Pointless Dealership

[aliwood_]

Hi,

i thought it was about time i put my first post up and sadly its a bad one.

I droppred of my 1.6 VVT 3 DR Megane at the Wokingham Renault dealership this morning for them to diagnose the dephayser pulley issue as i had been experincing symptons for the last couple of months.

The idle is all over the place and was calmed down by cleaning the throttle body and eventually replacing the throttle housing. It never really resolved the issue as no it randomly idles at just over 1k revs or just under. i have to lift the clutch slightly to get it to go back to idle. Before the work was completed i had to rev the engine just to keep it alive for the 1st minute or so.

Then came the "Bag of spanners" noise when starting from cold. This has happened three times now all when starting for the first time in very cold conditions. Two days in a row was enough for me to say thats it! Having had the car looked at by 2 RAC men and 2 independant garages i decided that only Renault themselves could diagnose it for sure. WRONG!!!


i just got a phone call from them to say they cannot find the fault and it seems fine. For a start it doesnt idle properly but hey its easy to miss as there is a HUGE rev counter on the dash. Apprently they need to hear the sound before they can diagnose, i told them it wont happen as its warm and only happened 3 times ever. My question is why accept to diagnose the problem when i told them it wont make that noise.

So now im faced with an £80 bill for nothing, i will have to go again and hope it makes the noise which just wont happen. £80 a go i think not!!!

Any one else been hit by these rip off artists that have created a common problem with no way of identifying it until your car is ruined enough that it does it everytime it starts??

[busternlouie]

The only way they'll get to hear the noise is if you leave the car with them (preferably overnight) or have the car trailered to the dealership. They need to experience it while the engine is cold and all the oil has drained back into the sump.

[aliwood_]

Having had time to calm down a bit i do see where the garage is coming from but after they tried telling me there was nothing wrong with the idling i still protested heavily when i went to pick it up.

The charges for the diagnostics £69 was waivered and i was promised a free courtesy car while the took the car in for three days later in the month. Not only that they kindly cleaned the car inside and out so it was completly spotless


The one lesson i learnt was dont take any rubbish from your dealership because lets face it i still have a car that they failed to make properly in the first place so i shouldnt be paying the earth for them to fix it