VW Service - Advice needed please!!!

[mkpp786]

Hey everyone, i need some advice.

I have booked my car into a vw service next week as i am looking to sell my car, and i want to keep the dealership service history going (currently a FVWSH)

What i would love to know, and i would really appreciate if someone can help me is:

1) Theyve quoted me a price, but if any additional work is done, will they charge me without notifying me, or will they ring me first to tell me that further work needs to be carried out and that ill be charged £????? etc. or are there somethings they actually carry out and then end up charging me for?

2) What can i do myself, before taking it to the garage so they wont unessisarily charge me for things
E.g. top up my washer fluid..... what else can i do?

3) Im having a major service done (42,000 service) what work will they actually carry out, and anything i should look out for so i know that a proper service has been carried out?

I would really appreciate some advice, and any anwers to the questions above would really be appreciated, especially from the technicians of this site!

Much appreciated!

MKPP

[Huweth]

I'm guessing new cambelt and tensioners, oil, oil filter, air filter, fuel filter and brake fluid. Check all the consumables and general condition of the car. The full details will be in the manual. Expect to pay about £500 for the work, unless you can negotiate a lower price as all the work so far is by VW.

Make sure they use the correct spec oil, which they should be able to tell you without thinking. In my experience, they will do simple things like topping up coolant and then tell you afterwards, when they will try to charge you. I simply replied, "Well shouldn't that be done anyway as part of a major service?". The answer was that I got those little things done for free.
Make sure you tell them to call you ASAP so that you can give the go-ahead for any extra work, but with a car like that I doubt there will be any.

When you get the car back, look at the fuel filter, oil filter, and air filter to check they are nice and new. If they have changed the coolant it will be a nice pink colour. The washer fluid should be green, not blue (VW washer fluid is green and must be used to meet manufacturers spec). If you feel really adventurous you can take the cambelt cover off to see that it's new.

At the end of it all, you will be covered by a full 2 year warranty on the parts they change, and any further damage caused by failure of those parts, so if they don't do something and it fails, it's their fault! For example, if the cambelt fails (£35) and destroys the whole engine(£4000?), they will put a new engine in for free.
Keep that receipt safe and let us know what they do!

[mkpp786]

Many thanks for the reply Huweth,

Well they have quoted me £348 inc Parts/Labour/Vat
I just wanted to make sure that this price didnt turn into £548 or something ridiculous without my consent. I will make sure to tell them that any additional costs, and they should call me.

If they do charge me without my consent, do i have a right in saying NO to paying the extra? or will i have to cough up no matter what?

They part which you jus metioned:

"In my experience, they will do simple things like topping up coolant and then tell you afterwards, when they will try to charge you. I simply replied, "Well shouldn't that be done anyway as part of a major service?". The answer was that I got those little things done for free."

What did you mean by "The answer was that I got those little things done for free."

sorry either im being real dumb or its jus cos its late....?

[Huweth]

They part which you jus metioned:

"In my experience, they will do simple things like topping up coolant and then tell you afterwards, when they will try to charge you. I simply replied, "Well shouldn't that be done anyway as part of a major service?". The answer was that I got those little things done for free."

What did you mean by "The answer was that I got those little things done for free."


They said, "Um, oh yes, I suppose you're right, you won't be charged."
Either they were trying to get an extra £30 out of me or they actually didn't think about the fact that it was supposed to be included.

I'm not a lawyer, but if I'm right, if they do try to charge you for work without your consent they have to either let you have it for free or 'undo' the work they did. They cannot hold your car hostage unless you agree to work and refuse to pay. There is a law that states that they can hold the car until payment is agreed/made. If you don't pay up within a certain time limit they can sue you or sell the car to get their money. It would have to be pretty extreme to come to that!

[mkpp786]

Thanks for the quick reply again Huweth. I appreciate the advice youve given me.

This is my first time sending the car into a dealership to get a service done, and hopefully it wont come to anything stupid like that, Just that you hear horror stories about dealership customer service, so there is a little doubt placed in your mind. Anyway i have heard good things about the dealership im sending it to, so lets hope nothing changes.

Appreciate the help/advice!

Thanks,

MKPP

[Ben]

Some good info there which I will certainly pass on to those I know it will benefit.

I agree with Huweth - do what you can and check things have been changed, good info on fluid colours. Dealers do tend to be more costly than usual so to keep my personal costs down, i'm supplying my own oil.

[pagey]

The best approach to start with would be to attain an inspection service list of what will be serviced etc under your service, a good garage will provide one. This will stop any "I thought I got that for free" or "I thought that was included" latter on. The garage should not charge you for anything in addition to the quoted price for the service without your permission.

The service will include something around a 50 point inspection (depends on garage.) Several items will be replaced as a matter of course such as oil,air filters top up windscreen wash coolant top up and a few other minor parts

There is no real merit for doing anything yourself before you put it in for a service because things like washer fluid, battery check, cooling system check, air filter etc are all going to be done. However checking the condition of a few component parts and fluid levels before and afterwards can tell you something of the level of work carried out.

For example some components that should be inspected in service should be cambelt condition,track rod boots condition,airfilter,oil filter,tyre tread depth,and many more. These items should appear inspected and items like airfilter,oil filter should be brand new, so easy to tell.

So if you know one of your tyres is on the limit of wear for example and this didn't get picked up maybe the mechanic was not as thorough as he/she should have been. Why not let some air out from a rear tyre and check this has been corrected afterwards, just a little test. You could go all the way crazy and go to the trouble of placing a piece of A4 paper ripped folded and wedged under your cambelt cover and see if its been removed, to indicate inspection but thats probably a shade to far for any sane man.

BUT LETS FACE IT, THE STAMP IN THE BOOK IS ALL THAT MATTERS IF YOUR GOING TO SELL HER.

Good luck

Pagey