Toyota Motor Corporation Chairman Akio Toyoda went to Thailand and apologized to customers, dealers, employees and authorities following the supposed irregularities of the side impact test (UN-R95) for the Yaris ATIV (commonly known as the Vios in the Philippines) produced there.
Aside from that, the Toyota executive (who is the grandson of the brand's founder) also flew to the Land of Smiles early last week to give assurance to customers that the Yaris ATIV “meets all the necessary safety regulations of Thailand, and that they can continue to use the vehicles with peace of mind.”
“Toyota is a company where, whenever a problem occurs, everyone stops, seeks the true cause, and works to improve and prevent recurrence. This is the Toyota philosophy that we have cherished since the company's founding. I myself will take the lead in returning to this philosophy once again and promote group-wide efforts,” Toyoda said.
For his part, Toyota Chief Executive Officer (CEO) for Asia Masahiko Maeda echoed Toyoda’s sentiments.
“There are three steps before a vehicle reaches a customer: development, certification, and sales. We would like to assure customers that there were no issues for the safety and quality of the car during the ‘development’ process. This is an issue about the next step, certification, where procedural irregularity was discovered, which we take seriously and have taken actions to resolve,” the regional CEO noted.
In a statement, Toyota said that in compliance with the regulation in its host country, it has suspended shipments and sales from April 29 until it is confirmed that there is no safety issue together with the authorities.
“Toyota takes this matter very seriously and commits to make utmost efforts to comprehensively review our certification procedures and operations,” the company noted.
“Toyota always aims to produce and provide safe and high-quality vehicles and will continue to put safety as the first priority. Toyota deeply apologizes for any inconvenience that this incident has caused to customers and stakeholders who trusted the Toyota brand, but will always work to be open, gain trust from all stakeholders and continuously take efforts to improve our products and services for our customers,” it added.
In relation to the press release issued in Thailand, Toyota Motor Philippines guaranteed that there are no affected units in the country.
Photos from Toyota Thailand
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