Save money on petrol with these top tips for fuel-efficient driving and vehicle ownership. There are easy things you can do to spend less on fuel.
Motoring
Toyota, Ford and EVs headline car supply shortage
The great car shortage shows no signs of easing, with virtually all car companies facing extended delays on popular models.
The queue for the yet-to-launch Ford Ranger has blown out to as much as nine months, despite the car not yet being in dealerships.
Ford Australia has confirmed it already holds 17,000 orders for the new Ranger, which goes on sale next month.
The two most expensive versions, the Ranger Raptor (priced at $85,490 plus on-road costs) and $67,190 Ranger Wildtrak, have wait times of nine and eight months respectively.
The Ford Everest, which is a rugged SUV based on the Ranger platform, is also subject to lengthy delays.
Prospective owners of the top-spec Platinum version will be waiting for up to seven months.
The Ranger delays are symptomatic of an industry-wide inability to source vehicles.
Many car companies are now refusing to predict a delivery time, citing the “fluidity” of the global supply chain.
The standard approach has been to advise potential buyers to check with their local dealerships for stock availability.
One of the reasons for this is the dealers are shifting cars among themselves, so while a certain vehicle may not be available in Victoria, there may be a comparable model interstate that can be shipped in.
Hyundai is among many companies advising buyers that the delays won’t be as bad if they’re willing to negotiate on specification and colour.
The other phenomena is some vehicles are arriving in Australia with fewer features than they were originally advertised with.
This is a direct consequence of the semiconductor shortage and, while some companies have resisted de-specifying their cars, others have opted to do down that route.
Volkswagen Group PR manager Paul Pottinger says the issue will afflict the VW range in the forseeable future while chip stocks are still at a premium.
"With the VW Tiguan Allspace, for example, we had to choose between fitting matrix LED headlamps and delaying production or getting cars to Australia with regular LED headlamps. We've chosen the latter," Pottinger said.
Two-year wait for Kia EV6
Kia’s EV6 is one of many electric vehicles that are victims of their own popularity and limited supplies.
The annual allocation to Australia was initially set at 500 vehicles. The first batch sold out in weeks and Kia Australia managed to secure another 100 cars.
With an order bank of more than 1,500 wannabe owners, anyone putting their hand up today for an EV6 will be lucky to see it before 2024.
And it’s not just the EV6 that’s facing long delays: many of the company’s range have a backlog of orders waiting to be filled.
“It is difficult to estimate wait times as the production situation changes regularly along with the usual contributing variables of model, powertrain, trim etc. (high spec trims can have a longer waiting time), a Kia spokesperson said.
“Supply has improved across a number of high demand models such as Carnival, Sorento and Sportage and the focus here is to fulfil backorders. At this point in time, Carnival petrol variants will have a longer wait time than diesel.”
Double hit for Tesla Model Y
Prospective Tesla Model Y owners face a double hit just days after the launch of the electric SUV.
The Y went on sale in Australia earlier this month with a starting price of $68,900 plus on-road costs and projected delivery in August.
Last week the cost rose to $72,300 (as part of a global price increase) and the volume of early orders has pushed waiting times out to between February and May next year, according to the Tesla website.
Demand for the Model Y in Australia was so strong Tesla founder Elon Musk took to Twitter to note: "We’re working on accelerating RHD Model Y production. Didn’t expect demand to be so high!”
Toyota is coy on dates
Toyota Australia won’t quote waiting times, but online forums indicate long delays for its most popular models, especially hybrid versions, with wait times from six to 18 months for the likes of the Yaris hybrid, Corolla hybrid, Camry hybrid and RAV4 hybrid.
A Toyota Australia spokesperson said that demand for new vehicles is at unprecedented levels.
“Wait times vary depending on the model, variant and specification requirements of each customer. The RAV4 Hybrid, Camry Hybrid, LandCruiser 70 and LandCruiser 300 are in particularly high demand and currently have longer wait times.”
“Due to the ever-evolving nature of this situation Toyota dealers are best placed to continue to provide updates to our customers on delivery timeframes for individual orders.”
Satisfying demand
Hyundai says its major issue is demand is greater than supply.
“We continually have around 20,000 Hyundai vehicles that are deliverable within a two-month window (this includes vehicles in the country, in transit, in production and scheduled for production). However given the increase in customer demand for our products, we have a large backlog of customer orders we need to fill.”
The good news is Hyundai has around 3,000 diesel-powered Tucson SUVs in the country or on the water, meaning that car can be in your driveway within weeks.
The premium end of town is also feeling the pinch.
A Mercedes-Benz Australia spokesperson said that on average, buyers are waiting around four months for a vehicle.
“Supply of C-Class and GLC is pretty good, while the worst affected cars are the compacts: things like the A-Class and GLA. The (electric) EQA and EQCs have a reasonable wait and we don’t know when we’ll be getting more supplies of the G-Class.”
The information provided is general advice only. Before making any decisions please consider your own circumstances and the Product Disclosure Statement and Target Market Determinations. For copies, visit racv.com.au. As distributor, RACV Insurance Services Pty Ltd AFS Licence No. 230039 receives commission for each policy sold or renewed. Product(s) issued by Insurance Manufacturers of Australia ABN 93 004 208 084 AFS Licence No. 227678.
