HJ was given the horror story of a car suffered total engine failure despite having all the stamps in the service book - engine failure at 30,000 mls and out of warranty.
Turns out the Ford Servicing dealer (not the supplying Ford dealer) had stamped the service book but in 30K miles had not changed the oil/filters................they had stamped the book and printed an invoice. Forensic examination showed there was no oil changes/filter changes.
HJ advised the owner to sue the "servicing garage" for the £7,000 repair bill.
Years ago there were stories of cars having the handbrake adjusted, washed and vacuumed and the service book stamped.................
How many of us have been fleeced over the years?
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I bet it was a diesel. Because it does not take long for the oil to turn black and therefore you might not realise it had not been changed.
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Before the day of t'internet i daresay this sort of thing went on regularly, now with the many motoring forums such things become widely known, maybe a lot of us prefer to service our own cars as we then know it's been done.
As for the general public being fleeced it's gone on for centuries at the houses of parliament, and will do for ever more,
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I have always been baffled by the way "What Car?" has features about shopping around to get the cheapest service for your car.
When I get my car serviced, I'm not interested in how cheap it is - I'm interested in whether the garage will do it properly. Saving £20 or £30 isn't a big deal.
The "What Car?" approach seems to make the very odd assumption that in terms of quality of work, all garages are equal.
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this country runs on can you do it cheaper syndrome though
i always get it and everyone else in service trades gets it too that i know
i sometimes ask for a stamp cheaper in the post office if im willing to lick it myself
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Unfortunately the motor trade is at an all time low, as regards service levels.
Where I work, all our technicians are currently being told on a daily basis that their efficiency's are too low.
in all workshops, there are different levels of ability, and the better the tech, the harder jobs he will get given.
those harder jobs obviously will take more time than an oil filter change.
so... the carp guys efficiency's are higher, they get a pat on the back, meanwhile the good guys keep wondering how long they will have their job for.
of course, one day the 'Management' will see the error of their ways, but by then the workshops will be full of half-baked idiots only capable of changing oil (if they can be bothered) whilst the decent techies are working on their own, for indies, or stacking shelves at Tescos....
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or headhunted to work in one of the new halfords coming to a site near you soon
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No fresh employment;Halfords just bought "Nationwide Autocentres".
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The takeover will lead to Nationwide's 224 outlets being rebranded as Halfords Autocentres.
Halfords says it then plans to open another 200 centres, creating more than 1,000 new jobs.
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Someone I know is a bike tech in Halfords, and tells me that there are plans to spin "Bike Hut" out into a separate entity later this year.
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>> Unfortunately the motor trade is at an all time low as regards service levels.
>>
Not sure that's true - it's as rubbish now as it's always been in the 30 years I've been using franchised dealers.
I've dabbled with indies and local garages but never found one I felt comfortable with and I've taken the view that at least with a franchised dealer there's a corporate entity I can shout at if necessary.
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>> I've dabbled with indies and local garages but never found one I felt comfortable with
>>
Thats a pity, my MB indy is old school and a gentleman and knows them inside out but his place looks scrap yardish to those who don't know which suits us regulars fine, other would undoubtably turn their noses up.
My daughter has found a very amenable Indian chap who runs a small garage and keeps her going at very reasonable rates with good work, and my sons Subaru rallying specialist in North Wales knows them inside out too (and the way his car goes is testament), we'll have to see how well the recently discovered BM specialist performs in due course.
They are around but they take some finding, they tend to be in tucked away in affordable places and grateful customers don't want too many new ones causing queuing problems so don't shout about them.
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>> Thats a pity my MB indy is old school and a gentleman and knows them
>> inside out but his place looks scrap yardish to those who don't know which suits
>> us regulars fine other would undoubtably turn their noses up.
I have one in mind for my MB now the service contract is ending.
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For anyone with a BMW in the Reading area I can thoroughly recommend Steve at Berkshire Motor Works (0118 979 8448) - trained and worked for ten years or so at the big Reading BMW dealer and set up on his own about two years ago.
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>> I have one in mind for my MB now the service contract is ending.
>>
It would be an interesting experiment to take your car in to the dealer once service contract has elapsed to see how many jobs are due that wouldn't otherwise have needed doing...if you follow my drift.
There are some highly recommended indies on the 2 main MB forums i hope you get a good 'un, my own chap saves me a lot of money as well as doing good work.
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>> It would be an interesting experiment to take your car in to the dealer once
>> service contract has elapsed to see how many jobs are due that wouldn't otherwise have
>> needed doing...if you follow my drift.
>>
They have been better during the last couple of visits (MOT in Oct and service in Feb) in pushing other jobs through, whereas earlier on they just refused everything but the most basec servicing. However I've spend a fortune on ServicePlus and had liitle value from it, although I've been happy to pay it for the peace of mind.
>> There are some highly recommended indies on the 2 main MB forums i hope you
>> get a good 'un my own chap saves me a lot of money as well
>> as doing good work.
>>
Who is the indie you use? I'm looking at MB Tech in Warrington, but it's a bit of trek from where I live.
Last edited by: Bill Payer on Sun 7 Mar 10 at 16:44
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>> Who is the indie you use? I'm looking at MB Tech in Warrington but it's
>> a bit of trek from where I live.
>>
I'm in Northants so's he and i'll be happy to give you the info but not on open forum, don't want anyone unsavoury badgering him, not suggesting anyone here qualifies you understand..;)...if you want to send me a pm via one of the mods....
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>> I don't want anyone unsavoury badgering him not suggesting anyone here qualifies
>> you understand..;)
>>
Oh, I don't know ...
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>> I'm in Northants so's he and i'll be happy to give you the info
Thanks for the offer, but that's way outside of my range.
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vxfan_mod at car4play.com
smokie_mod at car4play.com
Just in case anyone needs 'em.
Last edited by: VxFan on Mon 8 Mar 10 at 00:20
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Correction that is preferably:
moderators at car4play.com which goes to all mods.
Contacting them individually would be:
vxfan_mod at car4play.com
smokie_mod at car4play.com
Old habits I suppose. But better to email the moderators to get an email to all of them rather than thinking emailing one is best. And smoke mistyped vxfan's too.
Last edited by: smokie on Mon 8 Mar 10 at 07:21
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>> And smoke mistyped vxfan's too.
Thanks Rob. Now corrected. Do you want me to add an 'i' to Smoke too ;o)
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>> When I get my car serviced I'm not interested in how cheap it is -
>> I'm interested in whether the garage will do it properly.
Me too. I take the same approach with car insurance. You get what you pay for.
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>> >> When I get my car serviced I'm not interested in how cheap it is
>> >> I'm interested in whether the garage will do it properly.
Ho hum. So the best advice is to pay top whack... and go to the dealer. But OP's example DID go to the dealer. All that proves is that you might as well go for the cheapest.
Escargot>> Me too. I take the same approach with car insurance. You get what you pay
>> for.
I doubt it. So does that mean you go to a price comparison website and buy the most EXPENSIVE car insurance you can? I was pricing up my own insurance last week, and TPFT was considerably more expensive than fully comp.
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>> So does that mean you go to a price comparison website and
>> buy the most EXPENSIVE car insurance you can?
I go for the best quality of cover.
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The Daily Telegraph attracts the horror stories because the small number of people who are dissatisfied like to publicise the fact. The large number people who are satisfied don't feel the need to say anything.
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Last time I took the Zafira to the local Vx franchise for a service it came back with the oil looking distinctly dirty, it's a petrol BTW.
That was, of course, the last time I intend to use their services. No way of reasonably proving they hadn't done the work, so I took the hint and told everyone I knew about the suspected non-oil change. Funnily enough, lots of other people had very similar complaints about the same dealer...
As it happens, I change the oil and filter half way between the normal 20k dealer servicing anyway, so it's always sure to have an oil change then...
Now the old girl is past 4 years old, I can't say I'll be bothering to get dealer stamps any more.
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Having read the letter in the paper and the fact that the writer said he was going to sue ford i came to the conclusion that im am sceptical any of this actually happened
I have a dammed good mind(the left half) to contact the paper direct to ask for furtherr detaills but last time i rang them with a goods story they dismifferd me.
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Bellboy reporting from the sticks...............
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It does seem unlikely they could prove beyond reasonable doubt that the oil hadn't been changed.
However, it seems far from unlikely that oil changes are being skipped but still charged for. If I was generous, I would say it only happens when an honest mistake is made, but then that seems naive, don't you think?
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Ford - Story HJ/DT -"a Ford Garage Servicing" or not!!! - rtj70
