Servicing Can Affect Your Warranty

Tuesday, 10. April 2012

I’ve mentioned on several occasions that you are able to have your car serviced at a non franchised dealer but you have to be extra careful about warranty claims as manufacturers will try to squirm out of them. A recent case involved Ford and a young lady with a 4 year old Ford Ka. She suddenly found that the car had developed rust around the filler cap so under the terms of the perforation warranty she made a claim. However, the lady, Louise MacLachlan was shocked when Ford refused to pay because they claimed that she was claiming too late.

The damage should have been picked up at the last service but as the service wasn’t carried out by a franchised dealer they claim that the bodywork wasn’t checked. So whilst the service book was stamped this actually didn’t count for anything as Ford didn’t believe that the service had been fully carried out.

Auto Express waded in and got Ford to reverse their decision but it just goes to show that manufacturers don’t like you if you have your car serviced outside its dealer network. In fact the legal advice is to check the warranty because whilst the EU rules now allow you to have your car serviced outside the dealer network, whilst retaining your mechanical warranty, this doesn’t apply to perforation warranties.

Ford doesn’t exclude the perforation warranty from cover if you have your car serviced elsewhere but they are quite strict about the service carried out on the car and the fact that every item is covered. So you’ve been warned. By Graham Hill