BMW Corrosion Warranty Dispute Round 2
Discussion
Hello
A couple of years ago I managed to get my rust bucket of a 54 plate M3 repaired under the infamous BMW 12 year corrosion warranty:
It took 7 months of arguing with the BMW approved body shop and 4 months of arguing with BMWs customer support, then their dispute department, then their legal department, and in the end I didn’t have to take them to court and they fixed the car. Happy days!
After the car was repaired I was given a piece of paper with a table on it entitled ‘Lifetime Workmanship Guarantee – Annual Check’ with 10 rows for the car to be inspected once a year for 10 years against ‘faulty workmanship’, so I’ve done as requested in the small print and made the 80 mile round trip to visit the body shop attached to the dealer in which the car was originally purchased from and the work was carried out.
This year during the inspection I pointed out that an area behind the front wheel arches where the front wing meets the sills has started to rust again on both sides, they stood droning on about how it’s not worth getting fixed etc etc then signed the inspection form. I requested that they book they the car in to repair it again and was emailed an estimate of £768 for the following area on both sides:
The car was repaired on both sides in both the visible areas and under the sill cover under the warranty work done previously.
I emailed them back with the following:
“I’ve read the estimate which seems fair enough for a BMW approved warranted repair, but this raises a question with regards to the previous BMW approved warranted repair on these areas of the car. What are the terms of the ‘Lifetime Workmanship Guarantee’ that I’ve been bring the car down to you for annual bodywork inspections in order to maintain the validity of?, and shouldn’t remedial work of previously worked on areas be in some way covered by said guarantee?”
and received this stern sounding email:
“The lifetime guarantee is against faulty workmanship and should not be confused with the BMW anti-corrosion warranty which lasts twelve years from registration of the vehicle.
You will recall that at the time of the original repair, the warranty on the vehicle was almost expired, but BMW honoured the warranty and repaired the car.
There can be no further guarantee against corrosion and any subsequent areas would not be covered.
I hope this clarifies your querie.”
Is there anyone on here more knowledgeable on these type things that can tell me if they should be repairing it again or not?
If it were a small friendly body shop fixing it for ‘a couple of hundred cash’ I was dealing with I’d decide it was fair enough, but as they’ve even got the cheek to condescendingly remark that it was close to the end of the warranty and I was lucky they honoured it, it was only close to the end because of the sheer amount of time that they strung it along. I do genuinely feel that if it’s going to cost me £768 for them to ‘repair it to BMWs standards’ only 2 years after they ‘Repaired it to BMWs standards’ it is a in fact ‘faulty repair’ as they put it.
Has anyone managed to have remedial work to a previous corrosion warranty repair carried out before?. It took a hell of a lot of effort last time, I’ll just fix it myself if it can’t be done, but if it can I’ll get straight back on their case with this.
Thanks
A couple of years ago I managed to get my rust bucket of a 54 plate M3 repaired under the infamous BMW 12 year corrosion warranty:
It took 7 months of arguing with the BMW approved body shop and 4 months of arguing with BMWs customer support, then their dispute department, then their legal department, and in the end I didn’t have to take them to court and they fixed the car. Happy days!
After the car was repaired I was given a piece of paper with a table on it entitled ‘Lifetime Workmanship Guarantee – Annual Check’ with 10 rows for the car to be inspected once a year for 10 years against ‘faulty workmanship’, so I’ve done as requested in the small print and made the 80 mile round trip to visit the body shop attached to the dealer in which the car was originally purchased from and the work was carried out.
This year during the inspection I pointed out that an area behind the front wheel arches where the front wing meets the sills has started to rust again on both sides, they stood droning on about how it’s not worth getting fixed etc etc then signed the inspection form. I requested that they book they the car in to repair it again and was emailed an estimate of £768 for the following area on both sides:
The car was repaired on both sides in both the visible areas and under the sill cover under the warranty work done previously.
I emailed them back with the following:
“I’ve read the estimate which seems fair enough for a BMW approved warranted repair, but this raises a question with regards to the previous BMW approved warranted repair on these areas of the car. What are the terms of the ‘Lifetime Workmanship Guarantee’ that I’ve been bring the car down to you for annual bodywork inspections in order to maintain the validity of?, and shouldn’t remedial work of previously worked on areas be in some way covered by said guarantee?”
and received this stern sounding email:
“The lifetime guarantee is against faulty workmanship and should not be confused with the BMW anti-corrosion warranty which lasts twelve years from registration of the vehicle.
You will recall that at the time of the original repair, the warranty on the vehicle was almost expired, but BMW honoured the warranty and repaired the car.
There can be no further guarantee against corrosion and any subsequent areas would not be covered.
I hope this clarifies your querie.”
Is there anyone on here more knowledgeable on these type things that can tell me if they should be repairing it again or not?
If it were a small friendly body shop fixing it for ‘a couple of hundred cash’ I was dealing with I’d decide it was fair enough, but as they’ve even got the cheek to condescendingly remark that it was close to the end of the warranty and I was lucky they honoured it, it was only close to the end because of the sheer amount of time that they strung it along. I do genuinely feel that if it’s going to cost me £768 for them to ‘repair it to BMWs standards’ only 2 years after they ‘Repaired it to BMWs standards’ it is a in fact ‘faulty repair’ as they put it.
Has anyone managed to have remedial work to a previous corrosion warranty repair carried out before?. It took a hell of a lot of effort last time, I’ll just fix it myself if it can’t be done, but if it can I’ll get straight back on their case with this.
Thanks
Honestly. I'd get a reputable bodyshop to repair it now. BMW did fix it, but I don't think you'd want to keep going back and having to threaten legal action. Classifying it as 'faulty workmanship' is an odd one.
Have you contacted BMW HQ? They can knock some heads together at the dealership, or at least give you a less snarky response.
It's a shame you've held up your end of the deal, and they haven't which is a shame. But sod them off and find someone who will do it right and then hopefully stop it from rusting for longer.
Have you contacted BMW HQ? They can knock some heads together at the dealership, or at least give you a less snarky response.
It's a shame you've held up your end of the deal, and they haven't which is a shame. But sod them off and find someone who will do it right and then hopefully stop it from rusting for longer.
ThePurpleBeemer said:
the warranty on the vehicle was almost expired, but BMW honoured the warranty and repaired the car.
Does my nut in when d
heads say stuff like this. Of course BMW honoured the warranty because regardless of how close it is to expiring, its still in fking warranty.It's either in warranty, or it isn't. There is no "oh well its almost expired so we won't honour it" because it wouldn't be a warranty otherwise!
Having said that, i'd argue that given corrosion has returned 2 years after it was supposedly fixed it falls under faulty workmanship, if corrosion didn't fall under it why would they be having you drive up to them for an annual inspection to maintain this faulty workmanship guarantee?
What else are they supposed to be looking for? The door to Narnia?
Did they find the corrosion on the wing/sill or did you?
ETA: I'd be a bit careful having them fix it again if they're pissed off about it because they'd be more likely to make a pigs ear of it.
Edited by anonymous-user on Monday 28th May 21:23
I had my 04 Z4 rear wing tops (where roof meets wings) done under BMW anti corrosion warranty in 2015 iirc, so near the end too.
BMW Stratstone Leeds looked at it and said the car was in very nice condition for the age, but failed to honour the warranty.
In the end I took it to BMW Sandal Wakefield where I’d been a regular customer with the car and they did the work.
Roll on 2 years and the bubbling was back.
Had they asked for a contribution for new wings while they were at it I’d have happily paid it given how they clearly tarted up old knackered ones and essentially wasted my and their time/money.
I since sold the car but I think if BMW won’t do proper lasting repairs you’re better going elsewhere.
Frankly I don’t get why BMW offer these daft warranties if they can’t honour them.
I now look at cars that have had such work as not being worth more because of it.
I’d looked at an Interlagos M3 CS in January that’d had all the front/rear wings re-done by BMW (not replaced).
They looked amazing but then I just thought if the fronts/rears would bubble back through in 2 years I’d be spending £1,000+ again doing it right, so if anything it was worth *less* imo, not more.
So yeah to sum up. Great if you want it tidying up for free to sell on.
Avoid if you do want a long lasting proper repair with some come-back!
BMW Stratstone Leeds looked at it and said the car was in very nice condition for the age, but failed to honour the warranty.
In the end I took it to BMW Sandal Wakefield where I’d been a regular customer with the car and they did the work.
Roll on 2 years and the bubbling was back.
Had they asked for a contribution for new wings while they were at it I’d have happily paid it given how they clearly tarted up old knackered ones and essentially wasted my and their time/money.
I since sold the car but I think if BMW won’t do proper lasting repairs you’re better going elsewhere.
Frankly I don’t get why BMW offer these daft warranties if they can’t honour them.
I now look at cars that have had such work as not being worth more because of it.
I’d looked at an Interlagos M3 CS in January that’d had all the front/rear wings re-done by BMW (not replaced).
They looked amazing but then I just thought if the fronts/rears would bubble back through in 2 years I’d be spending £1,000+ again doing it right, so if anything it was worth *less* imo, not more.
So yeah to sum up. Great if you want it tidying up for free to sell on.
Avoid if you do want a long lasting proper repair with some come-back!
Sorry to hear of your troubles. I had some work done under the corrosion protection warranty although on my R56 MCS. I had no problem getting them to carry out the work under the warranty however I was left very unimpressed with the service I received. They had the car two weeks to paint three panels, however I was promised the car back three times before I actually got it back during those two weeks! I was sent a video of it in the paint booth the day before I got it back and when I see that I knew it had been rushed. To top it off they sent it back with a flat battery! I had my doubts about the quality of the work and to no surprise the defects have come back within 6 months, not impressed. I don't really want to send it back to them but it's going in again in a few weeks.
twokcc said:
Not heard of the r56 having rust issues- mind elaborating on what the problem was and how old car is(from a R56 s owner)
I've seen one or two others the same, mines an early '07. It was both rear quarters around the bottom half of the panels and if I'm honest you wouldn't notice it unless you looked very closely at the car. There were one or two very small bubbles on both sides. The other place I haven't seen on another R56 which was on the boot just under the chrome strip at the bottom of the glass. 
I would just get it fixed on the cheap. I did this job on a mate's 325Ci and it was easy enough - unclip the sill covers, mask the wing and go at it withy a flappy disc in a grinder to get it back to bright metal. Dab a bit of rust converter on the pitted areas, zinc proper and then top coat. That was a year ago and it hasn't come back.
You'll probably be pi55ing into the wind with BMW tbh.
You'll probably be pi55ing into the wind with BMW tbh.
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