There will be a lot of suddenly unemployed and or furloughed people rightly angry with Volkswagen at the moment. The German giant of efficiency and downright lies and coverups (dieselgate) has royally fucked up, yet again. Volkswagen has stopped all deliveries of the Mk8 Golf that was given such a rapturous overture by the world’s automotive press. But buying opinions from the elites of the motoring press isn’t a new concept for VW, it’s been happening for years. But that’s another debate for another time.

So why is Volkswagen putting the brakes on customer deliveries of a car that is the bread and butter of VW sales? It’s to do with a software glitch, specifically related to the emergency call function, a regulatory necessity mandated by the EU since 2018. VW claims it does not know how many cars are affected… yes they do.

VW will update the software issues between June 15 and 21, which is unusually specific guidance considering the company claimed not to know how many vehicles are affected. But this isn’t the first time the Mk8 Golf has been delayed. The introduction of new digital technologies, over the air updates, forced Volkswagen to delay the official launch until 2020.

Coronavirus has also caused yet more delays, naturally, but it seems that the Mk8 Golf is entering the market with the paint still wet to the touch. We here at DCB have also highlighted issues with VW’s current generation software. In our review of the bloody awful Tiguan, we pointed out the irregularities of VW’s Lane Departure system.

We specifically pointed out that in our view, the software has been badly implemented because Lane Departure systems in rival manufactures are simply better. It seems that VW either doesn’t have quality software engineers or the software isn’t going through rigorous enough BETA Testing.