@Coral-C - I feel for you, having endured the misery of Lloyd Group for the past few years. Excellent at the beginning but then lost all.of their good employees and became so bad it was best described as 'dark comedy'. To be fair, they recruited a new Service Manager and he has tried to turn Lloyd Kelso around with a degree of success. The dealership even issued a public newsletter by email to their customers apologising for what went before. Thing is, at approx. £170 per hour labour and the usual 'premium badge tax' associated with Land Rover, it hurts even more than similar poor service from a mainstream franchise garage.

My Skoda dealership is West End Skoda in Edinburgh. They are a privately owned group of just three Skoda dealerships which are all based in Scotland. They have been very fair, respectful and gracious as we worked through the rejection of Rosie 1 back in March. My Senior Sales Executive is also excellent and he has messaged me every month on or around the 1st with an order update. It feels personal. The Sales Manager is also a good guy and both have worked at the dealership for many years. Continuity and consistency are severely underrated these days. They're not perfect but who is, especially in the world of car sales, and so patience is needed in the relationship.

The caveat is that I have no experience yet of the aftersales service since we haven't collected Rosie 2 yet. That's crucial because the folk in the service team are the ones that really matter for the long-term ownership experience. When we visit for our own personal PDI, I hope to spend a few minutes chatting with the Service Manager and perhaps a member of his/her team.

What I can say is that this dealership doesn't have a 'hostess welcome' person (Edinburgh Audi) whose sole job purpose is to greet you on entry and simply show you to a seat - this lady must have had a substantial clothing allowance included in her remuneration package because she always looked stunning! Neither do they have a receptionist which initially feels odd until you realise that our experience of dealership receptionists is simply to try and transfer your call before telling you that the line is busy and they will ask someone to call you back, which has a less than 50% hit rate. At Lloyd Kelso, I was on first name terms with the receptionist who was a very kind lady and who eventually couldn't apologise sincerely enough for her colleagues after many weeks of no returned calls. We made it a game in the end and laughed together at the utter stupidity of the whole process. At West End, you choose the department you need on your keypad and get straight through - no call centre,no receptionist and no hostess service. And no £170 per hour labour charges! That's refreshing. No palacial glass and marble showroom which attempts to shrink you in the way a global bank's HQ attempts to do (here's looking at you, RBS Gogarburn before you crashed the economy in 2008 with your subprime loan book and over extended debt). Smoke and mirrors. West End is a decent, real world kind of place which feels normal.....and the toilets are spotless, always a good sign!

But we shall see how collection goes and the follow through thereafter. Honestly, I'm not asking for much: an unspectacular but straightforward customer journey will be just fine. No ribbons, no dustsheet reveal, no fanfare. Just a Sales Exec who is happy to help me set up my user account with Rosie and a bunch of experienced, salt of the earth technicians who understand what the strainer is on the Haldex 4x4 system. Substance matters, gloss is superfluous.

I will let the Briskoda Community know how it all goes, including the follow through with the all important team in the service department.

Hope this has been helpful!

David.

Edited 1 hour ago1 hr by Arianne
typo

Thanks for the extensive reply, David. Edinburgh is probably a little too far for me, but @Evolution13 has kindly given me a couple of pointers for recommended Skoda dealers closer to home.

My nearest main dealership was adequate when buying a new car, but servicing and after-sales is far from good. Prices quoted randomly got VAT added afterwards, work was done and then needed to be re-done because their 'fix' did not address the actual problem, lack of communication, etc. And don't get me started on their salesman who told me with a completely straight face that he would sell a new L&K 4x4 with all options (i.e. around £55k list price) for well under £40k while we were negotiating a trade-in price 🤨

With my previous car, which I owned for 10 years from new, I gave up on the dealership after 5 years and had all servicing done by a local, non-affiliated, garage who were much better in every way. With the new car, however, I feel I should go back to an official dealership - at least in the early years - to maintain a full 'dealer' service history. The work won't be any better than my local garage would do, but fussy buyers will prefer to see it in the documentation when I come to sell. Hence my search for somewhere I can trust.

Also, with the greater level of software in the Mk4 compared to my old Mk3, it probably needs more specialist attention anyway. Skoda seems to be progressively locking down the software systems so that non-approved technicians and owners cannot tinker with the cars. From this forum, I see that there are reports of more things to go wrong with the new models - although many of them seem to be teething problems with the very early Mk4 cars so (fingers-crossed) I may be unaffected. But again, it all points to needing to engage with an official dealer.

BTW, I saw that you have the 19" Veritate wheels on Rosie. They look great, but they are a pain to clean because of the limited access behind the spokes and the strange design of the wheel barrel. Take a look at my posts in this forum for a possible solution if you intend to wash them yourself.

Your observations are ones I can identify with @Coral-C . The use of an official dealership is sensible at least until the manufacturer's warranty expires, possibly a bit after that too, because a decent dealer will argue on your behalf for warranty claims and goodwill on any issues arising up to and slightly beyond the end of the warranty period. I know you can use an independent providing they use approved parts and consumables but it's hassle none of us need.

These cars, almost all modern cars, are becoming 'computers on wheels'. The dealerships are struggling to keep up and the issue extends across almost all brands. While the car industry is going through huge changes due to electrification, technology and Chinese challenger brands, I would rather run a mainstream European manufactured car right now because the proven support network exists. Perfect? No, but if my Superb develops a fault in Austria in January 2027 at sub-zero temperatures, there's an experienced Skoda dealership nearby. Tyroleans love Skoda as they are practical, alpine people. If it has pop out door handles, they don't buy it! Meanwhile, the Xpeng is left abandoned in the snow below the Schatzberg cable car!

I wish you well with your search for your new dealership for servicing. West End also have sites in Stirling and Dunfermline although I cannot vouch for them.

Best wishes, David.

PS. The 19" Veritate rims are for the summer only. I am a sucker for aesthetics on a car and these rims make the Superb look a little more elegant even if they are a pain to clean and unsettle the ride slightly, DCC+ mitigation excepted. As it is, our cars are totally pampered on our driveway using the two-bucket method, wheel cleaning tools and a trusty microfibre cloth. The inner barrels are cleaned together with the unseen inside facing spokes at every wash. I hate doing it but the results are worth it.

In winter, we will run 17" dowdy rims because they will take a hammering with road salt, only the 17" rims can accommodate chains without fouling the running gear and it's the law in alpine Austria and Como, Italy. I've never used chains on any of our 4x4 vehicles, including the much more basic Haldex system of our 2006 Volvo XC90, since premium brand winter tyres with more than 4mm tread depth are just fine. If they cannot do the business then it's not because of traction issues but rather deep snow, a lack of clearance and the snow plough effect. Then it's game over anyway.

So Rosie will look dowdy for six months of the year but then the mud, salt and spray of life in Scotland and the Alps across the winter means almost all cars look dowdy. And in the Austrian Tyrol, a stunning car on large rims just looks weird in winter and slightly uncool. In Italy, your car is uncool anyway unless it has knocks and scrapes across at least three corners - they don't have fully comprehensive insurance as we do here in the UK so, when it's damaged they just move on! South of Naples they don't bother with car insurance at all. Unbelievable but true!

Edited 1 hour ago1 hr by Arianne
The addition of the postscript.