Main dealer rip off...

[BSAvale]

Just a rant!

I work in Automotive so I know the deal but these examples seems to have much more of a mark up!

My 12 year old Rav4 which only does a few thousand miles a year now is having a service, Toyota were competitive on service costs and since they wash it and local garage doesn't and it is still filthy from the game season it has gone there. I thought it was only worth a few £thousand but looking on Autotrader with car prices having gone silly it appears to still be worth what I bought it for 5.5 years and 60k miles ago so it is having some overdue attention.

Managed to negotiate them down to match local for brakes and pads which I expected to be needed so that's ok.

The undertray is damaged - the little flap to empty the sump hit a rock...I have it fastened with two cable ties - Toyota advisory - £400!!!! ebay - £54 delivered.

Driver's side washer jet is not as powerful as the near side - I already changed the T piece myself (for £2) so it likely just needs a poke to clear some debris - Toyota advisory - £73!

What's the most a dealer has tried to take the mickey with on your vehicles chaps?

 

[Liveonce]

New coils pack on a Vauxhall £270.00 fitted, two bolts to remove it and refit, four new springs which make the connection to the spark plugs and pullout/push back in to the rubber sheaths from ebay £7.00 job took half hour start to finish.

 

[takbok]

About £1000 and 3 trips/days to garage for a drawn out and bodged new exhaust.

A local exhaust/tyre place does a stainless catback sytem for £350 in 2-3 hours that will last the life of the car.

 

[simgre]

Told me I needed new discs and pads, front and rear. Quoted £550, on a Friday afternoon can do it straight away.

Turned out the front didn’t need doing at all. No where near it. Rear discs and pads did. Cost me £189.

Mine, the wife’s and the boys all went there. None of us do now. A lot of business because they tried to have me over.

 

[Loki]

My advice would be to find a well reviewed local Independent.

 

[Sealgair nam fiadh]

Not a main dealer but a local quick fit tyre/exhaust place.
Wife took a Discovery 1for it's mot.
Not good they said "hand brakes not working, you need new calipers and discs on the back, it will cost £500".
Wife said " that's funny because it's a transmission brake and you can adjust it with a 17mm spanner".
She complained to their head office and got the cost of the mot refunded and a £100 voucher.

 

[splash]

I used to have a Toyota and every service they charged me £5 to top the screen washer up but never did.
So on the last service they did i filled it with screen wash completely overflowing when I put the cap on, before dropping it off sure enough they charged the £5 .
I complained that they couldn’t of added anything to the bottle, to be told they emptied it before filling it up with their fluid !
I told them it was bull and I had never been back or bought another Toyota

 

[Sealgair nam fiadh]

The funniest part was when she was kicking up f__k at the reception desk a parts courier walked in and said " here's the brakes for the Discovery you ordered"

 

[David T]

Jaguar charge £176 per hour just for the mechanics time. Last job, 2 x sensors so had them changed by local garage for £178 all in.

My dads Lexus needed his drivers side wing mirror replaced. £50-100 on Ebay. £756 at main dealer.

Don't mind paying for a service that somebody is providing but I can't stand being ripped off. The accountants that set these costs have no idea of the commercial world, pressure they put their front of house staff under and level of business they are losing. Their loss.

 

[Norfolk Horn]

Took my Toyota hilux in for a service and was told they couldn't do the dif oil as it needed a special tool and I would need to come back.
I was so busy at the time I booked to return the following Saturday I didn'tpay then as they hadn'tcompletedthe service or should I say I wouldn't. In the meantime I had a look and the special tool was a large socket.
On my return I rather bent the service managers ear and demanded my time and addition travel costs be reimbursed.
Quite a forthright chat latter I gave them half of the original quote as strange as it seemed I valued my time at the same rate as they valued their workshop rate. Funny that!!!
No more business from me

 

[FrenchieBoy]

Not a main dealer but a local quick fit tyre/exhaust place.
Wife took a Discovery 1for it's mot.
Not good they said "hand brakes not working, you need new calipers and discs on the back, it will cost £500".
Wife said " that's funny because it's a transmission brake and you can adjust it with a 17mm spanner".
She complained to their head office and got the cost of the mot refunded and a £100 voucher.

Useful having a wife that knows what she is talking about isn't it!

 

[Sealgair nam fiadh]

I was working away from home at the time and told her the hand brake might need adjusting but not to worry about it as it takes five minutes with a spanner.

 

[Norfolk Horn]

A tyre company that did the police cars ripped my wife off by over charging her about a £100 this was 15 years ago roughly.
They didn't realise that she worked at the local police station but they did after I got hold of the manager who I new and persuaded him it would be in everyone's interest for him to take that £100 and return it to her at work as soon as we finished our chat, which he did to her confusion.
It was all just a big understanding according to him.
The problem is my wife is nice but I guess one of us has to be.

 

[Fair Hill]

Got quoted 375 euro from Lexus Dealer to change oil, oil filter, air filter and cabin filter in a hybrid.

Bought the filters online, local mechanic supplied the oil, total cost of materials about 60 euro, mechanic had it (and a couple of other jobs) done in less than an hour and asked me was 20 euro fair for labour.

 

[Fair Hill]

Jaguar charge £176 per hour just for the mechanics time. Last job, 2 x sensors so had them changed by local garage for £178 all in.

My dads Lexus needed his drivers side wing mirror replaced. £50-100 on Ebay. £756 at main dealer.

Don't mind paying for a service that somebody is providing but I can't stand being ripped off. The accountants that set these costs have no idea of the commercial world, pressure they put their front of house staff under and level of business they are losing. Their loss.

Got quoted 910 euro for exact same thing.

 

[Bavarianbrit]

The large manufacturers all force their official dealers to refit their showrooms and workshops to a company style that cost a small fortune to do then they have to pass it all on to their customer. Hollis Motors in Dover was a VW main dealer for years and a good one for us till they pushed him as above he gave it all up and only does Seats now.

 

[Liveonce]

I used to have a Toyota and every service they charged me £5 to top the screen washer up but never did.
So on the last service they did i filled it with screen wash completely overflowing when I put the cap on, before dropping it off sure enough they charged the £5 .
I complained that they couldn’t of added anything to the bottle, to be told they emptied it before filling it up with their fluid !
I told them it was bull and I had never been back or bought another Toyota

Vauxhall service sheet included checking the tyre pressure of the spare tyre, so I let all the air out, got the car back still with no air in the tyre, complained the service had not been done correctly, got the offer for them to top the spare up with air, said no how do I know what else you have not done? Got no further with them have never been back to that main dealer. Personally would never have another Vauxhall but the wife likes them.

 

[sikasako]

When my Hilux was in Arnold Clark Toyota for its annual service I was advised that it needed new front brake callipers.
Total price I was quoted (including the service) was £2,300

 

[BSAvale]

That reminds me…on another car I had, a little Toyota Auris I bought for my wife, the windscreen wiper sensor kept falling off the windscreen - I had identified this when I bought it and they were supposed to have fixed it before collection. They clearly hadn’t.

It went back several times and kept falling off (I think it had had a new screen which wasn’t OEM at some point and clearly slightly poorly tolerances so was never going to fit).

I got fed up and told them I want it sorting once and for all, they promised to replace the unit but I didn’t trust them so scratched my initials into the inside of the plastic housing. The service manager swore to me that they had fitted a new part when it was collected. The unit fell off again a few days later and surprise surprise, it contained my mark…I quite enjoyed that conversation with the service manager who got very angry at being called a liar until I pointed out the proof and he was already in the hole he’d dug for himself.

 

[Liveonce]

My mate took his Toyota hybrid in for a first service, being retired from the motor trade, he was most upset when they changed the engine oil and filter, his view was it had done virtually all of the total mileage by electric so why did the oil and filter need changing