Central Locking not working - Ford Fiesta ‘08

[JordanBerry]

Hi all,

I recently bought a second hand Ford Fiesta, specifically a 2008 make. 
 

The central locking has stopped working and with troubling to find a fix I’ve come here. 
 

When I lock it with the key I can hear the locks activating, but then unlocking seconds later. I believe this is tied into the indicator on my dash saying there is a door open (despite all being closed).

There isn’t really a way to manually lock the doors except for pushing outwards the inside door handles and then locking the drivers side door from the outside. 

I have noticed that when unlocking the car with either the button or manually, that it will unlock all the doors (even those I have manually locked from the inside) except for the back right side passenger door. 
 

Otherwise I’m at a loss and can’t really afford to get it looked at if it’s going to be expensive. Was hoping if anyone has had any experience with this and could help. Any help would really be appreciated. 

[unofix]

Until you fix the problem of the car thinking one of the doors is still open you will never get the car to lock.

Is you car a 3 door or 5 door ?

Does the dashboard warning tell you which door it thinks is still open ?

The problem is a very common one and fairly easy to fix. Deep inside the door latch is a small microswitch which tells the car that the door is closed and it can be locked and alarmed. These microswitches get stuck or break. The quickest and cheapest option is to get a complete replacement door latch assembly from a scrapyard once you know which door is causing the problem.

[JordanBerry]

It’s a five door and unfortunately the indicator doesn’t say specifically. Would you know a rough estimate of what a garage would charge to fix it at all?

[TomsFocus]

If the rear right door stays locked, that's probably a good one to start with.

For a 'free' repair in the short term, you can try just unplugging that door loom.  The rest of doors may then lock and unlock correctly.  Just leaving that one permanently locked.  Inconvenient if you regularly use that door admittedly. 

[unofix]

Sorry missed the bit about the rear right door staying locked.   DOH !!! of course it's a 5 door.

As Tom says, I would suspect that door first. To get a garage to sort it would depend on who you use but for a small independent I'd expect £200 - £300

You can of course use FORScan and carry out the diagnosis yourself and then replace the door latch with a used one from the scrapyard (about £30)