1999 Kia Sephia LS review from North America

The transmission has been replaced twice—the second one lasted only 8,000 miles. Despite this, the car continues to shift erratically. Often the car refuses to go faster than 40 MPH, or when it does, requires the engine to reach over 65,000 RPM's before it will shift into high gear. My dealer now says the transmission is not the cause of my problems and wants me to pay $300 for various services, even though the symptoms are identical to those that were occurring prior to the last transmission replacement.

Breaks have been replaced three times.

Starter has been replaced.

Muffler has become punctured three times and replaced twice. I plan to bring the car in for another repair next week. If I was doing a lot of "off-road" driving with this car, I could understand how this could happen, but the majority of my driving occurs on paved city streets.

Speaker on driver's door emits more static than sound.

Wipers often make loud clicking sound despite dealer adjustments.

Rear-view mirror rattles.

Unfortunately, the transmission problem began to occur a couple months after my car became ineligible to be considered under the lemon law in my state. If it had happened a six months sooner, I would have probably gotten my money back and bought a new, more reliable car.

I have written to Kia six times since I started having these problems. Every time I write, I get a call from the eastern region customer support manager. He calls my work number early in the morning, at times such as 7:45 AM—before I arrive, and leaves messages for me to call him back at a long distance number. I call back, but he is always either on the other line or at lunch, or so I'm told. I leave messages for him, but he has yet to return a single one. I did manage to get a hold of him once, and he promised to follow up on my claim and to set up a meeting with the district service manager, but that never happened.

I bought my car because it seemed like it would be a low cost, reliable car. I was a college student when I bought it and I needed something dependable, but not expensive. The Kia seemed to be just the right car. It has turned out to be nothing, but a major headache. The car is a piece of junk, and it is quite clear that Kia doesn't care about their customers once they get their money.