Toyota Motor Thailand pulls the Yaris Ativ down from its website, adding more fuel to the fire caused by the recent safety irregularities on new DNGA-based cars.
Word is going on around the web that Toyota Motor Thailand has stopped sales and deliveries of its Yaris Ativ. This is an important bit of news as the Yaris Ativ is basically their version of our Vios.
A little bit of investigation by visiting their website has confirmed this rumour, as the Toyota Yaris Ativ is no longer listed there, with only the regular Yaris being part of their compact vehicle lineup.
According to Japanese Times, Toyota has stopped sales and deliveries of its Yaris Ativ in Thailand after its affiliate Daihatsu rigged part of the door in side-collision safety tests.
This follows a press conference held in Bangkok, where Toyota’s Asian Region CEO, Masahiko Maeda said that the problem may have occurred due to pressure during the development of the Ativ model.
“If development had been carried out under appropriate conditions, this kind of problem would of course not have happened,” Maeda said.
“I think the fact that it still happened, means there was some kind of pressure at the development site,” he said, adding that the vehicle’s relatively large size may have posed a challenge to Daihatsu, which specializes in the production of small cars.
Daihatsu disclosed last month that there were irregularities in some of their safety tests (crash assessments in particular), affecting 88,000 units sold into various markets – Malaysia included.
They are investigating how part of the door in side-collision safety tests carried out for some 88,000 small cars had been changed for the purpose of side-on crash safety testing.
Toyota said that they are working with the Thai government to resume sales. Perodua and Toyota Malaysia have deflected any claims that their Axia and Vios are unsafe and have continued selling the cars with no recalls intended.