Did you ever get a resolution for this issue?

I'm going through the same thing. My occupancy light on the ceiling wasn't illuminated...neither was the red airbag light on the instrument cluster. After taking my X in for the recall...both are now illuminated and they say the fix now is for a new occupancy mat which has to come from Germany.

As you, I had no lights illuminated prior to the dealership's intervention...now I feel as if I should have ignored the recall. :confused:

No. In fact I was given the run around by BMW USA they finally called me after reading my post on here and never would admit that they have screwed up on this one. I kept telling them that they made a big mistake by having people come in and have this service done because the recall is for a part that "might" malfunction but they have now made sure it will and have caused an unsafe situation for everyone who has had the service performed. They kept saying they needed more information and would call me back in a week and every week would call and say the same thing. It's been 12 weeks and I still can't use the passenger seat. The worst part is out other car is small and this is the family mobile so when I go places with the wife an kids it has become a pain in the a$$ because we have have to drive seperate. I talked to my laywer about this and he can't believe BMW knowingly hasn't offered a solution. He also said I could file suit for loss of use but it would be hard to figure out a number for damages. By he way if there are any laywers reading this and you want to represent a large group of people who have been knowingly out in harms way by BMW Private message me and we'll talk. Back to the issue.... I finally talked to a third person at BMWUSA who told me the new mats would be in from Germany around 12/26/2014 but that was probably just another lie since they clearly tell you what you want to hear then jerk you around for 3 months. No solution lets band together and file suit. That will get there attention.

Thanks for the info...and for verifying what I felt in my gut (should have left well enough alone). :(

yep, the parts are back ordered as of now, I had mine in weeks ago, it showed up when i did a vin inquiry here at work. I work at a bmw dealership.

Well, I guess patience is called for. Thanks for the info. :)

Similar story with my 06 x5. Passenger airbag was OFF even with someone (>100 lb) in the seat. Scheduled appointment with dealer to get it repaired under SIB 65 11 14, but they tell me they dont have the parts after keeping it for 2 days. Returned a few weeks later when the part arrived. Claimed they replaced mat (52-10-7-245-512 72SA or 521067) enabled it, cleared fault memory and tested -but it still doesn't work! Passenger airbag is OFF even when someone is in the seat.

This recall "fix" isn't working. Hard to believe they used parts with such high failure rates and screwed up the recall "fix" for such an expensive SAV. Its annoying. As for the costs, I would think you could estimate the cost by assuming you had to call a cab every time the family needed to go somewhere. That would be at least $50 per day, then add in another $50 for the lost time and hassle. Multiply the $100 per day by say 50,000 (just 10% of the e53's produced) who have this problem and you get $5 million a day. In any case it should be fixed because it is a SAFETY problem that was significant enough to warrant a recall.

Airbag
 

I had my passenger seat occupancy sensor replaced under the recall quite a few months back have had NO issues since.

Did you have a passenger occupancy light illuminated or the red airbag light in the cluster illuminated before the recall work was performed?

I didn't...but I do now...which is what disturbs me the most. :rant:

Airbag
 

Yes - Very intermittent at times.

This appears to be the reason the recall fix worked in your case. The owners that bring their vehicles in when neither of the lights have illuminated are the ones that are driving in with no problem, but driving away with the lights illuminated....and the parts to get the lights to reset and not come back on...are back-ordered. The recall fix appears to not work in our cases and ends up turning the warning lights on. :(