….use National Tyres. They used to be poor, but now Halfrauds have bought them, they’re absolutely abysmal. I had booked to have 4 All Season Contis fitted at my local National via TyreShopper, another National now H company. Their useless website would not allow a booking to be made there, so a very helpful person at the National call centre to me to reserve them at another branch and they would then book the tyres to be delivered to my local branch.

 

I turn up last Friday at 09.50 for the 10am booking. They check the booking and they remove the wheels and tyres. At 10.15 I’m told there’s a problem; they don’t have the tyres. I’m asked if I made the booking for Kingston and I explained the situation. He says they didn’t change the booking and they’ll be at the other branch. He rings them. They’ve put them in a cab and they’ll be here in 30 mins. Not a chance think I.
 

At 11.10, I tell them to refit the P7’s. Simple game; knowing they’re don’t have the tyres, they go-ahead and remove the ones to be replaced giving the customer no choice but to wait til tyres arrive.

 

I also see them scamming women into changing perfectly sound pads and discs. £695 for a front set on a Fabia but they’ll do them for £550. They also tried the same on the driver of a BMW 3 series; “see this (1mm) ridge here on the outside of the disc - that means it’s failed; they’ll all be the same so you need new discs and pads all round!” I leave at 11.40 and complain. The booking was made there and the tyres were delivered to them on Wednesday. They’ve also damaged an alloy. They’ve agreed to pay for the refurb and have offered an insult of a free MOT which I rejected. Booking is now made at a local Halfrauds today, but it should have been tomorrow - brilliant. 🙄 In two minds whether to cancel and get a refund.

National tyres have been owned by Halfrauds for a while now.

 

Youd thing they would check the tyres are there before removing them?

 

they also damaged a wheel on my car, admitted liability straight away and paid for a refurb that was shocking, I wish I just made them pay for a brand new wheel as the refurb diamond cut was terrible.

 

 

the joys of a fast fit centre where the staff give 0 cares about anyones car in there and normally end up with some extra damage. But because 99% of people wouldn’t notice or care; they don’t either.

To be fair I used Tyreshopper to get a full set of Goodyear Vector 4 tyres fitted to Mrs BJ's Panda via National Tyres (Hull)- no issues but this site was selectable on the web site.

 

However would I ever use trust my car to any fastfit site for service, MOT or repairs - never. 

We are having the same grief!

I'd used Kwik fit mobile to fit the tyres on my 718 a few months ago, brilliant service, job well done. Generally prefer the mobile fitters as they are way better than the depot clowns.

A few weeks ago I booked mobile tyre fitting for the all seasons I had fitted through Black circles. ATS mobile did the fitting, again very good job done. I used Black Circles as they were the cheapest for the tyres I wanted...

 

Anyway, booked the GFs Golf R in for Kwik fit mobile fitting of a set of tyres about 4 weeks ago. Had to wait just over a week for fitting, they cancelled at lunch time as the fitter had gone sick. Waited another week for the next appointment, they called and 5:15pm to say the tyres weren't at the depot. Had a nightmare contacting them to attempt to rebook, they eventually said this Saturday. At this point I threw my teddy out of my pram and insisted it was done in the week.

Eventually, they call back as promised and it's re-arranged for this Wednesday.

I have clearly stated that if they fail to turn up, we'll be wanting a full refund & compensation!

 

I find it amazing that a company can give such extremes of service quality.

I'm looking forward to the request for a review😂

I use blackcircles and a local back street tyre shop where the owner does most of the work. No stupid upselling or carelessness. Support your local small business!

Decided to go ahead and I had the tyres fitted this morning. Chalk and cheese. The staff were polite, efficient and the garage was clean and tidy. In and out in 45 mins. I’m getting the wheel refurbed tomorrow and will submit the receipt for a refund; they’ve also agreed to a £100 goodwill refund on the tyres. I won’t be using them again. Tyres are great, but will report back after a few hundred miles, as brand new ones are always quieter and generally drive far better than old, irrespective of make/type.

I have my own old school manual tyre changing machine, I've used it loads for 13" & 15" trailer tyres but all were metal rims, I have a slow deflation on an alloy rim on my Yeti, it might be a slow puncture, bead leak or maybe a porous rim, none of which scenarios have I ever had a good outcome with at a tyre fitters, due mainly I believe to time pressure, also as the tyres are approaching the wear marker I know that in France they will make up an excuse that the tyre is not repairable and lie and say that the law says that they must replace both tyres on the same axle.

 

So I am going to bite the bullet and see if I can demount and remount the tyre on the manual machine with the lever bar without wrecking the alloy rim, the car is a shed now anyway so not a big deal.

 

It will be ironic that after shelling out to tyre fitters for 30 years plus because they have the machines that supposedly will not damage an alloy rim to find that I do less damage than they frequently do doing mine manually!

I've used National Tyres 3 times -

 

1) After a repair, I discovered months later that they'd lost the plastic tweezers for getting the wheel bolt covers off.

2) Had to get a new tyre urgently following a nail in the side wall. Discovered weeks later that I no longer had 5 wheel bolt covers on that wheel.

3) Following another puncture repair, on looking for the manufacturing date on that tyre, I noticed that the tyre had been put back on inside out!

 

I could never bring myself to use them ever again.

15 hours ago, nicknorman said:

I use blackcircles and a local back street tyre shop where the owner does most of the work. No stupid upselling or carelessness. Support your local small business!

Yep. That’s who I originally used. Decided to give the business to a small indy, thinking they need the business after C19. Never again. 

UPDATE

 

So now I’ve got 300 mixed miles on the Conti All Season tyres I’m happy to report I’m very impressed. Grip is great in the wet and dry. A couple of days ago we had about 10cm of snow, which turned to slush and then froze. I left to goto work at 05.30 and our fantastic Kingston Council has not laid any road salt at all so far this year and there was ice across the pavement and right across the road in front of the drive. There was zero slip from the tyres as I left the drive and crossed the ice, which continued to the T Junction when again, there was no sign of skid as I came to a stop. But thee most impressive thing is the tyre roar or to be accurate, the lack of it! These are amazingly quiet tyres, which will make our long trips very much more relaxing.