On returning from a three week holiday with the 06 NC sat in the garage it refused to start when tried, it turned over but wouldn’t fire up. I called out the recovery people who diagnosed a fault with the crank position sensor through the OBD plug.
So I told them to take it to the local Mazda dealers for them to sort out, not a big job I thought?
The Mazda dealer wants a standard charge of £99 just to look at the car and confirm it’s the crank position sensor, is this normal to charge such an amount just to look at and diagnose the problem even though I’ve given the go ahead to fix it? Seems a bit steep to me and wrong.
I’d ask how much the repair would be if they do agree with the diagnosis of the recovery agent and if some or all of the diagnosis charge would be discounted from the repair cost if you allow them to subsequently carry out the repair.
I don’t think you can blame a garage for wanting to confirm a diagnosis before carrying out a repair.
If they fit the sensor on someone else’s say so and the diagnosis is wrong would you still be prepard to pay for the sensor and fitting?
Just for convenience trifflehunt, I’m new to the area and don’t know who to use and trust so Mazda was the easy option, the recovery people aren’t allowed to recommend anyone. I service the car myself so it’s the first time Mazda have had the car.
I know what you are saying RR and went through that with the dealer but they wouldn’t budge from the £99 charge even though I’m willing to pay their rates to sort it out.
Please give your location then a member may be able to direct you to a local independent specialist. If not for this particular problem, it may well it may well prove useful to you in the future.
About 2 years ago my car died due to water ingress, towed it to mazda dealer. paid £45 to plug in & diagnose fault (in wiring loom) which i would never have found myself.
they quoted 2500 - 4000 to replace loom!!!
paid the 45 squid & towed it home
My local garage fixed it by rewiring a short piece by-passing the loom section £180…
As R R says, get a quote. Then either DIY or go to your local garage.
It’s worth paying the experts for advice/diagnosis then as a home maintainer you have the right info.
My local garage charged me £40 for a reading to confirm that what I suspected was a misfire but was a known fault, plugs and leads cost £40, so £40 fix cost me £80.
Just a lesson in life, we live and learn. Lesson is, go on e-bay and buy a code reader for about £18 and you save and have it forever!!
Hey Keith I’m located in Neath, Swansea but there is a specialist at Barry but the recovery wouldn’t transport it that far, has to be local.
Davidds, I have a code reader but the recovery person also had one and his came up with the same fault P0335, I’m sure Mazda will do the same two minute job and charge me £99 for it. Should take less than an hour to fit a replacement CPS so I can live with that.
A couple of years ago I had a new company car(VW) on the 2nd day of ownership the engine management light came on on a Saturday morning whilst 40 miles from home in Derby, as a precaution I took it to a local dealer, they were superb and carried out a full diagnostic and told me it was an O2 sensor, but they didn’t have one in stock. They provided me with a complete diagnostic print out highlighting the faulty component on the report and told me to present this to my local dealer who will then just order the part and fit it… Well my main dealer insisted on carrying out their own diagnostic which showed up the same fault, refused then to let me use the car, and ordered a replacement O2 sensor and fitted it. Fortunately it didn’t cost me a penny but shows what a joke this is even within main dealer networks.
Yes I think paying main dealer prices are sometimes a joke but I guess they have larger overheads too.
A simple job of repairing a puncture on a Vauxhall could have run up to £200 if I had let them have a look at it. My problem involved removing a stubborn locking wheel nut first to make the repair to the tyre. At the very least it would have cost £65 + VAT for labour, a new wheel nut key £28 (the original was slightly chewed up), repair of the tyre £16 (if I remember) I also needed to book it in, they could fit me in in around 4 days, they wouldn’t even cast an eye over it on the day.
All this seemed a great deal of money for a puncture repair and when they told me it may not stop there if they couldn’t get the wheel nut off with the new key they would have to get a special engineer to have a go at it, an extra £75 + VAT. I ran out of the reception of the dealer and couldn’t believe how this may cost, I went to check my bank balance as well.
Anyways, I went to my local garage and asked their advice, young lad came out and had a look and said go get a new wheel locking key and bring it back. So I did, returned and in 5 minutes the wheel was off he also freed off the other locking nuts for me, repaired the puncture all for £10. I gave him a tip also for his speedy work and have been taking my cars there for MOT and service where required ever since.
One main element to consider is the fact that “it’s better to be safe than sorry”. As mentioned in an earlier post if the garage took somebody else’s earlier diagnosis for granted and did work based on that and then it turned out it was wrong, or if some additional problem had arisen in the meantime, you wouldn’t be happy, and neither would they because they’d be deemed to be “negligent” and liable for the costs involved. It’s just being sensible and protecting themselves.
As for the cost, sorry I can’t comment on that. Everything seems to be expensive to me!
Ziggy why not join the OC and get to know the locals in your area as I am sure they have a few tame garages about. My local man will do free diagnostics to club members.
£40 is a fairly standard charge, but not at the garage I use. Despite having bought a code reader, it wouldn’t detect the ABS fault on my car, so took it to my local garage/MOT center and they read the diagnostic at no charge, told me it was the right front, ordered a new one and fitted it (a bitch of a job I’d add) and charged me £90. I thanked them for being reasonable, and they said “You are a regular customer, and we look after them”. (They also cleared the fault, so that meant plugging their reader in again.)
£90 is having a laugh in my book, it takes less than five minutes. One reason why most of us avoid main dealers.
The ABS codes are still on the old style socket in the engine via an LED on the Mk2.5. I found that out after not finding it via ODB2 socket in the cabin.
Thanks for all the input but my grudge is the £99 for the diagnostic check, we know it only takes minutes and I can understand them wanting to run it on their machine to be sure that the problem is the same one myself and the recovery person diagnosed through our own OBD readers, just think about it, how long does it take you to earn £99 that you’ve already paid tax on? Not a few minutes I’m sure.
I’m no friend of main dealers, I use them purely whilst the car is under warranty.
They are expensive compared to say a local garage
So what would be a reasonable change in this case? £50? £25?
The dealers is a business like any other they have costs they need to recoup
. So that £99 pays for… rent, business rates, light, heat, the service desk handier, the mechanic, the service manager and (maybe a service director ), the MDs wage, his PAs wage, the diagnostics kit they have to purchase from Mazda, the seating you may have sat in, the IT kit that took your booking and printed your invoice , credit card charges, and so on and so on…and they have to make a profit which, if they’re a PLC, needs to pay a dividend.
On top of which, The maxda dealer has a limited universe of customers, Not every passing car will drop into them for obvious reasons.
I’m not defending the £99 charge. But an alternative would be to find a local independent who has the necessary expertise but not all the overhead…
Hi Ziggy. I’m near you in Skewen. I use Autofix, by The Bowens pub at junction 44 M4. They service and mot my cars and any mechanical jobs I’m not confident about tackling myself
Point taken, and not disputable, BUT - £99 is more than some dealers hourly service charge (labour), and conducting the test is a prelude to actual fixing it, on which they also add labour and part(s) with added profit. That pays the bills, so an OBD check is peanuts. - Or should be.
If you took the car into a dealer because one of your headlights doesn’t work, they’ll try the light switch, (no charge for that) and then add labour and new bulb cost with profit added, so tell me the difference?
Once more - shades of the Barbie Doll.
If you go to a shoe shop, and spend ages trying on shoes (I gave up on that years ago) they don’t charge you for their time and effort, you just pay for the shoe price - assuming you did buy a pair! Both are service based, but the difference is painful. Not everyone goes into the same shop, they choose which one they visit, so that compares to who visits a dealer, we all have our favorite brand. - Cheaper chains are doing a roaring trade these days. Ring a bell?