year I read a news article in which the head of Fiat India was proudly announcing launch of online spare parts ordering system, wherein the dealers can go online and order the spares. They can also check a VOR (Vehicle Off Road) button and spares will be despatched on priority. The cynic in me didn’t fail to notice that why allow vehicles go off road in first place. It’s a shame that a vehicle of such calibre as Fiat Palio is allowed to remain off road as some Italian clowns didn’t have time to maintain adequate inventories. OK Fiat bashing is besides the point which can become a topic for another article.

You would like to ask how much mileage I am getting in a 1.2 ELPS (petrol) , model which is marketed in India. I am managing 15 Km/ Ltr on mixed roads, which includes bit of city, bit of open highway and bit of hilly roads with AC on 50% of the time. My Palio has been delivering this ever since I am running her. This is very much contrary to the general feedback that I have from people that they are barely able to get 10 or 12. Recently my father-in-law drove my car and he could barely manage 9.

What’s the secret? It is all very simple actually….. First you must know your vehicle.

Fiat is a very spirited vehicle and if you are bit heavy on the A pedal then the motor just revs on and begs to go faster.

You do not notice speed because of excellent noise damping, suspension and body work which does not shake or rattle as you rev up the vehicle, and you do not hear the engine until you have already burnt a lot of gas. Rarely any of us see the tachometer (which is the rev-counter).

 So if you desire higher mileage then you must learn & practice as I have done. These can be applied to almost all the vehicles.

1. Do other things that they routinely tell you. Maintain good air pressure, service regularly, keep all fluids topped up and use good petrol. If possible us ones with cleaning additives.

2. Learn to be one with the vehicle, which is a slightly Zen concept, but just learn to feel the vibrations. Cars communicate through subtle vibrations through steering, seat & pedals etc. It is always not possible to check on the meters regularly.

3. Starting up : DO not press the accelerator pedal while starting, which is a hangover for us middle aged drivers who have grown up on Carburetted engines. The fiat and most other vehicles have MPFI engines, which do not need pedal pressing while starting.

4. After putting the vehicle into first gear, let in the clutch gently, feel it bite the drive train. Press the A pedal gently only when the clutch is fully engaged. Most cars including fiat are sufficiently powerful to take on the vehicle load without accelerating in 1^st gear.

5. Move into 2^nd gear quickly at about 10 kmph

6. Move to 3^rd at about 30 kmph

7. Move to 4^th at about 40 kmph

8. Drive in 5^th gear at all speeds beyond 50 kmph. Almost all cars including  the humble Maruti Alto, is able to pull from this speed upwards in 5^th gear.

9. Off course you may not be the first one of the block on a red light, but that’s not our aim here.

10. Switch on the AC once you have driven for about 2 mins.

11. In heavy traffic I generally put my vehicle in 1^st gear and allow it to coast with the pace of traffic without touching the accelerator. If required I coast in 2nd gear.Fial Palio can take this load with full AC. But it requires a gentle pedal if you are staring from stop with AC on.

12. While changing down shift from 5^th to 4^th only when you reach 40 kmph, 4^th to 3^rd at 30 kmph, 3^rd to 2^nd at 20 kmph, In a moving vehicle 1^st gear would be required only if you are slower than 10 kmph.

13. While driving uphill increase your gear changing speeds by 5 kmph to take care of momentum loss due to gradient. Mostly it will be very difficult to pull any decent gradient in anything more than 3^rd gear. DO not try to drive at 60 to 70 in 5^th gear at a gradient in full throttle. The vehicle might climb but after burning huge quantity of gas. As a thumb rule if you need to open more than 20% of  the throttle then shift down into lower gear. The vehicle is very comfortable at these speeds without any unusual strain, vibrations or noise.

14. I have specifically not given any speed limits as the Palio and most vehicles easily reach above 80 kmph with barely 20% open throttle. But off course it is alway better to stick to the lower limit of the top gear speeds for best efficiency.

15. Someone might follow the speed  limits in each gear but still get less mileage. The key is acceleration. As a rule of thumb in normal driving do not open more than 20% of the throttle in normal driving. Allow the vehicle to gently accelerate to the indicated speed and then change up. Cruise with maximum 20% throttle, which is sufficient for 80 to 90 kmph on a decent road.

16. You can also open full and reach the indicated speeds faster but will also burn a lot of gas in the process.

17. Also there are other things such as anticipate your traffic and braking and drive accordingly. Don’t be surprised. Surprise leads to abrupt accelerations and braking which lead to excess fuel burnt.

18. For example if you are approaching dense traffic , let go of the pedal and coast to slower speeds and the drive on rather than running with throttle pressed till last moment, then slamming the brakes and again accelerating hard out of the traffic.

To sum it up the key is not low speeds, you can easily cruise at 80, 90 or 100 and still get good mileage provided you reach that speed gently without pushing too hard. In palio it is very difficult to know when you are pushing too hard because it is never too hard. You always want to go faster and the vehicle allows you to, without a hiccup or a stray sound. Key as I said before is to learn to listen with your hands and feet and your bums as you car tells you its time to shift up.

So drive gently and intelligently and see you mileage figures change. In the process you can also help cut on green house gasses emmision and pollution.

So Finally I am here, my first blog. It will take me some time to get used to the technicalities but I hope it will be worth it. Heard about it a lot, people say that you can let other people peep into your head without ever knocking up a publisher. Great…I have high hopes from this.

Hope some day far far away  they will dig up the fossilised wordpress server and I’ll be there to tell how it was.