UK-POLOS.NET - THE VW Polo Forum

mike sel wrote: ↑Thu Apr 12, 2018 10:00 pm

WillWord wrote: ↑Thu Apr 12, 2018 7:21 pm Up Date on my cars journey.

Departed Port Elizabeth/South Africa 15.07 27/3/18
Arrived Vito/Spain Today 03.43 12/4/18
Departed Vito/Spain 14.15 12/4/18
Next Stop ! Zeebrugge/ Belgium ETA 14/4/18

So who knows were it will go after Zeebrugge, hopefully Emden

Good info there, keep the updates coming. My SEL was built last week according to the dealer, and is now in transit to the dealer. Funny thing though the Track my car app still says build week confirmed as this week. I have asked live message and they say it takes 10 days to build a Polo and it was started last week and is not showing as complete yet. Who knows but I should find out its on a boat within a week. the dealer says its then 8 weeks to collection.

8 weeks sounds about right, if you get your ship details from dealer be intresting to see if it mirrors my journey.

Update, car arrived in Emden at 00.01 on the 17/04 so actual time from South Africa was 21 days. Now as far as I am aware it under goes a quality control check, I have know idea how long this process takes, fingers crossed its sooner rather than later.

Up date on my SEL dealer sent me the VIn number etc, its apparently on a ship which left Port Elizabeth on 17 April at about 5pm. So It looks like its a 21 day journey, so that gives me an arrival in Emden of 8th May, I am told its about 4 weeks from there to dealer so that's 5th June into dealer. I'm away on leave then so soonest I'm going to get the car will be 23rd / 24th June.

At least that gives the dealer chance to prep the car properly, or more like ignore it for an extra couple of weeks then rush to get it ready at the last second. LOL

My SEL has apparently just landed in the UK and should be at the dealership in around a weeks time.

I could be wrong, but I'd be very surprised if any QA checks are done at Emden, okay maybe select a car at random for QA checking at Emden - and surely not a customer's factory order unit, the QA processes built into the "abroad" factories will be subject to internal vetting as well as maybe spot checking audit from either VW Group Germany, or an approved agency.

What will be happening in Emden is, units, ie cars etc from many "abroad" factories will be mustered at Emden for onward transiting to the final country of sale, any stop offs by these transporter ships coming in from South Africa, will be either drop off for regional transiting, or in the case of Spain and Belguim, drop off and collection of locally built units for onward transit to Emden as the Northern European mustering and re-distributing locally within Northern Europe.

RUM4MO wrote: ↑Tue Apr 24, 2018 11:13 am I could be wrong, but I'd be very surprised if any QA checks are done at Emden, okay maybe select a car at random for QA checking at Emden - and surely not a customer's factory order unit, the QA processes built into the "abroad" factories will be subject to internal vetting as well as maybe spot checking audit from either VW Group Germany, or an approved agency.

What will be happening in Emden is, units, ie cars etc from many "abroad" factories will be mustered at Emden for onward transiting to the final country of sale, any stop offs by these transporter ships coming in from South Africa, will be either drop off for regional transiting, or in the case of Spain and Belguim, drop off and collection of locally built units for onward transit to Emden as the Northern European mustering and re-distributing locally within Northern Europe.

Ahh I see. regardless of what they do at Emden it still seems to take about 4 weeks for a car delivered to Emden to get to the dealer. even more disappointing that a car sits in a holding facility for weeks before being re-routed to the UK. At least if it was being quality checked it would seem the time was not wasted.

I find it weird if people are finding a car built in an area of the world that involves being mustered for onward travel to UK dealers, is taking 4 weeks. Back in August 2015, mu wife's Polo SEL came in from Port Eliz to Emden via Arabian country, Spain, Belgium and Emden, but it only waited in Emden for maybe 4 days (a guess) before it was loaded onto a local car carrier ship for delivery to UK, in my case Tynemouth.

Think of it this way, what is Emden's main purpose? I think that you will find that it is "Passat Land" with a large stock handling port facility, so if it gets continually loaded up with cars, they need to stay there as short a time as possible or Emden would clog up?

RUM4MO wrote: ↑Wed Apr 25, 2018 3:19 pm I find it weird if people are finding a car built in an area of the world that involves being mustered for onward travel to UK dealers, is taking 4 weeks. Back in August 2015, mu wife's Polo SEL came in from Port Eliz to Emden via Arabian country, Spain, Belgium and Emden, but it only waited in Emden for maybe 4 days (a guess) before it was loaded onto a local car carrier ship for delivery to UK, in my case Tynemouth.

Think of it this way, what is Emden's main purpose? I think that you will find that it is "Passat Land" with a large stock handling port facility, so if it gets continually loaded up with cars, they need to stay there as short a time as possible or Emden would clog up?

Its very baffling. I have to say I am surprised the ship does not just call at Southampton or sheerness directly. As I understand it South Africa only make right hand drive cars so IF they are coming to Europe that only UK Malta Cyrpus. so why even go to Emden in the first place?

mike sel wrote: ↑Wed Apr 25, 2018 5:22 pm

RUM4MO wrote: ↑Wed Apr 25, 2018 3:19 pm I find it weird if people are finding a car built in an area of the world that involves being mustered for onward travel to UK dealers, is taking 4 weeks. Back in August 2015, mu wife's Polo SEL came in from Port Eliz to Emden via Arabian country, Spain, Belgium and Emden, but it only waited in Emden for maybe 4 days (a guess) before it was loaded onto a local car carrier ship for delivery to UK, in my case Tynemouth.

Think of it this way, what is Emden's main purpose? I think that you will find that it is "Passat Land" with a large stock handling port facility, so if it gets continually loaded up with cars, they need to stay there as short a time as possible or Emden would clog up?

Its very baffling. I have to say I am surprised the ship does not just call at Southampton or sheerness directly. As I understand it South Africa only make right hand drive cars so IF they are coming to Europe that only UK Malta Cyrpus. so why even go to Emden in the first place?

Found an old post on the forum which says cars are checked at Emden for compliance with Euro Vehicle Legislation (whatever that entails), and also a QC check by VW (post by Doc_House 30/12/2014 towards the bottom of page 9 in the post at the link below);

viewtopic.php?t=62436&start=120

SRGTD, maybe that is what has been said, but, if you have ever been in or involved in the manufacturing sector that involves shipping and selling to another area of the world, you would see that the plan must be to what the individual market requires in every way - it would be far too late to discover any issues wrt fit for Europe after a huge consignment was off loaded at Emden.

The only sort of QA or QC checks needing done would be the hand over from the shipper to the dockside agent, to make sure that no damage was done loading, at sea, during partial load changing and unloading at Emden - ie a quick "walk round".

The stopping off at LHD countries when the load will be mainly RHD might be explained by the fact that South Africa could also be building LHD utility vehicles like pickups and building some sub assemblies for use at other manufacturing sites, this is a very big company we are talking about and it is not as simple as nothing gets shipped to VW Group South Africa - only RHS Polo get shipped out.