Ford India hikes prices of vehicles by up to 5%

The depreciating value of rupee has forced car manufacturers to increase prices of their vehicles. Couple of days back, we reported that Toyota has increased the prices of Camry and Fortuner by 1 per cent, now the Ford India hikes the prices by 1-5 per cent on different models with immediate effect to balance the rising input costs. "Effective September 5, 2013, the prices will be increased in the range of 1 per cent to 5 per cent across majority of Ford's products depending on specific model and trim," Ford India said in a statement.

However, the company did not disclose the details of the vehicles to be effected by the price hike. The company's popular model in India are Figo hatch, Fiesta sedan and the recently launched compact SUV EcoSport. The company said that the reason behind increasing the prices are consistently rising input costs as a result of macroeconomic factors such as high inflation, depreciating rupee and high interest rates.

"Input costs have been consistently increasing and this is expected to continue for the foreseeable future. Although we have absorbed increases in costs over the past period, the situation is such that we now need to revise the prices of our vehicles," Ford India Executive Director, Marketing, Sales and Service, Vinay Piparsania said.

The three German luxury car manufacturers- BMW, Audi and Mercedes-Benz has already hiked the prices of their vehicles by up to 5 per cent to offset rising input costs. While Mercedes-Benz had hiked the prices of its entire line-up by up to 4.5 per cent, BMW including MINI hiked prices by up to 5 per cent and Audi raised the prices by up to 4 per cent. General Motors has also hiked the price of its three cars by up to Rs. 10,000. 

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