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People will often scrimp on servicing their car but they are playing with their own safety not to mention leaving the car open to serious damage that could have been avoided. You should pay attention to the guidelines in your car’s handbook, particularly if the car is still under warranty. If you fail to adhere to the recommended servicing timescales you could render the warranty useless.
Your handbook will tell you the servicing guidelines for your make and model of car. If you drive for a living and do 60,000 miles in one year, you should really have the car serviced three times in this time period.
When you do have your car serviced make sure the garage stamps the handbook. It is also worth noting that if you drive a certain make of car, most potential buyers of your car would expect it to have been serviced at a garage associated with that manufacturer. So you would get a BMW serviced at the BMW garage and a Volkswagen serviced by Volkswagen. Once the warranty has expired this tends not to be as much of an issue, but it is a great selling point when the time comes.
When you go for a servicing you can elect to deal with a franchised or non franchised garage. The benefits of going with the former are:
- the parts used should be genuine to that model and make
- the parts and labour carry warranties
- they have the latest diagnostic devices
- they should be aware of any known problems with a particular model
- If you are not happy you can direct your complaint to the manufacturer
- They keep a service history on your car which can be useful when it comes to a trade in.
The disadvantages include
- They are usually more expensive
- They may be located far from your home
- They can become very busy particularly at certain times of the year
- As they tend to be based in large showrooms you can get the hard sell i.e. it is time to buy a new car!
- The mechanics tend to follow protocol rather than trouble-shoot the real reason for a problem. They may replace the whole door rather than fix an electrical fault in the door window for example.
Regardless of where you get your car serviced you should follow these tips:
- Ask them to refer all works that need to be done to you before they proceed so that you remain in full control of the cost.
- Fill up the water bottle before the car goes in for a service. If they charge you for washer fluid you can then ask for the bottle!
- Clean your own car and ask them to reduce the bill instead.
- Always get an estimate prior to work being done and if the price is widely different query every penny and ask for it to be reduced back to the quoted cost.
If you decide to use a small local garage you should proceed with caution and ensure that it will not adversely affect any warranty on your car. Get recommendations from your friends and family. It is probably best not to try and service your own car unless you have the knowledge and expertise. Of course if you drive an older car and enjoy tinkering with it, you may want to ignore this advice.