Due an 80k service on my CR VRS pretty soon, am I right in thinking Skoda UK keep all thier main dealers servicing prices fixed? Seems to be £249 for a 20k service regardless of the model as far as I can tell. Anyone had one done by an independant recently as a price comparison?

£249 for a major and £129 for minor service. I got a few quotes from Indy garages last year and only one garage could beat the price be a tenner the rest were all more expensive by £20-£30.

£127.36 for the 5th variable service on my tfsi at the local VAG indy.

I guess the 5th variable is similar to the 10k? In which case similar price, I may as well book in with the local one then rather than bother with independants.

£249 for a major and £129 for minor service. I got a few quotes from Indy garages last year and only one garage could beat the price be a tenner the rest were all more expensive by £20-£30.

Though an indie probably would at least get their hands dirty and carry out a proper service for the price, rather than skoda's "inspection but don't actually change/renew anything" minor service ********.

£250 for the service, but rear brakes need doing (to be fair I was expecting that, the disks are noticably lipped), a leaking turbo gasket, and apprently one of my front shocks is leaking, which I'm not too impressed about with a 4 year old car. £900 service sounds bad but I suppose the service intervals are 3 times longer than my old 306 and I wouldn't have complained too much about a couple of £400 major services and £100 minor on that.

The biggie though is my non working aircon is due to a compressor failure, currently on back order so could be a couple of weeks before they get one in, and apparently £750 to do. Is that a common problem?

Skoda's 'National Pricing' policy is detailed here:

http://www.skoda.co.uk/owners/service-and-maintenance/national-pricing

Click on the maintenenace tab for fixed pricing on common consumables such as brakes, cambelts etc.

The prices to be fair are pretty good, remember you also get two years warranty on genuine Skoda parts.

"The biggie though is my non working aircon is due to a compressor failure, currently on back order so could be a couple of weeks before they get one in, and apparently £750 to do. Is that a common problem?"

Apparently it is a regular issue. My mate has had his go on his CR Vrs but luckily covered by a used Skoda warranty. It appears to be a real weak point.

Annoyingly it's now 4 years old so a year out of warrenty, there's something to be said for fitting poor quality parts so they fail while still under warrenty

They've also found one of my anti roll bar drop links is siezed when they've gone to change the shock, and there's play in on of the top mounts. I guess shocks and the mount is a reflection on the rubbish quality of our roads rather than necessarily skoda parts.

Makes me wonder if I should be doing a few more checks between the 20k service intervals, I do all my own servicing on the bikes and used to do the intermediates on previous cars, but modern cars are getting harder and harder to work on.

The biggie though is my non working aircon is due to a compressor failure, currently on back order so could be a couple of weeks before they get one in, and apparently £750 to do. Is that a common problem?

If you have a dig about the forum someone imported a compressor from Germany to save money.

It does seem to be common. Shoite parts, like the Teves ESP module as well.

Compressor failure seems very common. Just had mine replaced under 3 month RAC warranty after buying my FL vrs from an independent. I did get quoted £470 for a replacement compressor at an aircon specialist, Skoda recommend replacing the receiver dryer at the same time which I was quoted an extra £150 for.

I get the impression skoda are great for fixed price servicing but a bit expensive for other stuff. the dealer quoted me £758 to do the compressor, but its on back order and could be a couple of weeks before they get one it. I've just tried a local aircon specialist who seems to come well reccomended on another forum and he's said £411 for the compressor and regas. Even if skoda are replacing the reciever/drier at that price and the independant isn't, that's stil one hell of a price difference.

Skoda are competitive on standard services, and routine parts, but if they find something else to fix, expect to be quoted top dollar.

The mobile chap came out this morning to replace the compressor and regass it. He said he sees a lot of compressor failures on VAG cars, the main culprit being the bolt that holds the pulley on to the splines coming loose and allowing the pully to rattle around on the splines, wearing them to the point that the pulley turns but doesn't turn the shaft. So his helpfull hint is prolong the life of your compressor by threadlocking the bolt in the middle of the pulley before it comes loose.

He also reckoned those aircon refil cans you can get in halfords cause a lot of problems, people regas thier system but get air in there or end up with the wrong amount of gas, which can also cause the compressor to fail. Think he said he charges about £60 for a regas which doesn't sound bad compared ot £35 for a halfords can plus £20 for the hose.