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Toyota - the world’s leading manufacturer of boring vehicles - is succumbing to its own bullshit in a scary parallel. Cue George Orwell, because the company no longer even calls those who buy its cars ‘customers’:
“Our guests know that Toyota will look after them and the overwhelming feedback we get on a recall of any major proportion is largely a big thank you from our guests for acting so quickly on an issue.”
Sean Hanley - Toyota behavioural apologist and sales and marketing wonk, towing the company line in respect of a recent recall
'Our guests’ - allow me to retort: If I buy something from you, I’m not a guest; I’m a customer. Legislation is ushered in to confirm my commercial status.
So, I will not be downgraded to ‘guest’ by Toyota because of some social justice bullshit. I’ll remain here in ‘business class’ and be a customer,.
Toyota spent recent years stonewalling on the issue of the DPF design fiasco in 2.8 diesel Hilux, Fortuner and Prado.
Toyota sicced its arsehole in-house lawyers onto a comparatively anorexic business - Berrimah Diesel - for the venial sin of commenting negatively on Facebook. A typical malignant non-specific arsehole corporate lawyer empty threat.
Customers… Sorry: ‘guests’ - are having their ‘unbreakable’ Hiluxes break all over the former convict paradise, and Toyota’s response is to re-enacting The Emperor’s New Clothes. This is how the cake of bullshit gets baked.
Glaciers advance faster than the fix for the actual DPF issue. You are forced to return to the dealer many times, before they will install a manual DPF burn-off switch.
Perhaps the most under-done engineering Band-Aid I have ever seen. I really don’t see how this in any way addresses the fundamental underlying hardware deficiency.
The Big T says - it’s all fixed now. Gotta keep shifting those new Toyotas.
“Through all our learnings of previous-generation diesel technology, we believe that with the new vehicles and the manual burn-off switch, the communication with our customers - what DPF represents, how it works, what to look for, the support that we provide - we believe it is fixed.” - Sean Hanley
How the fuck is this is a belief issue? ‘We believe it’s fixed.’ There’s no epistemic dimension to fixing a design deficiency. It’s not a matter of belief. Either it’s fixed or it’s not. It’s an entirely ontological proposition.
This is an especially shifty sounding and clever thing to say.
Because beliefs are disposable - you can bin them, any time. If you believe it’s fixed and it’s not, you just change beliefs, and get back to bullshitting.
This engine is also too easily ‘dusted’. A euphemism for the incursion of dust past the air filter, where it forces the vehicle into ‘limp’ mode.
The mouthpiece says only 0.2 per cent of 170,000 vehicles have been ‘dusted’.
Mr Hanley went on to explain (if that’s the right word) that this dusting business happens only in (quote-unquote) “extreme conditions” - as if this is in some way acceptable.
Perhaps we should not forget we’re talking about filtering dust from air in a pipe.
Dust is easy to arrange. Air filter integrity is easy to test. The fact that dust gets past 0.2 per cent of Hilux air filters is a design disgrace. The actual defect rate is of course much higher because many Hiluxes are never tested by entering extremely dusty environments.
“If we think and believe there’s any risk we would initiate an immediate recall.” - Sean Hanley
Sorry, but that too just seems like epic bullshit. Of course there’s friggin’ risk. What undertaking lacks (quote-unquote) ‘any risk’? And ‘belief’? Please.
PS - it’s not just about risk and safety. There’s a consumer law dimension to these defects that you are apparently just not addressing - and unfortunately, it seems, journalists no longer have the smarts and/or the stones, to call you on it.
How about this instead: When you’re talking to a journalist, about sensitive issues, you’re really talking to your fake guests and prospective fake guests. So make accurate statements which reflect known facts and positive actions being taken to resolve the problems.
Toyota’s goodwill is in flames, and it seems nobody is yet reaching for an extinguisher. All they have to do is admit problems, address them fast, and be honest. It doesn’t sound that hard, but it is.
The worst thing about Toyota’s bullshit is that they’ve apparently started to believe it internally - perhaps because it’s more compelling and palatable than the facts, which are that their engineering integrity and internal validation processes are slipping.
If you’ve ever wondered why I don’t gush about Toyota, this is it.
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