Opinion on BMW 645ci repairbill

Large Bloke

Large Bloke

Large Bloke

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22 Feb 2013
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6
Afternoon all,

First time post so go easy on me

Just looking for some advice or opinion on a repair bill from my local BMW garage

bought my 645ci some eight months ago with 62,000 miles and a full BMW warranty from Stratstone Hull. Have since travelled some 5,000 miles its developed a creaking from rear suspension.
Took it to my local bm garage, they had it for a day and informed me that the rear suspension bushes were worn and needed replacing and as this was a wear and tear part it was not covered by the warranty and would cost around £600 to repair.
The point is i suppose it seems expensive and the fact i was not expecting any largeish bills in the first year...basically its given me the hump

your thoughts folks?

thanks
 
Unfortunately as its eight months old, your pretty much stuffed. If it was still within six months of purchase, it would have been down to the BMW you purchased from to prove it was NOT an inherent fault at the time of sale...
 
Thanks for the quick response marshallman05

It gets better, they have just called to say they need to replace the links? to the sway arm bushes as well, total bill of £1026

Spoke to the sales chap explaining my disappointment and he's going to see what he can do
 
To be honest, that's not a bad price for that work on that car. BMWs are expensive to fix and it's fair to say you will get presented with a bill like this from time to time.

But yeah, try and put a claim in. BMW warranties are excellent and they may pay out.
 
Rilot said:
To be honest, that's not a bad price for that work on that car. BMWs are expensive to fix and it's fair to say you will get presented with a bill like this from time to time.

But yeah, try and put a claim in. BMW warranties are excellent and they may pay out.
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6 series BMW's are expensive to fix, not all of them.
 
Ask them if it was an "instant failure" such as a catastrophic loss of oil pressure or heavy leak. If nothing comes out of that, take it to another dealer and explain that it an instant failure occurred before they look at it - they'll be more inclined to claim under warranty if you approach them in this vein.

I had both my rear dampers replaced under warranty on my DB9 this year under warranty after I argued that despite the dampers being a "wear and tear part" (whatever that means!), it was an instant failure and therefore covered under warranty - the inspection later backed this up when they noted the oil seals had blown. Initially they said I would have to foot the whole bill.
 
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I have only once had a BMW warranty claim rejected to due to wear and tear.

A letter to BMW later and the work was carried out FOC.
 
Ooooo my E60 has a creak from the rear, would be interested if this gets fixed through warranty.

Fox what was the context of your letter?
 
Ok update - this gets interesting
Asked BMW Stephen James to carry out work as long as I could talk to someone when I got there about the price etc - really needed the car this weekend
Went to collect the car 5pm spoke at length to the service rep Ben who was really helpful about my dissatisfaction on only having the car eight months and clocking only five thousand miles to then be presented with a bill of nearly £1000
He agreed that it was unacceptable even though it was refused through the warranty he would pursue Stratstone BMW to see if they would offer some assistance towards the bill as he felt it should have been checked over more thoroughly.
Then went on to say that while they carried out the work they had found that the strut bar between the adaptive suspension on the front had failed and was leaking oil and was a £2500 job that is covered by the warranty!!!
I then pointed out that both of these problems could have been related, he agreed it was possible and to leave it with him to sort out
So I left the garage only to jump in my and hear the dreaded creak that brought me here in the first place...back in the garage we have another chat and car is booked in next Tuesday with reassurances all will be fine

Will update as I go - rear end does feel much tighter now though!
 
If they don't pay out and insist you pay £1000 for a couple of bushes and ARB links, tell them to get lost. You haven't been very clear on what's needed to be done but from what I can gather, you need 2 x rear control arm bushes, 2 x ARB drop links and 2 x ARB bushes

Now, not to sound like a ***** and assuming i have the right parts, but from ECP you can get:

2 x Lemforder rear control arm bushes for £6 each.
2 x Lemforder ARB drop links for £22 each
2 x Febi Bilstein ARB bushes for £11 each from eBay.

So that's £78 worth of parts there, plus labour. I know from experience on a few cars, that ARB drop links and bushes are very easy and the Rear control arm bush change requires a bush puller out'er thing and then the car aligning again, but isn't massively challenging. I can't see how there is more than about £200 worth of labour there from a quality BMW Specialist.

Obviously, if you can get it done at BMW and for them to swallow the bill, and get them to faff around getting the parts etc, then great, but if not - would I be paying nearly £1000 of my hard earned on a couple of small pieces of rubber and a coupe of short pieces of metal? Not on my life.

EDIT: Just seen you have adaptive suspension - does this jack up the price of stuff a bit? Even simple rubber bushes?
 
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Not the same car but bushes are bushes, I picked up a set of full front and rear suspension arms fully pre polybushed in good nick for £100 for my motor...for just bushes, get from ebay, take to a specialist and pay about half or less than half that BMW are trying to gauge u for.
 
BMW dealers are hardly likely to be buying parts at Ebay prices now are they.

This dude has taken his 645 to a BMW dealership. Does he really sound like the bloke who is going to start 1. grubbing around under the car to find out what's wrong and 2. Even know what he is looking at if he gets under there.

No offence to either the OP or the people here obviously more clued up on the availability of parts at more sensible prices to those that know one end of a spanner from another but giving the OP "you can get these parts on EBay cheaper" is hardly helpful.

Where the OP can cut costs though and a more useful suggestion would be to get the car away from the BMW dealer and get it to a well known indy who will likely use the trade parts specialist parts some of you mention and end up with a much reduced bill..
If this is more akin to what the OP is expecting to pay... all well and good..

If the OP was expecting zero outlay because of purchasing warranty on a 67+k mile car... LOL Motoring. (sorry :D )
 
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Warranty claims are (almost) always the same. They have nothing to lose by initially rejecting the claim, because 70% of customers will take it no further and they suffer no loss by coming up with an excuse for not paying.
 
Fuzz said:
BMW dealers are hardly likely to be buying parts at Ebay prices now are they.
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I'm sure they buy them for less in fact, but they sure as hell don't sell them for eBay prices if that's what you meant.

Fuzz said:
This dude has taken his 645 to a BMW dealership. Does he really sound like the bloke who is going to start 1. grubbing around under the car to find out what's wrong and 2. Even know what he is looking at if he gets under there.
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I have no idea. I've never met him. He may well know lots about fixing cars (not that i was suggesting he DIY'd it) but that he took it to the BMW Main Dealer because his car was under warranty and he wanted to see if it could be done under that. I wasn't suggesting he start "grubbing around under the car" I was showing him what the cost of quality parts were, that I thought needed replacing.

Fuzz said:
No offence to either the OP or the people here obviously more clued up on the availability of parts at more sensible prices to those that know one end of a spanner from another but giving the OP "you can get these parts on EBay cheaper" is hardly helpful.
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I think it was very helpful? I mentioned the price on eBay because it was the only place I could find quickly that sold that particular part and therefore give him a rough price for it. The other prices were from ECP which many garages use to source their own parts.

I can't help but think that you're that you're fixating on this whole eBay thing though to make my suggestions seem more unreasonable or helpful.

I was showing him the prices of the parts, not suggesting he buys them. I showed him the cost of the parts and estimated how much labour would be at a garage to fit these parts (assuming they were the correct ones), only to illustrate how ridiculous the price was that the BMW Main Dealer was quoting.

Fuzz said:
Where the OP can cut costs though and a more useful suggestion would be to get the car away from the BMW dealer and get it to a well known indy who will likely use the trade parts specialist parts some of you mention and end up with a much reduced bill..
If this is more akin to what the OP is expecting to pay... all well and good.
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If only someone had mentioned he should take his car to a good BMW Specialist...

Oh wait...
 
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