The cars’ faults were so bad one had its engine replaced three times, court hears

Mazda has been fined $11.5m by the Federal Court in a case brought by the ACCC against the carmaker for misleading owners about their consumer rights over their faulty cars.

The Mazda CX-3 was one of the models whose faults were extreme.

Mazda has been ordered by the Federal Court to pay an $11.5m fine after misleading nine customers about recurring and serious faults with their cars.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission lauded the win, after it first made the allegations in October 2019 that Mazda engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct, and made false or misleading representations to the customers about their consumer rights.

Mazda made 49 separate false or misleading representations to the nine consumers who experienced recurrent and serious faults with their cars within two years of purchase. It ignored requests for a refund or replacement and insisted the only option was repair, even though the cars had undergone multiple unsuccessful repair attempts.

According to the ACCC, the engine in one of the cars was replaced three times.

“All of the consumers were given the “run-around” by Mazda while it engaged in evasions and subterfuges, provided appalling customer service and failed to make any genuine attempt to consider and apply the consumer guarantee provisions of the Australian Consumer Law,” ACCC deputy chair Catriona Lowe said.

“If a vehicle cannot be repaired within a reasonable time, or at all, consumers have a right under the Australian Consumer Law to a refund or replacement, and we expect car manufacturers to honour those rights promptly and without misleading consumers.”

Mazda has been ordered to pay $82,000 total in compensation to some of the consumers. It consented to the order, and has agreed to pay a further $3000 in compensation per vehicle.

The Federal Court threw out an appeal made by Mazda in March, after the company lodged a legal challenge to the original court ruling it had made 49 false or misleading representations to consumers.

Federal Court judge David Callaghan dismissed the ACCC’s allegations Mazda engaged in unconscionable conduct in his judgment delivered in November 2021.

“I have formed the view that although Mazda’s conduct can accurately be characterised as … appalling customer service, and although customers were rightly frustrated at Mazda’s delays and excuses for not squarely addressing their complaints and their requests for a refund or replacement vehicle, Mazda’s conduct was not, in my view, to be characterised as unconscionable,” Justice Callaghan said.

The case involved seven different models: the Mazda 2, Mazda 6, Mazda CX-5, Mazda CX-5B, Mazda CX-3 and Mazda BT-50, bought between 2013 and 2017.