Mercedes-Benz Citan minivan due 2014

Mercedes-Benz will delay the Australian launch of its Citan LCV until issues raised by a substandard Euro NCAP crash test result are resolved. In the wake of a three-star result by the independent crash testing body, Stuttgart has already announced a voluntary recall of 3500 Citans in Europe.

It’s also withholding people-mover variants from sale worldwide until the matter is resolved to its satisfaction -- although it has gone ahead with cargo van sales.

The Citan van is built in conjunction with Renault. By the time it arrives Down Under in mid-2014 (well over a year behind schedule) the issues contributing to the result will be fully resolved, visiting Mercedes-Benz commercial execs told media at a Sydney press conference today.

The result will be a substantially improved safety spec with no ill-effect on pricing, company executives said. While they stopped short of confirming an expectation of four-stars, they did stress the light van will see substantial improvements in the areas Euro NCAP found it wanting.

It’s claimed the primary safety issue was a window airbag that failed to fully deploy after getting caught on the upper seat-belt anchorage point.

Klaus Maier, the Mercedes-Benz commercial arm’s VP of sales and marketing, stressed that the recall is voluntary, and while the window bag didn’t inflate fully it was found to provide satisfactory protection.

“But we decided to correct it anyway – we’ve almost finalised the revisions,” Maier said.

On other points of contention that came to light, including hard interior surfaces, a skimpy list of driver assist features and poor pedestrian protection, the company is not commenting for the time being. However Maier and his colleagues confirmed it will be making other engineering modifications to bring Citan into line with expectations of a brand built on safety and advanced engineering.

“Obviously when we’re in a joint venture like this, we’re limited in what we can say before we’ve finalised with Renault what we’ll be doing,” he told media at a Sydney press conference today.

“And because it’s not only us, we have not yet finalised what we can do.”

The Citan is strategically critical for Benz, pitched as it is into a hotly competitive segment including Volkswagen’s Caddy, Fiat’s Scudo, Citroen’s Jumpy and, of course, the near-identical Kangoo.

The company attributed the poor NCAP result in part to the tightening up of testing criteria between the vehicle’s inception in cahoots with Renault and when the testing took place.

“Of course we weren’t happy with the result,” Mr Maier said.

“At the time the Kangoo underwent testing, Euro NCAP used three major criteria, and the Kangoo came out best in its class in two of those three.”

By the time the Citan came up for testing, the organisation had added a fourth field – driver assist systems. Asked if the company will be fitting such technologies, Mr Maier wouldn’t confirm or otherwise.

“But definitely we will continue to improve safety. It was a big issue in Germany, if not so much elsewhere. But while we might not be able to do everything we might like to do given it’s not only our car, we will be doing everything we can.”

The test result was more of a blow to Benz’s brand than to sales in Europe since the Citan’s launch in mid-2012, Maier said.

“It hasn’t affected sales really. Partly because three stars is the best result anyone in that segment has achieved. In Europe, the news of it came and went in a couple of days.

“Last month, Citan had a 7 per cent market share in Germany, and more than 10 per cent in the Netherlands – and that’s van variants only – no Kombi [people-mover],” he claimed.

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