VW Dealerships: How they treat you?

[dazzyvr6 0]

nice one,ill give you a shout when i need something :D :)

[Fat Tony 0]

http://the-corrado.net/.archive/forum/viewtopic.php?t=5771

 

See here for my feedback and I might add VW uk cound not give a dam

 

Different Dane I may add

[stevenmcc 0]

Having bought a VR6 a couple of months ago I thought I'd give it a service. The biggest mistake I made was taking it to a VW main dealer. I asked for a normal VW service, and I also needed a new passenger door handle and a look at my broken sunroof. The service was going to consist of the usual and the brake fluid needed changing - when I took the car in the brakes were working fine. After what should have taken a few hours I get a phone call two and a half days later informing me that I needed a new ABS pump, a new master cylinder and new bleed valves, and all for the price of £1700. You can imagine my reply.

 

After talking to a number of mechanics, garages etc I was pretty convinced that something wasn't quite right - car goes into garage with brakes working fine, to car needed full brake overhaul. I went in to see the service manager and asked to talk to the senior technician. I am no expert but I have a fair idea of how fluid moves round a pressurised enclosed system and it certainly appeared that they were trying to fob me off. I have asked them to remove the brake pipes and blow air through to clean them out. There is far more to this story, but is probably boring everyone.

 

I must be right in saying that if my car needed all that new gear, surely the brakes wouldn't have worked, or would have been pretty crap before hand. Anyone ever had this type of problem or get any advice. I found this sight while trying to look for as much info on Carrado's as possible.

[Guest]

As I just typed in another thread, I took my VR6 to Motor World in Oxford.

 

[rant]

They said it was the head gasket, and wanted to charge me £1,300, I spoke to Vince at stealth, he said the same price, but that would include timing chains too, as these should be done at the same time (something everyone else said too, except VW :roll: ), he also enquired as to how I knew it was the head gasket, I told him VW had said that, he didn't sound happy about what they had said, so I got a mate whos a mechanic to look at it. I also spoke to VW about the timing chains, and he said that they never need doing, but if they had noticed when removing the head then they would have changed them. ie: take my car apart and then start adding to the bill when I am bent over the table. They were looking at about £2,500 aparantly then.

 

baring in mind VW had had my car for 2 days,and came up with their head gasket theory, I found it quite strange that it took my mate exactly 2 minutes to say the rocker arm and HT leads were shot. giving it a compression test confirmed this, all in that took less than an hour.

 

The rocker arm actually fell off when he took the distributor cap off, so they obviously hadn't even done that, even though they must have thought their was a possability it was ignition related as they had changed the spark plugs!!!!!!

 

I also, after driving it home when VW had initially had it, discovered a 12" screwdriver blade balanced from the slam panel to the head, how it didn't fall into the engine will remain a mystery, and when I rung them up to have a go about this he had the cheek to ask if I would return it!!!!!!

 

They are complete incompotents, they charge too much (£75 per hour) for a shite job, and even then they leave tools in your engine bay which could have caused any number of accidents, and they don't actually fix anything!!!!!

 

what sort of costumer care is that, when EVERY other garage that would work on my car will charge me less than the people who built it, that really is rewarding my loyalty in buying one of their cars. And then they can't fix a simple HT lead problem.

[/rant]

 

Stay well clear of them, I know I am

[VRev6 0]

Dude, its spelt Corrado!! 8)

[stevenmcc 0]

Noted, and changed accordingley.

[JoeNose 0]

Stevenmcc, I sympathise, that's awful. As its the cost of the ABS pump that's by far and away the main part of the initial bill, do you know if the ABS at least was working when you took the car in (warning light going on then off when you started the car)? If the pump really is knackered you might be interested to know I obtained one for my C for £125 from a salvageyard. As opposed to £1400 for a new one.

 

At my local VW dealer, after having a small bit of work done what drove me mad was that the receptionist refused to allow me to speak to the technician who had worked on the car (for whatever reason, who knows). We ended up with me asking a question, him going away to relay it, then walking back a minute later with the answer. After this farce had gone on for a few minutes I gave up in frustration. Oh and he also told me that the slight misfire I had reported made it sound like the car "was running on 3 cylinders." It's a VR6, of course.

 

Avoid, although as noted in another thread, their parts guys are always really good.

[Kevin Bacon 5]

If the pump really is knackered you might be interested to know I obtained one for my C for £125 from a salvageyard. As opposed to £1400 for a new one.

 

Yeah that's good advice because some BMWs and Golfs use the same pump....so it's always worth browsing round the breakers if the pump is kapput. It's also worth periodically jamming the brakes on good and hard once a month, say, to test the ABS. Odds are that irregular use of the pump is a contributing factor for them seizing up.

 

When ever it rains, I make a point of coming off a slip road at 100+ and locking the brakes up. Sod brake pad wear....I like to know the pump is has still got lead in it's pencil!

 

K

[stevenmcc 0]

Thanks for the advice. I went back to the garage on Monday and asked to see the senior technician and get a copy of their report. When reading the report it stated that the ABS pump and master cyclinder 'may' have some corrosion inside. Having informed them once again that when I had brought it in the brakes were working fine, and the ABS light was going on and off as it should do when you start up, they began to come round to my way of thinking. I asked them to remove the brake lines and clean them out, then try bleeding the system again. They phoned me yesterday and said that it had worked! Lesson learnt - I won't be visiting a VW Main Dealer again.

[Kevin Bacon 5]

Corrosion in the brake system = rare fluid changes! Should be done every two years....

[Phil K 0]

When ever it rains, I make a point of coming off a slip road at 100+ and locking the brakes up. Sod brake pad wear....I like to know the pump is has still got lead in it's pencil!

:lol: So that'll be a white knuckle ride pretty much every day then :lol:

 

I've only really used Barnet and Small V dub in Farnham for parts, but just after I got the C I left it with them for a morning to see if they could diagnose a fault (the first of MANY) They plugged in diagnostics and couldn't find a fault which didn't help too much but were decent enough not to charge me for their time... parts dept gave me a free V dub keyring too (OK I'd just forked out £80+ for a set of BBS center caps :shock: ) I'll stay a regular customer...