[bamber]

Well it always takes one to rock the boat. My experience from the Touareg at Beadles Maidstone has been s**t service although the young lady that specialises in Touaregs at their service reception was hopitalised at the time. Took them nearly four weeks to rectify my climate control last summer, nothing unknown just incompetence.

It wasn't just the time factor it was the promises that failed such as we will call you when the part is in that scores them low.

I have also suffered indifferent service when my Golfs have gone in for warranty work and have had to use the intervention of VW Customer Services to get the work done properly. I have nothing but admiration for Maidstone Audi next door who run a very slick and good service dept.

Motorline in Tunbridge Wells have the equipment installed to service Touaregs. Went to their open evening a few weeks back. Wonder what type of service they will offer, hope it is better than their sales dept!!!

 

[bamber]

Old site or new site? The old site had was a converted warehouse and had limited facilities.

I am no fan of Motorline, I have tried to purchase VW cars through them twice in the last year and have been amazed by their lack of business awareness to the point of arrogance.

On the other hand cannot speak more highly of Listers in Stratford. Trading in my Touareg for another this weekend, will be my second VW bought from them in the last six months. Unfortunately a little too far to travel for servicing.

 

[bamber]

Matt, have tried your dealership in the past, before you joined though, initially tried to buy a Mark IV R32 that the CEO of Pfizer had bought as a birthday present for his wife that she didn't want and sent it back.

I took my Audi's for service to the old site when it was a VAG rather than a Volkswagen site but I lived near Sittingbourne then and the journey was not so long.

Will probably meet at Iwade Village Hall again at some time. By the way I assume those two new Mark V R32's that were unallocated for March 1st have names on them now?

 

[bamber]

My Touareg is booked for some warranty work in May so I will be keen to see an improvement over my visit in March. The Golf was booked in for the dual mass flywheel replacement under recall/warranty for a day after Beadles had it for a day before to determine whether it needed changing (more than one supplier of the flywheel for Golf's but only one suppliers product needed to changed).

On the day the work is booked (5 hour job by the book), I get a call at midday to be told that they need it for two days as the vehicle is a 4Motion and they have to drop the subframe. Point is they had the car in for a day previously to check but failed to notice it was a 4Motion!!! I had made arrangements for a day as I didn't need a car but that wasn't the case for the extra day.

They dropped the car back the following day and testing it that evening it was apparant straight away that the steering creaked and the steering was clunking or catching when turning at slow or no speed. I took it straight back down on the following morning (Saturday) and insisted they looked at the problem. One hour later they return the keys with the problem fixed, they had disturbed the A/C water disposal pipe during the work and it was catching on the steering!!

But why wasn't this found when the vehicle was road tested after the DMF was replaced. I picked up the clonking straight away let alone the significant creaking from the steering?

The Golf was back in last week for more warranty work, vibrations from the dash that can be difficult to pin point, and to be fair they have remedied the problem.

 

[bamber]

Lot of time for Trish for although she is one of the three service agents she specialises on the luxury cars. She is a very helpful and cheerful person. It is the mechanics that I have the problem.

 

[bamber]

I bought my original Touareg from Beadles Maidstone and shortly after had the first problem that they made a horlicks so nullifies your statement. My second Touraeg I bought from Listers Stratford, Beadles did not have a vehicle in stock with the spec I required. As I change my vehicles frequently I prefer to purchase six month old vehicles to lose a lot of the initial depreciation.

The second Touareg I bought over the telephone but on driving home a number of issues that should have been rectified in their 300 or whatever multi point check had not been corrected. I spoke to VW Stratford, they sent down one of their demonstrators as a loan car, had mine for 8 days and rectified all the faults plus did some other warranty work such as the sound proofing for the auxillary heater. They then delivered the vehicle back. So you could say I have followed your advice.

The most recent problem I had with Beadles was with my Golf that again I purchased through VW Stratford, Beadles did not have any 4Motion diesels in stock, naturally I try locally before moving on. VW issued a recall to replace the DMF, Stratford notified me but VW pay for the work irrelevant of where the vehicle was purchased.

I have owned seven VW's in the last four years, some purchased through Beadles but I have always had the vehicles serviced at Beadles Maidstone so they have had a fair wad of my cash so you cannot say I have not given them a fair chance!!!

 

[bamber]

Think Trish is great as I have said in a previous post, the major problem I had with my climate control in September 2005 and the delay was while she was off convalescing from a hospital visit and one of her non Touareg colleagues dealt or not with the problem. On other occassions it has been the techies that have let her down although that has been with my Golf(s) rather than the Touareg so different techies.

If she does read this forum perhaps she can tell me why my Touareg had a 42 mile road test when it was in early in May. I dropped it off and picked it up so there was no delivery mileage to me and back and it was only in to investigate possible wiper problem, a dodgy reversing light and to tighten up the rear passenger door to stop a whistling noise!!