motorhome dealers!

[Zookeeper]

Hi All

Felt in need of a rant. Are we the only people who own a motorhome who both work full time and use the motor home as a second vehicle for commuting from time to time?

Motorhome dealers seem to only have the 'technicians' working during the week so we can never get to actually see them to explain a problem and seem to think it is fine to keep our van for weeks to mend the faults that it has.

Rant over.

Thanks for reading.

Comments?

 

Wendy

[Dave Newell]

Sorry wendy but you need to give us more details of what problems they were trying to sort out before we con offer sensible comment. While your opening post is fine as a rant it is a bit thin on detail to invite comment.

 

D.

[Mel E]

Wendy,

 

Tongue in cheek, you understand, but why should motohome fitters be any different from GPs (Doctors), or a whole load of other trades and professions? Do you work at weekends for the benefit of your customers?

 

I can only suggest an itemised written (or, better, printed) list carefully detailing each point. Yes it takes more time, but if you number the points, at least you then all have a common base of reference - items 1,3 and 4 fixed, 2 and 5 to 88 awaiting parts, or whatever.

 

Mel E

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[Zookeeper]

That's what we have done Mel. It has meant that they are now actually fixing the problems but so slowly. It is difficult to believe they really have spent nearly 3 weeks on one van, more likely that they do a bit here and there between other jobs, especially as ours is warranty so they are not making any money.

It is hard to pin them down to give any forecast of an end date.

I am not going to name the dealer here as I do expect some of the problems are out of their control but it is so frustrating not knowing how much longer it is going to be.

I will be making sure I buy my next van from a dealer closer to where I live so I can keep a closer eye on any work being done on it. We are over an hour away at the moment and all to easy to fob off.

 

Sorry still grumbling. It's our first van and I can't remember how we ever survived without one, mind you we could afford to have 2 cars.

 

Wendy

[Mel E]

Wendy,

 

"Over and hour away" from your dealer is very close! With the plethora of different makes and brands you can find that even popular makes have only 1 to 3 dealers covering the entire country. So you have to plan for this.

 

At the moment, your best bet is to go through your list on the phone with the service manager and establish when each item is going to be completed and what - if anything - is preventing it being tomorrow. Then keep at them against their promises.

 

Mel E

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[catinou]

Hi Wendy,

 

How old is your vehicle? We purchased ours in September last year and were very unhappy with the service from the original dealer - having had the same problems as you and being over 2 hours drive away. We contacted Autotrail who agreed that any existing warranty work not completed in the 2 weeks the old dealer had our vehicle (supposed to be 5 days!) could be completed by a local dealer. As they are not Fiat registered for servicing we also arranged with Fiat to change to a local Fiat franchise for warranty on the base vehicle. (We were previously led to believe we had to have all warranty work done at the 1st dealer).

 

Our advice - change dealers if your vehicle is new and be dealt with locally - other wise we re-iterate the advice previously given - Trading Standards are very good at "making things happen". *-)

[Clive]

The biggest problem dealers get is customers!!!

No Customers - No problems. Easy!.