Some of you may remember posts I made a few months back regarding the gear changes on my 55 GT TDI; most of you probably won't....

Anyway, here's a bit of background info and what the issue is: I bought my car from my local VW dealer, at the end of my road, back in March 2007 for the grand sum of £16,000 The car had done 18k and was 1.5 years old. After a few weeks of ownership it became apparent the gear changes didn't feel right - crunching, baulking and juddering in 1st, 2nd and 3rd gears. For a car of this age and mileage, I didn't expect there to be any problems with the car I'd purchased whatsoever, mechanical or otherwise.

The first thing I done was take my car back to the dealer with the complaint of poor gear changes. I left it with them over night to test the following morning as the gear changes are far worse when the engine/gearbox is cold. They called me later in the day to say they'd found an issue; apparently the gear linkages needed adjusting. They done this for me at no cost as obviously the car was still well within warranty. I get the car back and the gear changes are exactly the same - no worse, no better!

I put up with the issue for a while and asked some opinions of people in-the-know. Many said that VAG boxes are renowned for their poor shifting and not to worry about it. I didn't spend a large amount of £££ on buying a car that doesn't drive to a satisfactory standard!

A few months later I took the car back to the same dealer about the same problems. This time, a technician came out for a test drive with me. He said that there is an issue and the gearbox will require stripping down to fully diagnose the fault. Finally, I thought to myself! So, I left the car with them for the afternoon. I get a call from the service manager to say that there is nothing wrong, it's a characteristic of the Golf TDI. So my gearbox never got fixed and I got fobbed off once again!

Time passed until my MOT was due. I took the car to the dealer to do the MOT and I specifically asked them to look at my gears before my warranty runs out (the following week). Picked the car up, the service adviser tells me that they were too busy to look at my gears and they don't think there is a problem!

Now, today, I still have the same faulty gearbox and my warranty expired in September 2008! I wrote a letter to VW UK explaining my problems in January. They called me back to tell me to get a second opinion from another local VW dealer. They told me that if they find a fault, they would contribute to the cost of getting my car fixed. In hindsight, I know I should have done this much sooner, ideally when the car was still under warranty. Unfortunately I didn't though....

So, Tuesday evening I dropped my car off at VW in Swindon (very helpful, very professional and an excellent service, may I add). Yesterday they called me to say they'd tested the car and they've found a fault - see everyone, I'm not going mad, there is a fault! They said there was a fault with some components within the gearbox but it will need fully stripping down to diagnose the fault. They quoted £980 to do this They also carried out the 24N8 update for me, FOC.

Where do I stand in terms of getting this repair done FOC by VW? Bearing in mind I took this to them under the warranty period, only to be turned away. They are offering a contribution, personally I don't think this will suffice. They should be covering the entire cost of this repair as they should have done it last year under warranty! Clearly the issue comes down to a factory fault as a well maintained car with low mileage should not have a worn gearbox.

Sorry for the length of post, I cut it down as much as I could!

Any comments much appreciated.