Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault | Motoring discussion | Back Room Forum

Tue 5 Aug 2014 00:13

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - daveyK_UK

Hi,

my friend who purchased a new shape Seat Toledo which is well within the warranty; he has booked it in with the dealer due to a knocking noise from the front wheels.

The dealer has told him if the fault is not a warranty issue, he will need to pay £90 for their diagnosis.

Since when did they dream up this scam?

We are not talking about an intermitent fault, it should be easy enough to diagnose.

Is he allowed to take it to an alternative VAG dealer nearby for warranty work? The skoda dealer and the VW dealer do not charge for diagnosing cars that are under warranty.

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Tue 5 Aug 2014 10:58

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - RobJP

Quite simply, it could be down to the steering rack being bent (which could have been caused by an accident, or hitting a large pothole), or a damaged suspension component (similar causes). Do you feel that a warranty should cover those types of problems too ?

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Tue 5 Aug 2014 11:15

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - skidpan

Any Seat dealer can do warranty work so find one who does not charge up front for a diagnosis.

However, if it is the result of damage he should expect to pay whatever it costs to sort.

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Tue 5 Aug 2014 11:27

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - double_tap_that

I would have thought the dealer would have told you up front if any charges are going to be applicable to any work that is going to be undertaken.

Question is..Did they actually found the "Fault"?

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Tue 5 Aug 2014 17:45

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - TedCrilly

A scam????

Look at it this way.......

There is admin time involved

There is technicians time involved

There is ramp time.involved

Say the dealer finds the fault and it turns out its not under warranty and gives you a quote, you take a sharp intake of breath and say thanks but I will repair it myself or get it done cheaper elsewhere and drive off into the sunset.

Dealer looses money because all the time spent could have been allocated to a paying job.

Multiply that £90 by say 10 times a month. then by 12 months and the annual figure is north of £10k.

Dont know about you........but I dont make a habit of working for nothing and needlessly running up costs and oveheads

Edited by TedCrilly on 05/08/2014 at 17:46

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Tue 5 Aug 2014 18:19

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - double_tap_that

...My garage always gives free quotes, And seem always to be busy!

I know where i will be going and be recomending!

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Tue 5 Aug 2014 21:58

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - alan1302

...My garage always gives free quotes, And seem always to be busy!

I know where i will be going and be recomending!

Is that actually doing diagnosis on the car at the garage or them just telling you how much something will cost to replace/fix based on what it may be?

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Wed 13 Aug 2014 11:58

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - YG2007

This is always a tough one to call. As a garage owner if we bring the car into the workshop to diagnose the fault we are taking a calculated risk that the fault if discovered will be awarded to us to repair. A diagnostics check with a MIL light on gets a fixed charged agreed before with start. We get to know the "Owt for nowters" who have never used the garage before, have hawked their car around several garages, want to be your best friend but actually want the diagnosis done so they can run off to their mate in the pub and get him to fix it. Most customers thankfully appreciate the effort we make, allowing them to enter the workshop if they wish to view the problem and then are comfortable with us doing the repair knowing they are not having their trouser leg lifted. For a main agent with their higher overheads £90 is not unreasonable to diagnose the fault. I've been at a Chrysler Jeep franchise where they insisted on £150 minimum charge for a diagnostics check and then a 1/2 hourly charge rate after that. If the car is in the manufactureres warranty period and it is a warranty fault you won't be paying for the repair, however if as others have said the fault is attributed to damage from use then you need to get your card out

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Thu 14 Aug 2014 11:14

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - Ordovices

We are not talking about an intermitent fault, it should be easy enough to diagnose

If it's that easy, then why take it to a dealer?

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Thu 14 Aug 2014 11:43

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - leef

Very well put YG.

If only more of the Backroomers were as helpful as yourself.

cheers

Lee

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Fri 15 Aug 2014 10:46

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - Andrew-T

Put very simply, it shows a disparity between what a customer thinks a diagnosis 'is worth', and what a franchised dealer knows it costs to provide. He probably feels uncomfortable about paying £90 to find out that he will have to pay more if it is not warranty-covered.

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Fri 15 Aug 2014 08:45

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - The-Mechanic

The dealer has told him if the fault is not a warranty issue, he will need to pay £90 for their diagnosis.

Since when did they dream up this scam ?

The dealer won't ask for their £90 upfront and, if it is indeed a warranty issue, they won't charge. It's been this way for a while now where the dealership has to cover themselves by stating there 'may' be a charge applicable if no warrantable issue is found.

As has been said, the noise may have been caused as a result of accidental damage. No manufacturer will cover this so why should the dealership spend time, for free, investigating ?

So, in short, it's not a scam. It's just the dealer covering their own posterior in case of a possible non warranty repair or a customer complaint that they did not state CLEARLY that the investigation / repair was chargeable.

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Fri 15 Aug 2014 09:24

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - bazza

You hear this all the time in anecdotal talk but really YGs explanation says it all. The franchised main dealer is working to set procedures and fixed costs, hence why they can often seem a bit less flexible in their approach. I was talking to the owner of a local indie garage who said he often has customers in who expect a free diagnosis and then go off and have their car fixed by their knowledgable mate! It's hardly fair and if any of us ran a business we'd feel exactly the same, the diagnostic kit costs tens of thousands and has to earn a living. Many garages will do a deal if the rectification work goes to them. It's a major factor why I avoid new cars that are tied to a main dealer and do most straightforward work myself. But when I need the services of a good indie I don't mind paying for the expertise, same with anything really.

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Fri 15 Aug 2014 19:48

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - pork_pie

I had a problem with my 1.4 tdci Fiesta where if the cruise control is switched on, the car judders after 15-30 minutes which disappears when I cancel it. The problem never manifested when the cruise control was off. I started to worry as I started to think it was an injector/DPF fault.

Booked it at the franchised dealer who said that a diagnostic would cost £93.50. I was a bit miffed at this but I realise this kind of stuff costs an awful lot of money and they need to recoup some of the costs. No errors were diagnosed and one software upgrade later and the problem is sorted. For now.

I took the car to a friend, who owns a garage, a day before the trip to Ford. He hooked it to the companies diagnostic device and said there were no error codes but had no software upgrade to offer but recommended I took it to the franchised dealer as arranged just to be on the safe side rather than mess about with things during the warranty period.

Part of me thinks, however, they are all charging for a feck up on an installation process, The car gets developed and pushed out on the market and the public do the testing then any faults are recalled and adjusted as required. I guess that is how the cookie crumbles in this modern day and age.

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Fri 15 Aug 2014 20:35

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - RT

It's much cheaper to get the diagnostic done at a good independent, on a chargeable basis.

£90 is taking the p**s.

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Sat 16 Aug 2014 11:09

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - oldroverboy.

It's much cheaper to get the diagnostic done at a good independent, on a chargeable basis.

£90 is taking the p**s.

Yourin e no mood to agree that dealers have costs?

I still remember in the days in geneva when a customer who was not french speaking was put through to me and was upset when i refused to do a diagnosis over the phone. I told him to bring it in and we would take a quick look foc.There were known faults we could advise about from descriptions, but we had the disadvanage of having a frontier with a low cost country next to us, and guess where the work often went!

if i have something that is dealer specific i go and get it done. my car is no longer under warranty so am free, but the OP is miffed because he "might" get charged if it is not warranty?

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Sat 16 Aug 2014 11:15

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - madf

A possible bill for £90 if it's not a warranty repair?

And it's a new car?

If you can afford a new car, you can afford £90..

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Sat 16 Aug 2014 13:49

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - coopshere

It never ceases to amaze me that people buy a new or nearly new car with a manufacturers warranty costing £thousands and then complain about spending a relatively small figure to have it serviced and repaired by an approved workshop.

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Sun 17 Aug 2014 10:53

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - RT

It's much cheaper to get the diagnostic done at a good independent, on a chargeable basis.

£90 is taking the p**s.

Yourin e no mood to agree that dealers have costs

I don't expect something for nothing, unless the fault is eventually dealt with under warranty - if a good independent can do diagnostics for £20-30, then franchised dealers charging more is taking the p**s - if they really have costs THAT high, they need to reduce them.

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Sun 17 Aug 2014 12:50

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - daveyK_UK

Update - when she arrived at the Seat dealer, the 90 charge was challenged and after a bit of arguing was reduced to 50 pounds.

It turns out to be a manufacturer fault, they wouldn't say what was wrong but did comment they keep the part in stock as it's a known fault on the Toledo / Rapid.

When she asked why Seat haven't issued a recall she was told the Toledo is a cheap car and they can't afford to recall them all!

They also failed to call her with an update, call her to tell her the car was ready, etc

As she was a long term Honda owner and only went for a Toledo due to the huge boot, once it's out of warranty she is determined to get rid and go back to Honda, especially as Honda now sell an estate version of the Civic.

I did explain to her that Seat dealers are generally amongst the worst and she should use a skoda dealer which she is entitled to do under the warranty as her service book is all electronic.

Seat UK conformed to her she can use a Skoda, VW or Audi dealer for a service in 'exceptional circumstances' and the warranty would be ok.

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Sun 17 Aug 2014 13:10

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - madf

"I did explain to her that Seat dealers are generally amongst the worst and she should use a skoda dealer which she is entitled to do under the warranty as her service book is all electronic."

SEAT are the worst - see Review. Second worst? VW.

tinyurl.com/lat3ayw

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Sun 17 Aug 2014 19:23

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - Andrew-T

They also failed to call her with an update, call her to tell her the car was ready, etc

The more I hear this comment, the more I am driven to the conclusion that it is an unusual dealership that uses its phone for outgoing calls.

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Mon 18 Aug 2014 13:31

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - daveyK_UK

Can I name and shame the SEAT dealer or do we simply accept Seat dealers are rubbish and best avoided?

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Mon 18 Aug 2014 22:39

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - Avant

Please have a look at the naming and shaming policy on one of the sticky threads.

Naming a dealer is OK if you're stating facts, but calling them rubbish (even if it's true) is too risky on a public forum.

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Tue 19 Aug 2014 00:15

Seat dealer - £90 to diagnose fault - Andrew-T

Can I name and shame the SEAT dealer or do we simply accept Seat dealers are rubbish and best avoided?

There have been discussions around this topic before. As a rule the desirability of dealerships has more to do with the staff and the local work ethic than the big badge on the forecourt. Rather like saying all French cars are junk - there are good and bad ones, like most other things.

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