Just had my 2015 scout serviced, it has done 40,000 miles and is a month or so out of the warranty, so took it to a well regarded independent. Before today my car has been on the fixed schedule, with various services done every 10,000 miles. Now as I do just over 20,000 miles a year this can be expensive, but I accept that.

today on the way home I checked the service indicator and was surprised to see that it had been changed to variable/flexible.

 

i spoke to the manager and he explained that they always reset their VAG cars to variable, and that this is what it should be from the factory, with some dealers changing this to fixed. We discussed mileage and he suggested that at 20k per year, the sensible option was to remain on the variable. He did confirm that they had used long life oil, and suggested that the oil used was the same as the fixed.

 

thoughts?

My dealer did not set mine to variable after its last service, and is serviced every 10k on the fixed schedule. I do about 16k so it gets one every 8/9 months.

 

Independents may be different, but some dealers like to charge considerably more for variable services, presumably because they will see the car half as often as under fixed.

 

From speaking with 2 different dealers, they use the same oil for fixed and variable services; both conform to the longlife 504/507 spec.

Forgot to add, the discs and pads that the dealer said were heavily lipped and 80% worn were given a clean bill of health by the independent.