The dealer does not give the 3 yr /100000 km warranty - GMH does.
According to Australian Consumer Law, it is the business that warrants a product they sold so that is fit for service and is of of acceptable quality. There is no length defined within the ACL legislation for this statutory warranty which can not be avoided.
The business that sold the product can not simply handball it to the manufacturer who can often state it's outside the manufacturers warrranty period. Remember, the legal obligation is for the seller to resolving the issue with the purchaser. The real kicker is that if the issue is classified as a 'major fault', the choice of remedy is at the purcaser discretion so he can ask to have it repaired, a new one provided or a full refund of the purchase price.
Obviously the manufacturer may aid the seller by providing a manufacturers warranty but this does not absolve the seller of his legal obligations. And it's here i think too many people get confused and acccept what they are told by the seller and or the manufacturer.
Sadly, even the ACCC or Consumer Affairs groups sometimes talk as if it is the manufacturer that is legally liable for warranty issues, though i think this is in part because the product is sold with a manufacturers warranty which brings in 'making false or missleading declarations' which is part of ACL and applies if the manufacturer tries to wheezle out of fixing something within their manufacturers warranty period. And there are other laws where the manufacturer seems to be on the hook for safety issues though i'm not sure what legislation that falls under.
Everyone should do themselves a favor and read the ACL and hopefully people can then be more knowledgeable when standing up for their legislated rights.
As for the OP's steering issue, i'd say that is a major fault (and a safety concern) so he should have spoken with the consumer affairs group in his state and got some advise on how to approach the dealer to get this fixed under the statuatory warranty. When/if the Dealer is faced with a full refund, suddenly the issue of spending time to correctly diagnose the fault seems to fade away and oddly the dealer and manufacturer seem to communicate much better.
Luckily OP's vehicle was included in a recall range of VINS but this never should have taken 6 months to resolve this major fault and safety concern.
Maybe as more people push their ACL rights in law, either more refunds will occur or the government will change the law to protect the guilty...
