The car computer decided that the beast was due for a service. Well last week it said 5000 to go but it's more convenient for me to get it done now. Took it in to the main Vauxhall dealer today. £130. The service indicator had been re set to 15 000 'till the next service instead of 30 000 miles and they'd used a semi synthetic oil instead of the fully synthetic in the engine. Also a 10 -40 oil instead of a 0 -40.
They're getting the car back tomorrow to do the job properly and if they make me pay I'll start off with 'My employer values my time at £27 an hour and I've already wasted another afternoon here'
If they hold the car to ransom I'll have to pay but 'see you in court'
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Main dealers eh? Premium price for carpy job. How did you find out the oil was of inferior quality?
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They're getting the car back tomorrow to do the job properly and if they make me pay ....
I expect they will. Sounds like they didn't use the long life oil (it's twice the price of what they have already put in) so expect to pay the extra price for the expensive oil.
Did you specify that you wanted to keep the service interval at 2yrs/30,000 miles when you booked it in?
The semi synth oil will be fine unless you're planning on keeping to the 2 yr service interval, which, IMHO, is a bad move. A lot can go wrong in 2 yrs.
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A calm discussion would no doubt be the best approach. Car manufacturers sometimes change their service recommendations in the light of experience.
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L\'escargot by name, but not by nature.
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>>How did you find out the oil was of inferior quality?
Stamp in the incorrect section of the service book, incorrect box ticked in the oil spec in the service book and incorrect spec on he invoice.
>>Did you specify that you wanted to keep the service interval at 2yrs/30,000 miles when you booked it in?
As VX make a point of repeatedly mentioning 2 yr /30 000 in the promotional material, handbook and service book with little or no mention of alternatives ( 1 yr 20 000, not 15 000, if the better quality oil is not available) and the car was set up for the long life service regime am I bieng unreasonable in expecting the service to be carried out to that specification?
>>The semi synth oil will be fine unless you're planning on keeping to the 2 yr service interval, which, IMHO, is a bad move. A lot can go wrong in 2 yrs.
I agree with you there but I'm of the 'old school' and regularly monitor the condition of the vehicle myself. Were it not for the warranty I'd carry out the work to spec. myself as is my normal practice.
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Having taken it in 5k early, are they likely to argue that you don't appear to like long service intervals? - so they did the (cheaper?) 15k service, instead of the 30k.
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Sorry, you posted while I was typing.
To clarify, I bought the car with 9 000 miles on the clock and the service indicator suggested 14 000 to go. No problem with that. Since then I've monitored the indicator and it's been counting off the miles slightly slower than the odometer. Last week it showed 5000 to go but on Sunday it indicated a service was needed. Since I was going to get it serviced while on holiday in any case for convenience's sake I had no problem with servicing it now anyway. I can find no mention of a 15k service in the documentation. Methinks the dealer is pulling a fast one to get more labour charges in.
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To clarify, I bought the car with 9 000 miles on the clock and the service indicator suggested 14 000 to go. No problem with that. Since then I've monitored the indicator and it's been counting off the miles slightly slower than the odometer.
It sounds like your car was set to the flexi-service interval when you bought it. Mine certainly was. Some clever electronics monitor your driving style and oil condition and determine when your service is actually due. Regular short trips will shorten the service interval, but long regular motorway trips will make the service indicator come on at around 30k / 2yrs.
I can find no mention of a 15k service in the documentation. Methinks the dealer is pulling a fast one to get more labour charges in.
I can't speak for your dealer, but mine gave me the choice of staying on the 20k / 2yr flex-service interval, or changing to the 10k / 1yr interval (2.2 petrol engine, btw) Given that the 2.2 petrol engine has been known to snap it's camchain because of long intervals between services, I took the 10k / 1yr option.
It's also mentioned in my handbook, but it's too old to cover the 1.9CDTi engine (I checked a couple of your previous posts for your engine size), and the Vauxhall online manuals don't appear to be recent enough either to look it up.
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There does appear to be some serious training issues at many main dealers. It is the technicians that will make or break the confidence of the consumer. In my experience there are far too many incidents regarding wrong spec items used, jobs not done properly and of course the old favourite that your vehicle is returned with oil stains on the drivers seat.
In this day and age you appear to be lucky if your vehicle is not returned damaged never mind serviced correctly. Manufacturers really need to assess the performance of all dealers with a sharper eye and tighter grip.
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Took it in this afternoon and they replaced the oil and re programmed the computer as it refused to cooperate.
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I can't understand the difference between the SAME service for the SAME car from main dealers...
Fiat - requires 24,000 mile service.
Called some dealers..
Fiat/Suzuki Garage: £245 inc vat
Dealer 2 £176
Dealer 3 £165.69
Independant £235
Suzuki - requires 9,000 mile service.
Called some dealers..(all Hants/Surrey/Sussex)
Fiat/Suzuki Garage: £130
Dealer 2 £180
Dealer 3 £129
Dealer 4: £115
Dealer 5: £162
Dealer 6: £138.54
Posted a query on owners forum and up north, £97 is the rate from at least 3 dealers!
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"Some clever electronics monitor your driving style and oil"
How the hell do the electronics monitor the oil condition? I have the Vauxhall technical cdroms and I cannot find any reference to this. The computer monitors the engine and uses algorithms to determine servicing intervals.
The ridiculously long service intervals are set to keep company fleet managers happy. No car engine is ever going to last if the oil is left in for 15000 miles. This has been covered before.
If you do nothing else to your car at least change the oil every 6k miles.
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\"Nothing less than 8 cylinders will do\"
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If you do nothing else to your car at least change the oil every 6k miles.
When are people going to realise that oil technology has moved on and we no longer need to change the oil as frequently as our Grandfathers once did?
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"Some clever electronics monitor your driving style and oil" How the hell do the electronics monitor the oil condition? I have the Vauxhall technical cdroms and I cannot find any reference to this. The computer monitors the engine and uses algorithms to determine servicing intervals.
They have oil condition monitors, which I understand involves shining infrared light throught the oil. The computer monitors cold starts, type of use, driving style etc.
No car engine is ever going to last if the oil is left in for 15000 miles. This has been covered before.
Merc's and BM's reqularly go to 20,000 miles plus on variable servicing, depending on the type of use.
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VX claim up to 30 000 So far in my posession the predicted distance to service is equal to or slightly less than distance run. If VX are happy with the intervals then I'm happy to stick with them. If it breaks in the first three years it's not my problem and after that it's not mine as I plan to have changed the car by then or at least by 90k or so. Oil and filter technology as well as engine build quality have improved a lot and I've no problem with extended intervals. I believe some HGV run up to 75k or so.
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You are right some HGV's can run up to around the 60k to 75k mark (kilometres) before they require an oil change. This is the equivalent of around 37,000 mile mark to the 46,000 mile mark, between oil changes. Okay the engines may be bigger and a lot more robust but at the end of the day they are using the same technology and many will run past a million kilometres without any serious engine problems.
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The hire fleet I work on has just gained a new 7.5t Iveco.
This has an electronic oil level check and dashboard display. Now the dipstick and oil filler can only be accessed by tilting the cab. According to the supplying dealer, new EEC regulations mean that only someone equipped to deal with an oil spill should be handling oil. Some operators are still suspicious of electronics though and other health and safety regs. prevent their drivers from tilting the cab. This has meant that the dealer has been called out several times (at great cost to the operator) to manually check an oil level.
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Yep, I had the same problem with the Iveco, I had 2 new 18t when I was a transport manager, you had to tilt the cab to get to the dipstick, but the oil level indicator in the cab did throw up a couple of very odd readings at times, and in the first couple of weeks we had them off the road a few times. Only a week or so ago I had an Iveco Stralis tractor unit that had the windscreen wiper malfunction, After spending 2 hours in the garage being plugged into the laptop it was decided the Body ECU needed replacing, this took all of 10 minutes and cured the problem, had it not been in warrenty it would have cost circa £1000 - So not all electronics are a good thing, just seems like a licence to print money when they go wrong!!!!
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Oh my goodness "new EEC regulations mean that only someone equipped to deal with an oil spill should be handling oil.". So that's all of the oil going off the shelves at Halfords then and the end of the dipstick.
Trouble is, H&S gets more ridiculous, so I find it easy to believe.
John
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