Swift build issues

In 2002 we brought a 6 month old Swift 480SE, 1 minor problem in 7 years, In 2016 brought a new Swift Conquer 480 with the HT body shell, again only 1 minor problem fixed under warranty.

Our dealers are Salop Leisure Shrewsbury excellent dealer PDI excellent of which we were supplied with a video. The salesman George Harris carefully went through the process, none of the usually high pressure, checking we are happy.

Salop provide site facilities to enable you to get use to your caravan , there is an engineer on site in case of problem. George Harris even popped up I his own time to see how we were getting on.

Salop also insist on returning the caravan within the first 30 days for re-inspection, advising to give the caravan some hard use, it only on use do problem really show up.

Would we recommend and buy another Swift yes, would we recommend using a good dealer yes.

The build quality of cars has improved over the years because of the way they are built, on a line and by machines and robotic assembly.

MHs and caravans are still, in the main, hand built by a mix of craftsmen and labourers.     I have talked to many dealers about all makes and they reckon they are all the same.

I am convinced that the most important thing in buying either is to ensure you have an excellent dealer who has an excellent workshop.

I bought a Sterling (Swift) Moonstone in year 2000 and had it 13 years and not on problem.   The next van was a Sterling Eccles in 2013 and in the first 15 months had around 12 issues.    All fixed very quickly and properly by my dealer.     I traded that van in for my current MH, a Swift. Collected MH on 2 March 2016 and returned it one week later with a leek in the roof area.    I believe that was a freak issue; it took over 2 weeks to find this pin-hole which was about 7m from where the water was coming in the inside of the van.   But the dealer did find it and fixed it.    22 months and 13,500 miles later and no other problems.   Quite happy with the MH and the move to the dark side!   

BillC

Poor quality and faults should not be tolerated.

Motorhomes are the same. Suppliers think if they ignore the problems they will go away.

THEY WILL NOT!. We have bought our LAST  because of problems.

We bought a new Swift van last year following good experience with 2 used Swift vans. The new van hasn’t been perfect with some faults that simply should not have passed QC and should not have been allowed out of the factory. insufficient sealant around the shower which lead to water pouring through the bathroom instead of down the plug hole, (other buyers have experienced same problem too) being the most concerning. It does make me cautious about our next van purchase, whenever that happens. My brother bought an Elddiss van at the same time which has been totally fault free. 

We are thinking of jumping ship the other way. Bought a brand new Lunar Cosmos in April 2017. What a disaster, thinking about a Swift Eccles. Wondering if I should really be returning to hotel holidays. So sad that the caravan industry lets itself down with such poor build quality. All we want is a relaxing hobby, but a large proportion of us buy into a whole load of life shortening hassle and worry. Why do we do it?

I advised some years ago now, when being told by a dealer friend of mine, manufacturers do not bother about such things as QC so much because they pay the dealers to PDI and put right any niggly faults found. This more than often is not done, the PDI on most new 'vans is done by the user on his/her first couple of outings with ( their hard earned ) new caravan. Some faults will be put right on site using screwdriver and pliers, others maybe major will be " Oh pop it back Mr Joe Soap we'll take a look at it ( when we have time! ) and if it's beyond us it could have to back to the manufacturer ".

People do not spend many thousands of pounds to be dealt this way.

Happy caravanning.

It seems that now Swift is earning the same type of reputation for poor build quality as Bailey. It's a shame, instead of a race to improve build quality there seems to be a race to the bottom.  Yes those caravans have all the bling, bells and whistles anybody could possible want, but that is no substitute for good honest build quality as seen in the better continental vans.  

K 

We picked up our brand new Swift Vouge 580 Sb from a dealer in Swindon,after being showed how everything worked we towed it home. Our first week away in it we started to discover problems,blind over bed would not close,bathroom door would jam shut,the top fridge grill on the outside fell off,the door would`nt shut properly,the lights flashed when the taps were turned off,some of the cub board doors were loose and not lined up,trim around the table unstuck and worse of all (after a couple of days of using the caravan) water running over the floor by the cooker that turned out to be the waste pipe from the sink was not connected properly and was told by the dealer that the pipe was to short. and the carpets were ruined.

We returned the caravan to the dealer to be fixed and after 2 weeks we went to pick it up and i was not happy with the work that they had done. Under the sink in the cupboard the simply cut the lino out with a Stanley knife to dry the floor and put the bit of lino back and ran some sealant around the outside. The dealer said that that was all they could do. When i got the caravan home i checked under the cupboard   in the bedroom with my damp meter and i got a very high reading of damp so i took the caravan back to the dealer again and was told that because my damp meter was not -industry standard the would`nt accept    my readings so they checked it with there damp meter and got a reading of 17%,i then asked the dealer to use the prongs on the damp meter as i had done with mine but he said Swift would not accept reading with prongs pressed into the floor because the lino gave a false reading so i pressed the prongs from the dealers damp meter into the floor and got a reading of 29% and the dealer sill said it was within limits. This is still on going and Swift have not committed yet and i have told Swift and the dealer that i want a replacement caravan or a refund because i did`nt buy a brand new caravan so i could have damp in the floor. I would be interested to hear from other people if they have had the same problems and were do i go from here.

Formally reject the caravan remembering that your contract of sale is with the dealer and not with Swift themselves. 

I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve posted this link on here which in itself is a sad reflection on the products of the caravan industry.

https://www.which.co.uk/consumer-rights/advice/how-to-reject-a-faulty-product-and-get-your-money-back

Towards the end of 2014, I had my heart set on a new Swift Elegance 630 - their top of the range van at £28k or thereabouts, a significant outlay.  Perhaps my expectations were too high, but when the dealer rang me to say that they had just collected one from the factory, I couldn't wait to go and see it in the flesh.

So, there I am inside this new flagship model.  I open one of the front drawers - and the front drops off.  Go to the kitchen window blind and it jams.  Tried to open the sliding wardrobe door - it wouldn't because it was catching on a screw head sticking up in the bottom track.  To make matters worse, exactly the same problems occurred with the equivalent Sterling model which was also on display.  Can you imagine going into a car dealership and finding similar faults on a car costing that amount?

Yes - all these issues could have been sorted by the dealer and were trivial, but what sort of a company allows their newly launched, top of the range product, to leave the factory in this state?

Needless to say, Swift did not get my business and despite all the 'Bailey bashing' on here, we bought a Barcelona.  I won't say that we haven't had a few minor warranty issues, but after three and a half years nothing has dropped off or broken and it certainly left the factory in a far better state than the Swift product did.

Whatever you buy in the caravan world is a lottery and it shouldn't be that way - not at the prices currently demanded.