Renault Australia forced to adopt three-year hot hatch warranty

‘Backwards step’ said to be a ‘directive from head office’.

David McCowen

23:2420 May 2018

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Renault Australia forced to adopt three-year hot hatch warranty

Renault Australia has defended a shift from five to three-year warranties for performance cars, saying the change was imposed by overseas management.

A spokeswoman for the brand says a change in consumer guarantees for the Clio RS and upcoming Megane RS was “a directive from head office”.

The manufacturer’s PR department also sent dealers a confidential bulletin surrounding the change instructing staff to tell customers the truncated warranty was “absolutely not” because “vehicles are unreliable and the warranty is costing head office too much money”.

The internal line is that “the change in Renault Sport warranty aligns us with global Renault Sport warranty policy”, going on to suggest salespeople inform customers “this new warranty is aligned with other competitors in the market place”.

But the latter point isn’t strictly true, as key hot hatch rivals such as the Ford Focus RS, Honda Civic Type R, Hyundai i30N and Peugeot 308 GTi are backed by five-year, unlimited-kilometre guarantees. Subaru’s WRX and STI duo are also currently on sale with five-year backing, but the popular Volkswagen Golf GTI and R feature three-year warranties.

Renault Sport owners reacted passionately to the change on bulletin boards, describing the decision variously as “woeful”, “not a good look”, a “backwards step”, “out of touch” and “a crock”.

The French marque's three-year, unlimited-kilometre guarantee will apply to the new Megane RS hatch, while the reborn Alpine A110 coupe gets less generous three-year, 100,000 kilometre backing. Other non-performance Renault vehicles retain five-year, unlimited-kilometre warranties.