Consumer NZ’s latest survey has ranked Ford as the least reliable car brand among respondents.
The survey, which gathered feedback from 5,791 car owners, asked participants to report any faults they had experienced with their vehicles and to rate their overall satisfaction.
According to the findings, the Ford Escape and Ford Focus recorded the highest number of major and serious faults. These models also had lower satisfaction levels, particularly regarding ongoing maintenance and repairs.
Focus was discontinued last year, while the Escape has also been withdrawn from the New Zealand market. The survey found that Ford vehicles commonly experienced issues related to engines, transmissions, and electrical systems.
Report author Bryan Wall said that most products, including cars, are built within budget constraints, meaning some components are likely to fail over time.
“Cars are subject to quite a lot of stress and strain on the road, high speeds and so on, so parts are going to fail eventually. It just depends on which parts fail that deems how reliable a car is,” Wall explained.
“If it’s a major failure, say a water pump, and it’s expensive, then it’s going to be deemed a less reliable vehicle.”
The Volkswagen Tiguan ranked as the next least reliable vehicle in the survey.
Nearly half of respondents reported experiencing a fault during their period of ownership, with a quarter of those faults classified as major.
Wall said these results were not unexpected.
“One of the cars I’ve actually got myself is the Volkswagen Tiguan, and we’ve had issues with them. I think the design of these vehicles is great – you’ll see there’s two sides to the survey.”
“There’s a reliability and a satisfaction score, so you find the two are certainly interrelated; if you’ve got an unreliable vehicle, you’re generally going to be unsatisfied.
“However, there are certain vehicles where people actually really like them, and they’ll keep putting money into them and repairing them. The Tiguan is one of those. It’s a really good vehicle to drive. It’s got all the bells and whistles, but it’s got this strange unreliability part to it.”
Wall added that repair costs are largely determined by parts and labour. He said he’s curious to see how electric vehicles will hold up over time.
“We’re seeing a lot of EVs that people are really, really happy with at the moment because the maintenance on these is essentially quite minimal, really, compared to an internal combustion engine.”
“It’s generally software issues that have to be updated and so on to fix problems.”