Hyundai's Poor Design - Very Costly Damage!!!!

When my Plymouth broke down in the fall of 2006, my husband and I decided to buy a Hyundai. We really liked the warrenty and mileage guarentee that these cars had, so once again I was a proud owner of a Hyundai Elantra.

Little did I know what I was in store for.....In the 2 years that I have had this car, we have had it in the shop 7 times. The first time was because our city decided to repave the asphault in front of our home and the little rocks got stuck in the wheel bed. I was told that this is not covered by Hyundai's warrenty, since it was caused by something other then normal wear and tear.

The 2nd and 3rd times was because the air bag light and seat belt mechanisms were not working properly. This was covered under warrenty. The 4th-6th time was because my car kept "dying". The first 2 times I took it in the dealership insisted that there was nothing wrong with the car and that I was just leaving the lights on - hmmm ok. However on the 3rd time the dealership found that I had a bad alternator and battery so that was replaced. I had the car back 2 days when my seat belt indicator came on every 5seconds beaping as if I was driving without my belt on. So I took it back and what happened next is why I write this ridiculously long complaint. When I dropped my car off I had a cup of soda in the cup holder and 1 hour later I got a call from the service manager explaining to me that because I had a cup in my cup holder, and because there was 1/8 of an inch of liquid (which by the way was not seeping out, when the cup holder was lifted out) I was told that I somehow burnt out the wire harness for my entire airbag system, which by the way is directly under the cup holder and is not protected. But because this was caused by me using my cup holder, the warrenty would not cover the damage. Since Hyundai would not cover this under warrenty, the extra warrenty/car rental that we purchased would also not be availble to use. Fortunatly we have Full Coverage through Geico which water damage is covered under comprehensive and while we only have to pay the $250 deductible the complete damage total could have been very devastating to my family. We have at this point topped out at $9862.00 in damage and still not done, all because of a ridiculous design. I only say ridiculous design because if your gonna put a wire harness directly under anything it should not be a CUP HOLDER with EXPANDABLE sides to fit various sizes of cups, and if truly that is the only place in the care the wore harness can fit then common sense should tell them that it needs to be covered and protected.

When I contacted Hyundai Consumer board to complain all I got out were the words - what the heck is a cup holder for, if it is not for cups, and the CSR said let me guess "Your airbag wire harness has burnt out do to liquid seeping through the sides of your cup holder" I said yes how did you know, she then told me that they hear this complaint at least 15-20 times a day!!!! Until enough people complain Hyundai will not change this design. SHAME ON HYUNDAI for even allowing 1 person to experience this horryifying ordeal. My car has been in the shop for 16 days and as I stated before is still not done. Why so long you ask, because apparently I am not the only fool who did not ask for Hyundai to take apart the dash when I bought the car, to see what was under the the cup holder and I assumed that the center console with the 2 cup holders was actually to be used for cups, instead of being a pretty design, so since I was not the only one the parts needed to fix the problem are on backorder. This has been a complete nightmare and all Hyundai can say is that were sorry, but this was caused by human error.

If you Buy a Hyundai do not use the cup holder, do not clean the center console with a wet rag or with any kind of liquid, if you do you may be facing the same damage that I and others have gone through.