I have been a GM owner since I was 16 (2000). Enjoyed working on them and just overall preferred them, the look and the ride. I have owned nothing but General Motors vehicles so naturally when I got married and my wife and I were looking for a new vehicle it is all that we looked at. We ended up falling in love with a 2016 Chevrolet Malibu Premier in white with grey rims. My wife loved all the tech features and I loved the 250 Hp of the 2.o Liter turbo, as well as the comfort in the ride and seats. Week one of owning the vehicle which only had 4 miles on it when we picked it up, and there was a issue. It was a paint issue that took months but was finally resolved by General Motors. A year later and more issues begin to arise, that to say the least are very quirky and troublesome to say the least. The problem with these issues isn't the issues themselves its that over and over again there are sporadic and the dealer(*) have only been able to duplicate, and fix, one issue so far. The issue found and fixed was with the heater control changing temperature on its own when it was not on Automatic. At first we were told to just sync the temp from driver side to passenger and there won't be an issue. After pushing the issue they dug deeper, replaced (or shotgunned as I put it) some parts in the HVAC head unit. That issue is solved! Since we have had it in for that issue, the HVAC has done similar things with the Drivers side heat, and once I couldn't even get my 'Max' defrost to come on at all. Awfully annoying when the windows are fogging up to say the least. During this whole time I was also having issues with key fobs intermittently not unlocking the vehicle. I could remote start it or honk the horn, but no matter if I used the buttons on the doors or the key fob I could not get the doors to unlock. This also could not be duplicated any of the times it has been in to be looked at. Most recently while driving on a trip to talk my stepdaughter to her father, a chime came on while moving slowly in traffic, I looked down and very briefly saw a message about my steering assist. It came on three times that trip, and a handful of times since. Talked to my service advisor, but of course theres no reason for them to look yet since it hasn't stayed on long enough to even know what the whole message says. Being that steering is all electric on these new cars, which makes for awesome steering, it does worry me with the amount of driving that we do that we could have an issue while driving down the interstate. I have searched and searched with no one else having similar infrequent issues such as these, and quite frankly I am increasingly irritated. I would trade the thing off however at 22,899 miles now I owe a little more than anyone is willing to give in trade. My frustration with this issue has brought me to the realization that GM'* quality has gone down the drain and I don't think I want anything to do with the brand anymore. They almost feel like part of the family to a certain degree because I have relied on them for 19 years now.
GM, this is one dissatisfied, loyal customer you are losing. If I can ever get ahead on the vehicle Ill be looking into other brands and what they have to offer these days.
SIncerely
Josh

Welcome to the forum Josh. We are not affiliated with GM, however this forum helps owners with repairing their GM vehicles.
I think you should send a copy of this to GM/Chevrolet customer care.
They can be contacted by phone as well 1-800-222-1020 and let them know!
I assume your Malibu is still under warranty, and you should continue to peruse any necessary repairs.
It is not pleasant when you buy a new car & have so many issues, I wish you the best Josh.

One of the most frustrating things for a GM Tech, are intermittent concerns....

It'* hard to fix if it is not happening, and also if there is not a TSB on the subject that gives you a heads up on the problem....

One of the problems, in diagnostics, is GM just does not give you much labor time, to fix something that isn't happening.......about the only thing we could do, is have the car stay overnight, and have a Service Writer, Manager, or Tech drive the car home, hoping that the concern would act up....sometimes even that shows nothing...

More often than not, when you have problems like this, it is a wiring problem, that occasionally rears it'* ugly head......sometimes, you have to get lucky finding it....and if you are really lucky, you might find a code in history....

There is no rhyme or reason for a car having problems.......You can sell hundreds of a model, and just one of them rears it'* ugly head, and gets all the headlines....

Many times, when a customer comes in, no problem is found,,,,but when it comes in a second/third time, then it'* time to call TAC and get some input from them, because they can authorize the replacement of a potentially bad part...and they have access to reported problems that haven't come out as a TSB, yet....

I've personally owned mostly GM for over 20 years. In the past they spent a lot of time saving $0.69 on every car they produced by cutting a corner or two here or there. Buick big-block water pumps and head gaskets, Metric transmissions, unreliable substitution of plastic parts that lead to surprises that metal would never have had, 6T7x 35R wave plates, etc. Then they exacerbate the issue by resisting repairs on prevalent issues. That said, once the issues are sorted out on a particular vehicle I love the engineering and the result. I believe today'* GM is a whole lot better sorted out than those days. That'* not to say that there isn't the occasional unit that has issues.

To be fair, other manufacturers had their share of issues over the years as well: Ford modular/triton V8 intake issues, Ford valve spring failures, Ford transmissions slipping from Park to Reverse on their own, Chrysler transmissions and transaxles, Chrysler resistor packs, Chrysler rear axles, Chrysler K-cars, Dodge pickup steering recall, Honda mid-90'* automatics, Toyota oil sludge, etc. etc. I've personally put hands on at least half of these issues myself at one time or another.

I agree with the guys above. I suggest you thoroughly document each occurrence with the odometer reading, time and date, and a brief description. Use a description that is shortly worded so the description can be used accurately again and again. Bring the car in for the issues as much as you can, and have a current copy of this log to hand to the service writer. Once a trend is established in issues and visits repair visits, take the issue up to food chain. If you already have kept some notes that could be put into this form you might already be ahead of the game.