BMW and M Power Owners

[TW]Fox said:
It annoys me that they don't cover weather seals under the warranty as well but to be fair it is clearly stated in the documentation what is and isn't covered, if that doesn't meet your needs then why buy the policy? It's still amongst the very best of these sort of policies and the level of cover is very good.

They are very clear about what is and isn't included. Most of the time of there is any sort of problem it's the specific dealer rather than the warranty.

I don't know what the service advisor is talking about regarding repair or replacement. The warranty policy documentation is clear in saying that it does cover repairs or replacements of covered parts.

The problem here has nothing to do with whether it needs a repair rather than a replacement and everything to do with the fact the suggested resolution is cleaning and cleaning isn't covered.

I've just read the Porsche policy documentation. The Porsche policy also excludes cleaning, just like the BMW policy does.
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You’re right it is clear, but it’s difficult to know whether an issue is relating to the exclusions without taking it in, at which point if it is excluded, you’re liable for £225 labour and you’re left with a faulty component still.


E.g. in this case, if the light isn’t covered due to a weather seal and they clean it to repair it, I’ll have to cover the costs of this repair.



This wouldn’t happen with the Porsche one - you’re not liable to pay for any labour if they find it isn’t covered.



And if you don’t take it in, and it later causes further problems, they can reject it for not taking it in sooner if I remember correctly.
 
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MrRockliffe said:
You’re right it is clear, but it’s difficult to know whether an issue is relating to the exclusions without taking it in, at which point if it is excluded, you’re liable for £225 labour and you’re left with a faulty component still.


E.g. in this case, if the light isn’t covered due to a weather seal and they clean it to repair it, I’ll have to cover the costs of this repair.
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I agree with you - the good news is that cases like this are quite rare but unfortunately anything involving water getting where it shouldn't get is a risk of this sort of outcome.

Condensation in headlights has always been a difficult issue across multiple manufacturers. There is even a section in the manual about how much of it is 'normal'.

MrRockliffe said:
This wouldn’t happen with the Porsche one - you’re not liable to pay for any labour if they find it isn’t covered.
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I've no experience if Porsche but I'd be genuinelly surprised if official policy was that nobody pays the bill for diagnosis time involved in finding a fault that is not covered by a warranty. It's entirely possible that individual dealers may use their own judgement in whether they charge, but ultimately somebody is paying for the workshop time whichever route they take.

I can't really see anything in the terms of the Porsche warranty that mark it out as being superior to the BMW one. It looks like a comparable product with similar exclusions. I think the Porsche warranty is good value and I like the idea that you can pay for multiple years at once as well. I wish BMW offered that.

I think your difference in experience is mostly down to how each individual dealer operates and not the warranty policies themselves. This could equally happen between two different Porsche dealers.
 
Personally I've never had a warranty on any BMW I've owned. Over the last 10-11 years I've had minimal issues on 2 E92 M3's and 2 F82 M4's, 1 TPMS receiver module on an E92 and 1 rocker cover on an M4 needed replacing, that's it... Saved £1000's probably £10k+ as BMW want £5113 for a warranty on current M4 ZCP (70k miles).. madness considering I've spent less than £1300 over 10 years on issues that would've (probably) been covered by a warranty.
 
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iMacMart said:
EGR Cooler?
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I don't think it's 'just' that, as those recalls have been going on for a while now, there're cars from 2023 which had some major issues with ABS/Breaking system - pretty scary fault tbh...

BMW's quality is getting worse and worse... :(
 
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MrRockliffe said:
Really not having a great experience with BMW insured warranty at the moment.


One of the headlights on my 3 series has very high condensation.




I took it to BMW, who advised me that if it isn’t covered under warranty, I’d need to pay an hours labour for the investigation.



After 3 hours they gave me the car back, and said they’re going to submit the information to the underwriters, but hadn’t had the chance to test it because I needed the car back by the end of the day (they didn’t tell me in advance they would need it overnight to test it).



I called today for an update, and they said it needs to go back for a headlight clean. If this fixes the issue then I need to pay for the labour as it won’t be covered by the warranty. I questioned this and they said the warranty only covers replacing parts, not fixing them.



I’ve got the full comprehensive warranty with £100 excess.




I’m really struggling to see what I’ve paid for at the moment. The Porsche warranty is BY FAR the better product with 0 excess and no labour to pay. It’s repair or replace and there will never be a cost to me. Oh and it’s cheaper.
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Was the condensation in the light before hitting the traffic cones you mentioned in another thread ?

The seal/housing might have a crack/break in it.
 
Taken my E89 in for a rear headlight condensation issue and as Fox said, they basically told me 'seals aren't covered' and I had to get a new headlight fitted at my cost. In my case cleaning wasn't an option as the rear indicator was broken; which is an LED strip glued onto the rest of the headlight housing/structure.
 
MrRockliffe said:
Yes, it started just before going to Scotland so I started taking pictures to track progress
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My experience with the BMW warranty on a rear cluster letting water in was after removing it and checking for cracks etc the claim was refused as it was the weather seal letting water in which is excluded.

Not a huge deal with the rear light as only £120 ish to replace myself. I wasn’t charged labour for checking it as it was in for a service at the time and the excess was £100 so not worth worrying about.
 
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MrRockliffe said:
Yes, it started just before going to Scotland so I started taking pictures to track progress
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you bought it summertime - not a dealer though ? - mine get cloudy over winter months, when cold air condenses, so, I think you could say fault was already present.
(had left dust caps loose for a while to give moisture chance to evaporate during use)
 
jpaul said:
you bought it summertime - not a dealer though ? - mine get cloudy over winter months, when cold air condenses, so, I think you could say fault was already present.
(had left dust caps loose for a while to give moisture chance to evaporate during use)
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It’s a sealed unit, and the condensation is significant.


Here’s the other headlight. Picture taken at the same time on a warm sunny day.






I bought it when it was cooler, and we had some cooler days. It started just before Scotland when it was still quite warm, and got progressively worse during my trip.



I suspect water has found its way into the headlight.



Not sure if there’s a dust cap to access, but there is water dripping on the inside of the light, sometimes from the projectors themselves.
 
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Dangerous Dave said:
My experience with the BMW warranty on a rear cluster letting water in was after removing it and checking for cracks etc the claim was refused as it was the weather seal letting water in which is excluded.

Not a huge deal with the rear light as only £120 ish to replace myself. I wasn’t charged labour for checking it as it was in for a service at the time and the excess was £100 so not worth worrying about.
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I think the laser light is a near £2k job per light, and not accessible. It’s a bumper off job.


Seals going on £120 lights is one thing, especially if it’s accessible and you can clean it. But this has been designed to be replaced, not repaired - incredibly anti consumer behaviour.


Edit:

From BMW:



Irrespective of what the warranty terms are, here’s their own guidance.
 
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MrRockliffe said:
I think the laser light is a near £2k job per light, and not accessible. It’s a bumper off job.

Seals going on £120 lights is one thing, especially if it’s accessible and you can clean it. But this has been designed to be replaced, not repaired - incredibly anti consumer behaviour.

Edit:

From BMW: pic

Irrespective of what the warranty terms are, here’s their own guidance.
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This, its literally a screenshot from BMW Workshop manual that you can find in ISTA...
20240927-163252.jpg


Edit: Write to their UK Head Office, raise it as a complaint and include the screenshot.
 
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Does look like could leave the back cover off headlight for a while and see if it helps evacuate bulk of moisture during dry use; if it's front seal, very difficult to repair.
how would dealer clean it w/o massive man hours.
 
MrRockliffe said:
I think the laser light is a near £2k job per light, and not accessible. It’s a bumper off job.


Seals going on £120 lights is one thing, especially if it’s accessible and you can clean it. But this has been designed to be replaced, not repaired - incredibly anti consumer behaviour.


Edit:

From BMW:

Irrespective of what the warranty terms are, here’s their own guidance.
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The guidance is for new car warranty which has no such exclusion for seals so I'm not really sure how this helps.

You've purchased an insured warranty and it's the terms of that which matter.

I don't think it's in doubt that the headlight is faulty, the issue is whether the fault is one that is covered under the insurance product you purchased.
 
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jpaul said:
Does look like could leave the back cover off headlight for a while and see if it helps evacuate bulk of moisture during dry use; if it's front seal, very difficult to repair.
how would dealer clean it w/o massive man hours.
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That’s a different headlight :( I’ve owned other BMWs which have a panel which you can remove. There isn’t an accessible one on the laser light which makes it impossible to do anything with as a consumer.
 
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[TW]Fox said:
The guidance is for new car warranty which has no such exclusion for seals so I'm not really sure how this helps.

You've purchased an insured warranty and it's the terms of that which matter.

I don't think it's in doubt that the headlight is faulty, the issue is whether the fault is one that is covered under the insurance product you purchased.
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You are 100% right but it is immensely frustrating as a customer. Especially as it is purchased through BMW. It infers, wrongly or rightly, that it would meet their standards, which it doesn’t :(
 
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