I visit and browse the forum often but post infrequently as I don't believe I can contribute to the informed opinions often. As it happens today, I thought I would share the below to help other members who may be in the same situation.
We own a 2011 Polo 6R 1.4 (petrol) DSG that was bought as a Das Welt in 2017 with 45K miles. Car has a FVWSH, was one private owner when we bought it and, as part of the sale, the supplying Dealer competed a timing belt and water pump change. Given the known issues with the DSG box and various (fragile) electronics, we opted to renew the VW Extended Warranty (All Component). It cost us £189 with £100 excess last year (with 15K mileage limit).
My wife loves VWs and the car was bought because she fancied a change. Car itself has been very well behaved (for a VW), aside from an odd issue here and there (characteristically not covered by the Das Welt Warranty), such as chaffing to a wiring loom leading to a malfunction of the radiator fan. This year it was due:
* full variable major service
* brake fluid change
* MOT
* strip, clean, adjust rear drum brakes (car had new brake shoes when we bought it)
At quoted prices, VW were expecting us to pay £460-odd for everything other than the brake adjustment, for this they wanted full hours labour (£150 +VAT). We used their 'Service Price Match Promise' and were able to get it all down to a reasonable £340 (inc. VAT). The price match request was pretty painless and accepted without too much hassle. What helped was submitting the written quote listing VW part # for each of the service items used. As the car had the extended VW Warranty we were confident if other items were found we would push for them to be covered under warranty.
Sure enough, we got 'the call' from our helpful Service Advisor - car passed its MOT but the following items were highlighted (all were reported as 'AMBER' on the VHC):
* AUX belt cracking - £86.15
* Centre exhaust clamp corroded - £97.06
* OSF bleed nipple rounded off, corroded and seized. Requires replacing - £86.23
* Front suspension top mount bearings worn - £547.10
Since this is a car on longlife servicing and will see the VW Service Dept. once every 2 years, and given the timing belt and water pump was done when we bought it, we figured we would keep the car for the next 2 years so we should get these things looked at. We agreed to the work being completed, but requested they price match the labour rate (per hour) as used for the Service. They declined stating if we wanted them to price match this work, we would need to get a new quote. We duly did and produced a quote for 1.5HR labour units, which they dragged their feet on matching, but eventually agreed. Total cost, including parts, labour + VAT: £190.
On the latter item, they clearly forgot we had the VW Extended Warranty, and when we asked them if they had submitted a claim, their advice changed from 'get it done now' to 'its as an advisory only' and the Warranty would not agree to a claim so they were not intending to submit the claim. We had to push (and push) them to submit the claim. After about a days worth of to-and-fro for us running between between Dealer (unhelpful) and Warranty (very accommodating), the claim was approved (much to Dealer's surprise). Total cost, warranty excess only (£100).
The reason I have posted is to share my experience for the benefit of others when it comes to:
* VW Extended Warranty
* Service Price Match Promise
* Managing the Dealer to ensure they do the jobs you need them to do
Whereas I can see why the Dealer would want us, as retail customs, pay for costs of repair (Warranty rates are no doubt much lower than retail) you should not accept what they tell you at face value and be confident enough to challenge and push them. I found VW Extended Warranty couldn't have been more helpful with this claim, and it was only by us working with them, was the claim approved. My Dealer was sadly useless and I am pursuing this through other channels.
I hope our experience will give others the confidence in using the price match promise effectively, and if you are thinking about the VW Extended Warranty, our experience will help inform your view. Lastly, do not take your Dealers word for what they believe the Warranty will approve or not, always worth asking and pushing - on this occasion had we not pushed, the bushings would not have been changed and continued to wear...or worse yet, if we had been uninformed customers, encouraged into parting with the full cost of repair
![Exclamation :!:](./images/smilies/icon_exclaim.gif)
All in all, this cost us £640 all in, and the cost saving is significant!
...as for the seized bleed nipple, we figured if one side was seized/rounded the other would likely not be too far behind so we bought a second bleed nipple and they agreed to fit for free
![Razz :P](./images/smilies/icon_razz.gif)