Booking in for the second annual - prepaid service - was a piece of cake using the online system. Didn’t want a courtesy car or a lift.

 

Dropped off, strolled into town, bussed it to and from relative’s house, back to collect.

 

Nothing to pay of course, but would I be interested in £313 worth of “Identified” work? No ****in’ chance boyo.

 

Plus a Red Alert FAILED report for the front right camber being out by 1 degree. Yet both left and right sides show -1 degree of camber on the printout.

 

Recommended work listed as:

 

1. Key fob battery every 12 months £4.30 - changed by me recently for pennies after 2 years following dash warning.

2. Wiper blade replacement every 6 months £50.63 - working perfectly after 2 years and 14,000 miles with new (cheap) Bosch blades in my garage.

3. Aircon Service every 2 years £138.47 - running perfectly. My previous Superb was recharged after 6 years.

4. Battery recharge £24 - don’t be silly - all running perfectly.

5. Align this very squint 1 degree of Right Hand camber for a mere £96 - when I’m ready I’ll find my nearby wheel merchant to check it for peanuts.

 

I know they have to pay for the shiny new premises and that little cup of coffee I helped myself to this afternoon, but this nonsense is just insulting.

 

And after I queried them and the spanner man was consulted, I was told that said spanner man had dropped my tyre pressures by a couple of PSI so I’ll have to go check them again.

 

ps - doddery old grannies may be happy to be sucked in to main dealer servicing, but after a lifetime in the world of ‘maintenance’ this grumpy old man isn’t 

 

Upselling at its very best.

 

I wonder what the successful hit rate is?

 

Are women more likely to accept this crap than men? (Am I allowed to say that?)

 

 

Edited 9 November, 20187 yr by xman

Battery recharge!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

7 minutes ago, xman said:

Upselling at its very best.

 

I wonder what the successful hit rate is?

 

Are women more likely to accept this crap than men? (Am I allowed to say that?)

You can say what you like, it's called freedom of speech, don't worry about others, it's only the snowflakes that sweat the small stuff.

Afaik front camber is not adjustable. Rear is only adjustable on cars with multi link rear suspension which few Skodas have.

2 minutes ago, J.R. said:

Battery recharge!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Stop/start (micro hybrid) cars  maintain an average 70%-80% state of charge. Normal and recharging is superfluous.

Dealers that do this sort of thing only drag their reputation and other main dealers downwards. From my experience the dealers that do this are also the ones that try to charge you well over the odds for the service work too. If you can you should vote with your feet and go elsewhere.

 

Conversely, I visited a Skoda dealer on Monday for a £99 oil service and £54 brake fluid change. Free "health check" done, nothing identified as additionally required or recommended. Just the total £153 to pay the servicing I booked and that's it. My previous 2 visits have been the same.

Edited 9 November, 20187 yr by ahenners

What a disgrace - dealer should be named and shamed.

 

Scaremongering and charging extortionate prices it’s quite frankly unacceptable - I wouldn’t be taking my car back there again.

@BoxerBoy  Was this @ Parks, Arnold Clark's or some other shark?

1 hour ago, ahenners said:

Dealers that do this sort of thing only drag their reputation and other main dealers downwards. From my experience the dealers that do this are also the ones that try to charge you well over the odds for the service work too. If you can you should vote with your feet and go elsewhere.

 

Conversely, I visited a Skoda dealer on Monday for a £99 oil service and £54 brake fluid change. Free "health check" done, nothing identified as additionally required or recommended. Just the total £153 to pay the servicing I booked and that's it. My previous 2 visits have been the same.

 

If I just wanted someone to change my oil and/or brake fluid, I’d pop round the corner to my nearest independent tyre / service / MOT emporium and have the job done for a fraction of these prices.

 

As an aside, I was given the “invoice” to show how my 2nd annual service would have been charged - 

Labour £72.49

Long Life Oil £23.46

Oil filter £6.69

Pollen Filter £18.11

Washer £2.88

Screen Wash Solution 1L £2.88

 

Parts discount -£3.23 (?)

 

Bottom line inc. VAT £150.07

 

BTW having paid for 3 annual services up front, each service averages £110.

Which I’m OK with.

 

I just can’t stand the BS that goes with it.

 

Funnily enough I did NOT receive a video clip today from the geek under the car during the service showing me that he knew how to use a phone to send me a clip of him “on the job” and taking good care of our car. Utter ******. Which what I politely told the nice SKODA person who callled me last year after the service as part of their customer service follow up.

 

I guess I have an asterisk against my name saying “don’t send this guy a video clip”.

As others have said - name and shame.

 

Regarding that oil service for £99 and brake fluid change for £54 - wherabouts in central scotland do you go for this 'at a fraction' of the price?  I live in central scotland and most people I approached for just an oil service on my SEAT refused. (Only one SEAT garage - Mossison's Stirling, would entertain an oil change, every other SEAT dealer in the whole of Central Scotland refused citing they would only offer a full service).  I finally managed to find a small local indi (with excellent customer feedback) to do the oil change for around £80 - that's about £40 less than Morrisons were charging.  Must say if I'd known that Skoda were offering the service for £99, I'd have been happy to pay the £20 extra for a VAG stamp and no question whatsoever if I need to make a warranty claim at a later date.

Edited 10 November, 20187 yr by Guest

Xman is correct there's an amount of negative camber on the front that CANT be adjusted (1.25 degrees) so id say that was a borderline fraudulent statement to extract 100 notes!

heres my before and after done on a hunter, check out the bottom statement!


 

It's a little like those dodgy Nigerian email scams. It only takes one or two people to fall for it to pay for all those that didn't.

 

My PCH required a service before it goes back and being on a variable it was £205 for it's first service.

 

It was persisting it down, so first of all I am told they can't do the free vac/clean.

 

Then, as they are about 10 miles from my house, I opted to wait. 45 minutes later I was handed my invoice, paid and left.

 

Something stupid like £40 oil, rest was labour and vat... 

 

Annoyingly this is something I would've gone to national tyres for their £40 oil change but being it was PCH, I could see them complaining.

And it's not unknown for them to "miss out"  certain items on the schedule. Especially on bigger services. I had a Mitsubishi ASX Van that needed it's "big" service under the maintenance plan, it was around £475. I went through the items done and parts charged for on the extensive list which included many gaskets and seals to do the required valve clearances. Lifted the bonnet and the top plastic cover hadn't even been removed let alone cam covers etc, not even a finger mark on it, same with the wheels. I just couldn't let this go by so took the manager out to show him and see what he thought. They tried to argue at first but gave in and said "we will re check them if that's what you want" !!!. Two hours later ...... 

Edited 10 November, 20187 yr by teescom09

It's the part of main dealership I hate it really winds me up, blatant ripping off, Once my car is out of warranty i'll be going  back to my usual VW/Audi/Skoda independent garage.

My mate runs his own garage and I know i`ll only pay when it's necessary.

The alignment is expensive because of the lane assist I would guess..

 

I believe it has to be tied in with camera calibration..

7 minutes ago, pdtrewern said:

The alignment is expensive because of the lane assist I would guess..

 

I believe it has to be tied in with camera calibration..

 

Nooooooooo.

 

On a basic car without such frivolities.

 

It’s all a game.

 

Hey ho - one more paid for annual service next October before it gets turned in / sold on or whatever.

 

Will be a super wee motor for somebody.

On 10/11/2018 at 04:48, gRoberts said:

Annoyingly this is something I would've gone to national tyres for their £40 oil change but being it was PCH, I could see them complaining.

 

£40    Is that what tey quoted you for a longlife oil change using the correct manufacturer spec. parts  or just a price on an advert?

14 minutes ago, Scot5 said:

 

£40    Is that what tey quoted you for a longlife oil change using the correct manufacturer spec. parts  or just a price on an advert?

 

£48.56

19 hours ago, Greenie58 said:

It's the part of main dealership I hate it really winds me up, blatant ripping off, Once my car is out of warranty i'll be going  back to my usual VW/Audi/Skoda independent garage.

My mate runs his own garage and I know i`ll only pay when it's necessary.

 

Surprised your mate hasn't already told you that as long as he uses manufacturer approved parts and services it according to the manufacturers schedule, your warranty will be intact. (assuming he's VAT registered and you retain all the necessary receipts to prove the work has been done). The manufacturers monopoly on servicing their own vehicles was abolished by the EU years ago.

 

From Skoda Warranty T & C:

 

SERVICING

Your vehicle should be serviced in accordance with the manufacturer's recommendations. Any damage to or defect in the vehicle caused by poor or insufficient servicing will not be rememedied under the vehicle warranty.

Please ensure you maintain sufficient records to enable our Authorised Network to confirm that the vehicle has been appropriately serviced. In any event, please insure that the digital service schedule has been updated by the business carrying out the service work, or detailed invoices supplied with date, mileage, plus specified parts and fluids used.

 

Edited 11 November, 20187 yr by Guest

1 minute ago, Scot5 said:

 

Surprised your mate hasn't already told you that as long as he uses manufacturer approved parts and services it according to the manufacturers schedule, your warranty will be intact. (assuming he's VAT registered and you retain all the necessary receipts to prove the work has been done). The manufacturers monopoly on servicing their own vehicles was abolished by the EU years ago.

 

From Skoda Warranty T & C:

 

SERVICING

Your vehicle should be serviced in accordance with the manufacturer's recommendations. Any damage to or defect in the vehicle caused by poor or insufficient servicing will not be rememedied under the vehicle warranty.

Please ensure you maintain sufficient records to enable our Authorised Network to confirm that the vehicle has been appropriately serviced. In any event, please insure that the digital service schedule has been updated by the business carrying out the service work, or detailed invoices supplied with date, mileage, plus specified parts and fluids used.

 

He's not vat registered.

7 minutes ago, gRoberts said:

 

£48.56

 

That makes more sense because £40 they'd be paying you to change the oil.  Of course that isn't unheard of because businesses will operate at a loss to attract custom. Of course there's a reason for this...  they'll also check over your car and point out the other so called 'faults' which they'll kindly fix... at a price.  (usually referred to as 'free winter checkup' or 'free tyre checkup' or 'free brake service') and we end up back at square one accusing those people of 'having a laugh'.   Big chain tyre centres are infamous for this.

8 minutes ago, Greenie58 said:

He's not vat registered.

Entirely up to the individual but the life of a car is judged to be around 6 years ( 5yr in Scotland). Even if out-of-warranty, you're covered by law for certain circumstances but if it's proven you have no maintenance record then you forfeit any rights you may have.

 

Having a relatively new car serviced with no records would be too risky for me, but as I say everyone has their own requirements. ( If you ever need to sell the car, you'd also loose a chunk of money because it'd be sold without service history).

1 hour ago, Scot5 said:

 

That makes more sense because £40 they'd be paying you to change the oil.  Of course that isn't unheard of because businesses will operate at a loss to attract custom. Of course there's a reason for this...  they'll also check over your car and point out the other so called 'faults' which they'll kindly fix... at a price.  (usually referred to as 'free winter checkup' or 'free tyre checkup' or 'free brake service') and we end up back at square one accusing those people of 'having a laugh'.   Big chain tyre centres are infamous for this.

 

When I used to take my Bora in, it was done in 5 minutes normally. Literally, drove in, up in the air, oil drained, filter changed and then filled up.

 

Never once have they done any health checks. Used to get my Mondeo done for £25 using Castrol edge if I remember correctly.

1 hour ago, Scot5 said:

Entirely up to the individual but the life of a car is judged to be around 6 years ( 5yr in Scotland). Even if out-of-warranty, you're covered by law for certain circumstances but if it's proven you have no maintenance record then you forfeit any rights you may have.

 

Having a relatively new car serviced with no records would be too risky for me, but as I say everyone has their own requirements. ( If you ever need to sell the car, you'd also loose a chunk of money because it'd be sold without service history).

With previous cars he's always stamped the service book and Iv had no issues selling on, with the car I have now a 16 plate the service obviously will be logged on a database but he can still give me an invoice, my word has been enough when selling on with my cars on and I cant think of a time when the service history has been questioned or checked even though its been documented.