Car Servicing

The items listed would all be things you should be aware of. What they should have done was give you the figures you quote so that you knew they needed doing in the fairly near future.To me I would probably have had the brakes done if I had known the figures left as I cannot see anyone keeping the car for that long they needed doing again.

The wipers you can do yourself although I might be wary of the very cheap ones on line.

The MOT does not include an examination of the brakes just a test to see if they are working at the time so cannot be relied on for anything more.

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The MOT does not include an examination of the brakes just a test to see if they are working at the time so cannot be relied on for anything more.

Just had an MOT yesterday, and one of the things picked up was that front pads were getting low .... IIRC you need a min of 3mm for a pass  and certainly my usual tester will advise when they're getting low, not neccessarily on the advice sheet

 .....To me I would probably have had the brakes done if I had known the figures left as I cannot see anyone keeping the car for that long they needed doing again. .....

You obviously change our car more frequently than me 

Mine has always advised me of brake pad wear ICON at MOT. I also keep my car for a fair time but try to avoid too much braking to make them last longer. 

Personally all I do is have an engine service, oil, filters, diesel filter, as I get second hand high mileage cars and have the ability to check all the other items.

I have also found Formula 1 tyres fantastic got wife’s Honda jazz full service (hers is low mileage with service history) with MOT for £140. It is fixed price depends on engine size hers is just under 1400 automatic Petrol.

They advised wiper blades which I had done at £20 (your quote is absurd for blades).

Also advised all 4 tyres, although lots of tread were cracking on side walls, I had actually observed that myself a few weeks earlier and had mentioned to wife they would need changing for winter

Brake pads that low should have been an advisory defiantly a poor MOT test if you had oil, filter and air filter changed for £85 it was bargain good quality oil and the filters won’t be far from that.

The tyres, well I would change them it for the sake of a few thousand miles also if you don’t notice the tyres go under or borderline to under you could get a spot cheek, points on your licence and fines and still be required to replace them.  

At least change them for the winter as tyres that low will just not have the same grip in winter during heavy rain and snow, you also need to conceder if your tyres go borderline or just 01mm under and have an accident and you have a bump it will defiantly go to blaming you not the other person.

Same thing could happen with the brake pads also again if you don’t notice them get worse you could end up getting new disks as well.

Have to agree 100% though shop around every time for servicing, insurance, parts easy to do today with the net and last year’s good deal can’t be guaranteed to be the best deal this year.

Just my thoughts

When I was on holiday last week, the ambulance response car received its first service. A Seat dealer in Coventry. Ian, my oppo, took the car in and it was serviced and he picked it up and drove it back to Nuneaton - some 20 miles I would say. When he got back he thought he would just check under the bonnet to make sure everything was in order. Good job he did! There, lying in the engine bay was the oil filler cap!!! It would have been bad on an ordinary car but on a car that could have potentially been on a response emergency from the off was diabolical. These cars sometimes do 150 miles on blues and twos at speeds of 100mph + where possible- can you imagine the mess and damage that a simple thing like that would have caused? That's the very reason I won't go to main dealers- expensive- very expensive and careless! The service manager was informed and in no uncertain terms either.!

Thanks for the comments. My car is an 07 having done just 49000 miles. I use it to travel to work daily but it's only about 4 miles and the rest is just mainly local.  Our main car is my wife's purchased new this year from SUZUKI on an excellent club deal. The SUZUKI is ungder warranty for three years so goes to the dealer. I had my car serviced by an online servicing company who offered an half-price deal as a promotion. I only do around 6000 miles a year and so I try to run the car as frugally as possible but would not use it in an unsafe condition. So you will see that for me 3000 miles is 6months motoring. Long journeys are done in the new car. Tyres need to be replaced before they reach the legal minimum and mine will be. The original point was that long service intervals do not always mean you save on running costs as the dealers will push you to replace parts that may still have many months of safe use left. 

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They advised wiper blades which I had done at £20 (your quote is absurd for blades).

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Absurd .... but not an isolated price. I bought some bits at Mercedes for my car, and thenasked for a set of 3 wipers without asking for a price. They too were £50-odd. I said to the lad on the parts desk that was the last OE set I was buying from them

Having had company cars for the last 35 years it's only just hitting home how much servicing costs. 

Even a litre of the new synthetic low ash oil costs a ridiculous amount. 

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Even a litre of the new synthetic low ash oil costs a ridiculous amount. 

Costco does a few premium brand oils at reasonable cost