1999 Kia Sephia LS from North America - Comments

In the past two years, we have have had the transmission changed twice.

The starter was replaced.

And a few other recalls (wipers, gas, etc).

I got what I paid for... a lemon. I expected a basic car that could carry me reliably from point A to point B. As time passes, travelling between points becomes more difficult. Kia's customer service is no help. Instead of listening to complaints and correcting problems, their representatives simply say, "What do you want us to do?" Never again, will I purchase a Kia.

In your comments you say that the car is a lemon, but you haven't really given any supporting arguments to that allegation. I personally feel that if you feel passionately enough to write a review you could at least put in more than 90 characters worth of comments. You list warranty work and recalls in your problems categories... frankly, I don't think that you should list that unless those recalls or warranty work weren't handled by the dealer. I've had recalls and warranty work come up, but the problems have been fixed right the first time and I think that is more than acceptable because that means that Kia cares about what people think of their cars. I got a recall notice telling me that they had forgotten to put a sticker on the inside of my car so they had me bring the car into the dealership to put the sticker on... if they didn't care they wouldn't have done it or they would have just sent me the sticker and told me to put it on myself... but they didn't. Also, your transmission "problems", I have over 100k miles on my Sephia and not a single transmission problem. In a nutshell what I am saying is... don't call a car a lemon unless you have supporting experience... calling a vehicle a lemon is a serious allegation.

Listen buddy as someone that also has a 1999 Kia Sephia, that guy is 100% right. I've also in the past 2 years had to get a new transmission. A Chip in my Kia has been replaced 3 times in the last 2 years, theres been at least 6 recalls like the guy said. And the air bags don't even work and another car crashed into me.

LEMON!!!

I don't know where these people are purchasing their vehicles, but I have owned my 1998 KIA Sephia for quite sometime now, I bought it used with over 80k miles on it, It is a very good running car, I cannot say it is the greatest as I said I bought with over 80k miles and of course used cars are going to have their problems, nothing serious like transmission problems or anything like that, but the car was not well taken care of by its previous owner, So if you take care of your car it will take care of you.

As far as recalls go I have had 2 recalls on my sephia and it was no big deal, a little inconvenient as it does take time out of my day, I never received notice, I simply brought my KIA into the dealer for regular maintenance, they told me it had recalls and fixed them that day, no charge, so if someone has a problem with their car I understand how your experience would put you off on buying another, but KIA is the same as any other manufacturer, these things are mass produced, and there will be good ones and bad ones, it's not perfect.