Tonobo

I have to admit that as much as I would have loved to buy the Fabia I was looking at there is now too much doubt in my mind. I'm going to look at a Mazda 2 today. Thank you all for the advice and info.

All a bit confusing then. What do you guys who own a Fabia do about the timing belt?

Just an update on buying a Fabia, I hate it when people ask for advice and then don't post an update how they got on. I was all set to buy a nice 2018 SE -L model until I got talking about servicing costs. It turns out that Skoda recommend changing the timing belt every 4 years. I'll be honest I was a bit shocked. I've never heard of a car that requires such frequent timing belt changes. A Fiesta is good for 120K. It's not even so much the cost involved, it's more to do with how little faith Skoda have in their own engine. Thanks for the advice but it's back to the drawing board for me.

Cheshirecat - Many thanks for taking the time to go into such detail. From your description it sounds very much like my i10 in terms of performance, which is fine. I just need something a little bigger and ideally with more refinement. I think the Fabia will do just fine. Thanks again.

Thinking of buying a 2019 Fabia SE. I currently drive a Hyundai i10 1.0 so I'm not looking for a ball of fire. I'm just a little concerned because some reviews say the MPI 75 engine is dangerously slow. On paper it's the same as my Hyundai but the Fabia is heavier. Any advice would be appreciated.