Charge for a courtesy car when new car in for warrantee work

[juggsy]

When I bought my used, few years old Cayman from a Porsche dealer there were a few areas of attention they said they’d resolve as part of the sale, and also a couple of bits which popped up after taking it home.

Cue a week later when a nice chap picked up my car and dropped a brand new 911 S convertible on the drive to play with for a week, FOC of course. Sales guy was quite happy to say he was planting the seed for a future upgrade!

Saying that I took a leased Golf in for its first service last year. When booking it in, I asked for a courtesy car when the guy went “oh there’s a charge for a courtesy car, but we’ll just wave that”.

[r11co]

The clue is in the name - COURTESY. There's no requirement to supply a car at all.

There's a thread going on in N, P + E about some self-entitled blogger who got all pissy because a hotel wouldn't give her 5 nights free stay in exchange for a good review. We've just found PH's equivalents of that blogger.

[juggsy]

r11co said:

The clue is in the name - COURTESY. There's no requirement to supply a car at all.

There's a thread going on in N, P + E about some self-entitled blogger who got all pissy because a hotel wouldn't give her 5 nights free stay in exchange for a good review. We've just found PH's equivalents of that blogger.

The equivalent of that blogger would be someone walking into a dealership and asking for a free test drive for a week, in exchange for a glowing review and lots of Instagram posts.

What we’re talking here is someone who has bought a new car, it’s broken in a fairly short timeframe, and are looking to ensure they have something to get about whilst it’s fixed. Whether charging a nominal fee for a courtesy car in that circumstance is debatable, but you’re not exactly comparing apples to apples here.

[Chlorothalonil]

Warranty.

[anonymous-user]

r11co said:

The clue is in the name - COURTESY. There's no requirement to supply a car at all.

There's a thread going on in N, P + E about some self-entitled blogger who got all pissy because a hotel wouldn't give her 5 nights free stay in exchange for a good review. We've just found PH's equivalents of that blogger.

We really haven't. The OP has just asked if charging for a courtesy car is normal, nothing more than that.

[Rat_Fink_67]

r11co said:

The clue is in the name - COURTESY. There's no requirement to supply a car at all.

Yep, the warranty is with the manufacturer not the dealer. Want a free car? Then deal with the manufacturer, virtually all of their customer care departments have free loan cars available from rental firms.

[Dodsy]

Mercedes charge for a loan car for warranty or service work. They also charge a fee ( i think its £15) if you choose to wait in reception while your car is serviced

I only used them on mce for a warranty repair and one seevice while it was under warranty. After that my local garage now do a service for a bit less than mercedes charge and give me a free loan car for the day

[Prof Prolapse]

Dodsy said:

Mercedes charge for a loan car for warranty or service work. They also charge a fee ( i think its £15) if you choose to wait in reception while your car is serviced

I only used them on mce for a warranty repair and one seevice while it was under warranty. After that my local garage now do a service for a bit less than mercedes charge and give me a free loan car for the day

Re: the bold. Wasn't this debunked on here recently when someone pointed out that the fee was in relation to the work being completed an expedited manner, at an exact time, and letting you use facilties whilst they do so?

You are also free to drop the car off and pick up with no additional cost aren't you?

Just in the interests of being fair to Mercedes...

[Sheepshanks]

Prof Prolapse said:

Dodsy said:

Mercedes charge for a loan car for warranty or service work. They also charge a fee ( i think its £15) if you choose to wait in reception while your car is serviced

I only used them on mce for a warranty repair and one seevice while it was under warranty. After that my local garage now do a service for a bit less than mercedes charge and give me a free loan car for the day

Re: the bold. Wasn't this debunked on here recently when someone pointed out that the fee was in relation to the work being completed an expedited manner, at an exact time, and letting you use facilties whilst they do so?

You are also free to drop the car off and pick up with no additional cost aren't you?

Just in the interests of being fair to Mercedes...

It's up to the individual dealer (or more likely the group they're part of) and also how you book - if you do it through MB's MyService website then there's the option for the dealer to add a charge but my local one doesn't. When they charge it's usually £20.

One thing people don't realise until they happen to check - prices vary a lot between dealers on MyService - for instance I just tried two dealers for the next A service on my old Merc and my local one quotes £168 and another quotes £263. Neither add a charge for drop & go or waiting, mine adds £36 for a courtesy car (but they've never charged me), same for collect and deliver. The other dealer adds £30 for those.

[Andehh]

p1stonhead said:

Monkeylegend said:

Is it an insurance excess charge?

Mercedes introduced this a few years ago at my dealer, £10 for the day to reduce the excess from £2000 to nil in the event of an accident.

BMW do this too (£15 per day) but in the three times I have been given a car to date, no one actually bothered to collect any money for it.

Alright for some, never seem to forgot for me!! £15 on top of of a £500 service... Swines