[Mike]

As of today (at least) there is a delivery hold on all PacHy's. I went to see my dealer about our sold order (from Feb 16th) which hasn't yet been delivered and was last shown as being in-transit and offloaded from a train in Montreal. That was 2 weeks ago and Montreal is only 2 hours away if you drive slowly so we went in to see what was going on with our very expensive vehicle.

It turns out that today the dealers in Ontario (and as far as California) were told to stop all deliveries and even take back delivered vans if possible from customers (good luck with that!). No one knows why - or at least those who do aren't telling - and no one knows for how long. As of today all vans on lots or in transit are to be held.

I'm thinking this doesn't sound good. It seems to me to be highly unusual for a company to release something like this and then implement a stop order with no explanation. Someone may want to tip off the media to investigate this whole thing since I doubt any of us will get very much out of FCA on our own.

 

[Neogeo]

That's some weird stuff going on. I already got mine tinted and clear bra installed. On top of that I got the extended warranty. Now we may be facing a possible recall. I have bought quite a few cars in my life and this has got to be the most traumatic experience.

But, so far, the van has been great and can't comprehend what could be the issue.

 

[Bluesfox]

Well given that there were at least 2-3 posts on here about hybrid vehicles becoming completely disabled while on the road (requiring a tow truck!?), it is not surprising to hear that something requires adjustment. Pretty serious scenario.
Hope they can get the issue sorted quickly. If this is the reason why the ship hold, then glad to know that the CEO has a conscience and is doing the right thing. One can only speculate until a clear official announcement, but if these user accounts are accurate then it ought to be a contributing factor.

 

[OCPacifica]

What will they give me in place of it? A gas model? Once you go plug-in Hybrid you can't go back.

 

[RobbW]

We bought our PacHy from dealer stock on May 1. I just sent off an email this morning to our salesperson and just about everyone else at the dealership asking if there is something I need to be concerned about with my vehicle. I told them I have a long road trip planned for this coming weekend and need to know if there is any reason I should not be driving it. No response yet, but I don't know that the dealership has even opened for business yet. I'll post if I hear anything back. We haven't had any problems with our PacHy yet, and it has been nothing but a joy to drive, so far. I just hope this is not something that will prevent us from driving our PacHy, or worse yet, have it taken from us!

 

[TMaclay]

We bought our PacHy from dealer stock on May 1. I just sent off an email this morning to our salesperson and just about everyone else at the dealership asking if there is something I need to be concerned about with my vehicle. I told them I have a long road trip planned for this coming weekend and need to know if there is any reason I should not be driving it. No response yet, but I don't know that the dealership has even opened for business yet. I'll post if I hear anything back. We haven't had any problems with our PacHy yet, and it has been nothing but a joy to drive, so far. I just hope this is not something that will prevent us from driving our PacHy, or worse yet, have it taken from us!

I did 312 mile round trip on May 7 with mine. No problems at all and very smooth & comfortable + 32.5 MPG in hybrid while moving along 55-70 MPH. The trip monitor claimed a max of 80 and it is so smooth you'll really want to watch the speed. I've since set the Nav to alert me when I'm 5 mph over the speed limit and it does this even when Nav isn't in use. (Note: I'm still looking for the voice of Sister Mary Elephant to prank the grandkids). If you haven't activated Uconnect and (I think) Sirius traffic, doing so will facilitate the Nav display showing traffic congestion/stops on major roads with the red/yellow/green lines as Google Maps does.

The only odd thing I noticed was the cooling fans in the engine compartment don't like to run at constant speed so you hear them revving up/down as you're cruising along. It was 65 Deg F outside so no A/C was running to cause this. I like to think I'm pretty steady on the throttle but putting it on cruise control steadies out the fans somewhat. Have a safe trip.

 

[RobbW]

The only odd thing I noticed was the cooling fans in the engine compartment don't like to run at constant speed so you hear them revving up/down as you're cruising along. It was 65 Deg F outside so no A/C was running to cause this. I like to think I'm pretty steady on the throttle but putting it on cruise control steadies out the fans somewhat. Have a safe trip.

The other day, I had noticed the odd sound of fans running in the cabin. I had my climate control turned off. So, I couldn't for the life of me figure out what was causing the noise. At one point, we were parked at a supermarket parking lot while my wife ran in to pick something up real quick. I noticed in the top margin of the nav screen this tiny icon that looked like a seat with a fan over it. I tapped it and it brought up the climate control screen with buttons for the ventilated seats. I didn't even realize this was a feature my new PacHy had! Apparently I must have accidentally tapped the ventilated seats option on the screen while trying to fuss with something or other on my iPhone that is mounted in the vent right next to the screen. Once I turned off the ventilated seat, the fan noise stopped.

 

[RobbW]

This is the response I received this morning from our dealership/salesperson:

Robb,

To be honest, I have not head of any of this and we are still selling them too. I think that you will be ok.

I hope you enjoy your trip.

Thank you,
Chris Olson


Unless FCA just hasn't gotten the hold info out to all dealerships, it sounds like it might be a localized hold on Ontario dealerships and possibly a few in California. Anyone know for sure if this hold has been implemented at dealerships outside of these two states/provinces?

 

[busterwhat]

Waiting for mine. Delivery got stopped. Sales person said there are instances of the car not going into park. Chrysler is holding all deliveries until the issue is resolved. Not cool.

 

[Mike]

So far here's what we know:

Sales and deliveries have stopped in at least Ontario and California.

The stop applies to all sales and in-transit vehicles which means you can't purchase one or order one, and even if you have ordered/purchased one they can't actually give it to you.

We don't know why. We don't know for how long.

Even if it just applies just to Ontario and California (the two biggest markets in their respective countries) it would have to be something pretty major to stop all deliveries and sales. A minor problem would be a recall like the strut issue and they would simply deliver the van and have people come back to get it repaired, or have it repaired at the dealerships before delivery.

The fact that there has been no communication on any of this suggests they either don't know what the problem is, they don't have a fix for it yet if they do know what the problem is, or the problem and fix are too major for dealerships to handle in their repair bays.

There are an alarming number of issues popping up on the forums but that could just be a sampling bias as people are more likely to complain if there's a problem than if they are happy. Still, there aren't that many members and they haven't built that many PacHy's yet so the failure rate seems to be worse than 3.4 failures per million vehicles (aka Six Sigma).

Great. Now SiriusXM just called to congratulate us on our new PacHY. The clock on our 1 year free trial has apparently been running since May 4th, and we now have no delivery in sight. Just great.

 

[RobbW]

Following up. I had a live chat with FCA Customer Care. I can copy/paste the chat transcript if anyone really insists. However, the gist of the chat is that FCA (at least Customer Care) is not aware of any safety-related hold on the PacHy. They said there is currently a hold on the shipping of the Pacifica Hybrid, but it is not a safety concern for me or my vehicle. After relaying that I have a long road trip coming up this weekend, the rep stated, "There is no reason why you should not be driving your Pacifica, if your vehicle was unsafe to drive Chrysler would notify you immediately! Your safety is our priority!"

At this point, I am going to take them at their word and continue my plans for the road trip this weekend. I'm beginning to think there may have been some miscommunication or an error in interpretation of the shipping hold, and speculation may have gotten out of hand. Until such a time that a significant safety issue has been demonstrated for the Hybrid model as a whole (as opposed to a couple one-off incidents), I will continue to enjoy driving my PacHy in peace!

 

[chrissbu]

I just spoke with my dealer, and while mine continues to suffer on a shipping hold (released to shipping on 4/26), he has not received any notifications of any stop sales or holds en masse. I'm in western NY.

 

[OCPacifica]

I was planning to go somewhere for Memorial Day Weekend (maybe Vegas), so it would nice to know if I'm going to get stuck in the middle of the desert waiting for a tow truck.

 

[tslice98]

Confirming a large shipment of PacHys made it to the rail yard in Benicia (SF Bay Area) on Friday & they all are being held there, with a delivery date of TBD. The dealership I ordered from has 8 PacHys currently being held there. They have no idea why.

 

[Mike]

I just did a post in the 'Canadian Delivery Problems' thread but basically someone from Sergio Marchionne's office called us today (my wife emailed them yesterday to complain) and they know nothing of the hold. So the a bunch of dealers around the province are finding out about a hold from their regional reps and the CEO's office says they know nothing about it...interesting. A second dealer here in Ottawa also knew nothing about the hold. Very strange. Needless to say, I don't care if there is or isn't a hold, I just want my van. If there is a hold someone needs to communicate why and for how long. If there isn't one someone needs to get in a truck, drive to Montreal and bring my van here. It's been sitting in the train yard there for two weeks now and it's only a two hour drive away. This isn't rocket surgery.

How can a company that has been doing a thing for around a hundred years be so terrible at doing that thing!? Seriously! I'm so fed up right now.

 

[OCPacifica]

This is so weird.

While I'm hoping there isn't an issue, if there is, those of us who already own and are driving a PacHy around need to know what is going on so that we can be safe.

I really was planning a Memorial Day trip but I don't want to use the PacHy if there is a chance we could be stranded somewhere.

 

[RobbW]

This is so weird.

While I'm hoping there isn't an issue, if there is, those of us who already own and are driving a PacHy around need to know what is going on so that we can be safe.

I really was planning a Memorial Day trip but I don't want to use the PacHy if there is a chance we could be stranded somewhere.

I have a long road trip this weekend. After speaking with FCA Customer Care, I'm fairly confident there is nothing I need to worry about and, therefore, and still going ahead with my plans. Viva la weekend!!!

 

[adamtopher]

There was a long shipment hold on many of these vehicles in March and they eventually released a batch of them in April. A lot of this seems like FUD. Our PacHy is doing great albeit only a 500 miles so far.

Could be another hold for inspections similar to the last batch.

 

[ninocalifa]

My situation is even worse. I see the car in the dealer's lot but they won't give it to me. I am starting to reconsider this purchase. very close to giving up.

 

[chrissbu]

There was a long shipment hold on many of these vehicles in March and they eventually released a batch of them in April. A lot of this seems like FUD. Our PacHy is doing great albeit only a 500 miles so far.

Could be another hold for inspections similar to the last batch.

Back in March, though, the vehicles were remaining in JS status. Mine was built on 4/10, and still wound up getting put into JS status for 2 weeks before going to KZ, so at some point, at least, they were doing an extended QA hold fresh out of the factory. From my understanding, as soon as they go to KZ and a window sticker is generated, the dealers are invoiced for them, and they're in the hands of the shippers. All of the ones I've seen for the past few weeks in Chrysler's inventory that show up as "In Transit" have a KZL status (released, not shipped). Mine is in KZR status, which my dealer (who's been doing this for 25 years) had never once seen before...that one just says "Arriving at the dealer in a few days." Well, that showed up on 4/28, and it's been in that status ever since. After a couple of weeks, he pressured the regional rep a bit, and they said that they made some calls and were able to get our van "hot tagged," which we were told to mean that it would get some priority, as they believed it was just stuck in the storage lot behind other vehicles. The next day, the status changed to "Unofficial hold: quality audit." And now we've been in that status since May 10.

So a variety of claims of the root cause, but at the end of the day, it seems like there's a very small group at Chrysler that actually knows what is going on, and that's not being communicated out to the Chrysler Cares teams, the regional reps, the dealerships, or even the CEO's communication team.