Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I bought a newer car a year ago (2011) with an extra 5 year warranty. I'm coming up on my first inspection to be done on the vehicle that has the warranty. My question:
Should I go to dealer to have inspected , etc., which will cost more...or go to a private shop that I know?
If I go to private shop, will it affect my warranty? Or, as long as I get a receipt, I'll be OK?
You need to look over the terms and conditions of your warranty. They may or may not state that any warranty work must be performed by a shop specifically certified by that manufacturer.
If I were in your shoes, I'd go to the dealership... you know they're certified, and warranty work for non-wearable items will be warrantied, and won't come out of your pocket.
If a private shop finds an issue with something which falls under warranty, you may have to pay out of pocket for them to repair it, and then, if the shop is determined not to be certified to perform warranty work for them, not only will you not be reimbursed, but, if it goes asunder 20 more times, you'll be eating it 20 more times.
If you are talking safety and emissions testing it doesnt matter where you take it. some states do it themselves like nj others like ny you can go to any state approved shop. they will charge you the same and has no impact on the warantty
Read the warranty. No one can answer your question accurately without reading it. If you do not want to read the warranty, then just go to the dealership where you purchased the vehicle. That should be safe, since it is not likely the warranty excludes the place where you purchased the vehicle. (Although it is possible, so, reading the warranty is the prudent thing)
You don't have to read the warranty. You KNOW they will slither out of it any opening they get. Besides, what can an independent shop do about manufacturer warranty claims? I will even have oil changes done by the dealer. The more players are in the loop the more things can go wrong.
Inspections usually don't matter, here in VA most shops are inspection stations. I take mine to the dealer mainly because the dealer I like is on my way to work and my inspection usually falls around the time I need an oil change. I just have the dealer do it while it's there.
If you trust the shop, no problems. I haven't found one here I like, so I just go back to my dealer. Reasonable-ish on costs and I like them, plus they've bent over backwards a few times to fix stuff.
I have had much better luck going to New Car Dealers in my area that have 5 star service centers - although more costly per hour, the mechanics seem very well trained/knowledgeable/friendly.
I once bought a vehicle from a dealership that specialized in sales of "lightly used" vehicles with extended warrantees and which also had a substantial repair center; I had them do the initial work needed on my minivan.... it didn't go well as they truly did try to get away with not repairing things which needed repairing and charging me for things which should have been covered by warrantee; all trying to delay so that the warrantee would expire before anything substantial was fixed.
I learned my lesson big time and it was an expensive and time consuming lesson; I won't ever buy from them ever again, and when it comes to buying warrantees on used vehicles; good luck having them honored! Those warrantees have so much fine print and legalese written into them, it is very likely you won't ever get your money's worth.
I ended up having to take the minivan to the new car dealer service center and trying to get them to communicate with the used car dealership warrantee provider... it was difficult, I got some of the stuff repaired properly, but a couple years later I was thrilled to just sell this vehicle.
To the OP - read the warrantee and try to figure out who can service the vehicle and also if the problem you are experiencing is even likely to be covered. With that information, then figure out where to take it.
I've always had my vehicles serviced by the most qualified tech available. Over the course of my life, sometimes that's been a dealership guy, sometimes it's been an independent. The key is the guy doing the work, not the name of the front of the shop.
That being said, obviously with a new car under warranty it's important that you not do anything to void the warranty. Historically having an independent shop perform service work isn't an issue, but it's been a while since I've even considered buying something still under warranty so it's best to make sure.
The advantage to having it serviced at a dealership is that while they have the car on the rack they can often look for developing problems that can be fixed under warranty. But that would only be the case in dealerships where oil changes are actually performed in the service department. Some dealerships these days have "Quick Lubes" attached to them that are pretty much run independently of the regular service department.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
