After buying a car, not every car owner is asked about where to take the car. Many go "on the path of least resistance" and use the same dealer from which the car was purchased. However, the most educated legal operators know that they have the right to turn to another official technical center without losing the guarantee.
Basic rules for finding a good dealer
If you choose a dealer to go to, you must remember that this procedure cannot be approached formally. If you have a need to save on the cost of the works, or it is not convenient for you to travel to the dealer from which you purchased the car, be prepared to spend time and effort on reading forums and sites, visits to technical centers and comparison of price-lists.
To begin with, carefully compare the prices of all the official and authorized dealer tech centers located in the comfortable area. The list of operations for each of your vehicles is approved and recorded in the service record, and the cost of consumables and works may vary.
It is also important to remember that staff, even within the same dealer network, can have different qualifications in each particular centre. There are outspoken outsiders, and there are leaders of service quality.
In some dealer technical centers, owners of cars are allowed to bring in the expenses purchased from the dealer
Feedback from customers who have visited your service provider can help you get a view of both the administrative staff and the quality of service. It will also be very useful to look at the relevant discussion thread at the forum on a particular brand of car: on such resources information about the dealers and services is usually as reliable as possible.
What else is worth paying attention to?
In addition to price policy and quality level, there are many criteria for choosing a dealer to go to the ATT. In particular, a match of the list of process maintenance operations with the official regulations prescribed by the manufacturer for your car. It is not uncommon to add cases to the list of operations that do not harm the car, but they will not "help" it. It is a kind of fraud that some dishonest centers are dealing with to increase the cost of a single car visit.
The most vulnerable place of a dishonest dealer is to communicate with the brand representation. If an unpleasant situation occurs, the owner can use the visor
Try to find out how long the firm has been on the market. The competition in vehicle maintenance is quite tight, so if the dealer manages to "keep afloat" for a long time, it is a good indicator.
Be sure to make sure that you can come to the TO with your expendables or spare parts. Of course, not all dealers (no one wants to lose profits) are allowed to do so, but there are companies that allow the car owners to bring some "expendable".
When you access the extended warranty, note the conditions for its activation. It is possible that the contract specifies the condition to undergo a separate inspection
In addition, you can visit the service in advance to estimate the size of the room, the presence of the waiting area for the owners, the cafeteria, etc. You can also see if the owner has the opportunity to get into the "seatbelt". However, these are secondary conditions that are aimed at your comfort rather than the result of the car.
When the dealers were deceiving customers everywhere, they almost passed. The situation is becoming better every year: the quality of work is increasing markedly, and price differences are gradually decreasing.
It is important to remember that the main effective weapon in the fight against a dishonest dealer is to use the official representative office. At the moment, almost all of the world's automakers have offices in Russia, and dealers are trying to avoid complaining about their addresses and any conflict situations. At the same time, the possibility of problems can be minimized by reading feedback about dealers on the Internet, as well as a thorough comparison of prices and lists of proposed works.
