Other body or interior problem on the 2004 Volkswagen Jetta
11 fires 4 injuries 15 of the 26 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.
When other body or interior problem gets reported
Owners of the 2004 Volkswagen Jetta report other body or interior problem at a median of 90,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 65,000 miles and a quarter after 130,000 miles, from 19 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 88,000 miles. It is the 1st most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 45,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 165,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 120,000 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
When the reports scatter this far, the mileage is telling you about how these cars were driven more than about the part itself.
11% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 46,400 miles | 63,000 miles | 91,000 miles | 130,000 miles | 166,400 miles |
Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.
What a percentile can and cannot tell you here
These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.
What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.
Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.
What happens, and what it costs
Of these reports, 11 a fire and 4 an injury are mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.
Putting it right typically runs $200–$2,000 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 23 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2017, at a median of 25 miles, and latest on the 1996 at 100,000 miles.
By volume the 2002 carries the most reports, with 109; the 2004 has 26. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.
If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.
While driving my 2003 1.8t volkswagen jetta, the seat heater on the driver side malfunctioned. I felt a very small point of pain in my leg, but didn't really notice it until I started to smell smoke. I immediately shut off the seat heater (which was on a setting of 3 out of 5 initially), pulled the car over to a parking lot, got out, and fortunately nothing caught fire. I brought the car in to my dealer (trend motors in rockaway, nj), who promptly fixed the problem, and have ordered a new seat cover to replace the one damaged by the malfunction. The car was covered under warranty at the time of the problem, which occured on november 4, 2004.*ak
My wife just pulled into the garage after a short trip to the store. When she backed in smoke and flames came from the seat heater control (seat heater was off at the time). This could have been very serious if we had been driving at the time!*jb
The right rear hinge on the trunk of my 2004 jetta cracked on a joint. This caused the trunk to close in an imbalanced way. I recently closed my trunk and the leading edge of the trunk lid made contact with the back light (rear windshield) glass and shattered the glass completely. The glass fell into the car creating a very hazardous situation. When I contacted my local vw dealer to inquire about getting the hinge fixed, they explained that this is a common problem on vw jetta and passats and they have had numerous similar failures. I also contacted my insurance company (geico) and they told me the same thing, that they had an unusual number of claims from vw owners of shattered back lights (rear windshield) after the trunk lid was closed by the owner. If my kids were sitting in the rear seat, they would have been shattered with glass. Because my car has over 50,000 miles I am out of warranty. I called vw customer service and was basically given the run around. I said this is a safety issue and not a mileage based issue and they should fix my car, but they have refused. *tr
Also reported on the 2004 Volkswagen Jetta
Other powertrain problem
Fuel pump failure
Other engine problem
Other electrical problem
DPF, EGR or DEF system failure
Timing chain, belt or tensioner failure
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 26 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.
Questions this page answers
At what mileage does other body or interior problem happen on the 2004 Volkswagen Jetta?
Across 19 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 90,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 65,000 miles and a quarter after 130,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is other body or interior problem on the 2004 Volkswagen Jetta?
26 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 1.7 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.
What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars
Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed