The labour strikes at Maruti Suzuki’s Manesar plant, apart from disrupting the production, is threatening to lead to greater consequences, as the company has received about 2-4 per cent of cancellation orders for Maruti Swift from the prospective customers due to a long waiting period.
According to dealers, around half of the customers who cancelled their orders have gone ahead and purchased either the Toyota Liva or the Volkswagen Polo. Commenting on the situation, an executive at a Delhi-based dealership stated, “There is a huge waiting period for the Swift, mainly because of the impact on production at Manesar due to the strikes. The petrol Swift has a waiting period of about 22-24 weeks, while the diesel version currently has waiting period of about 24-26 weeks.” The waiting period is currently between 2-7 months depending on petrol and diesel options and the geographical location. The executive also added that no new delivery of the model has been received by the dealers across the country.
MSI Managing Executive Officer (Marketing and Sales), Mr. Mayank Pareek acknowledged that some people had cancelled their orders but that number is very small. Mr. Pareek also added that the company has currently around 1,00,000 undelivered Swift orders and while the waiting period for the diesel variant is 4-5 months, the waiting period for the petrol variant is 2 around months.