Dealer Service Plan

[Grompix]

I’m in a bit of a quandary about the servicing of my latest Yaris.
I had taken out a service plan with our local Toyota dealer when I bought my previous Yaris Mk 3 Hybrid from them way back in 2014. It seemed like a good idea, I had no problems with the dealer and they did a good job (as far as I was aware). So I took out another plan (this time with MOT included) in 2018 for another 3 years.
Unfortunately, my local Toyota dealer (a well-known family firm) sold out to a conglomerate last year and I was less than impressed with my last service. My Mk3 Yaris was serviced and it passed it’s MOT no probs but this time the dealer tried to pressurise me into forking out £700+ for a change of rear disk-brakes and a perforated handbrake cable tube. When I asked if it would be an MOT failure if I declined their ‘offer’ they eventually said no. The actual cost was £9-29 for a replacement rear wiper-blade rubber. A helluva saving over £700+ but £9-29 for a wiper blade rubber!!

I managed to get my rear disk-brakes and pads sorted out for £190 at my friendly local garage (there was nothing wrong with the hand-brake cable tube!).

When my trusty Yaris Mk3 was written off by a dim-sighted white-van-man six weeks ago, I told the same main dealer of my intention of getting another Yaris Hybrid - and could I continue to use the remaining service time on the existing service plan? His answer was to close down the existing plan (made under the old family concern) and open up a new one (with the new company of course - hmmm!)           
Anyway, as a result of this (and other incidents) my quandary is - I don’t trust my main local Toyota dealership at all, so I don’t want to be locked into a service-plan that is applicable only to them.

So, can anyone on this forum offer some advice as to what options I have in servicing my new (2020) Yaris Mk4 and still keeping within Toyota guidelines/warranty?
I notice that on the MyT (My-Toyota) website, you can take out what appears to be a ‘general’ Toyota Service Plan. Would this be usable with any Toyota dealership?
For me, it’s a case of once (or more!) bitten, twice shy. I have it in mind (sort of) to take out this ‘general’ Toyota service plan and book my car into a Toyota dealership when it is due for its service (which may be off my beaten track - but I’m willing to travel a bit) and see how they perform. If they play silly bu**ers like my local dealers, then I suppose my next service can be with some other dealership - hopefully still using the same service plan?

Is this the case - can I do this or have I got that completely wrong?

Of course, places like Halfords seem to offer Toyota Hybrid servicing too and they claim their services to be Toyota compatible (or even better). Halfords also claim Toyota warranties are protected as they only use Toyota parts - hmmm!
Complications!
Anyone here help at all?

[FROSTYBALLS]

An issue re using independent garages uncovered within another topic, is that they won't have access to Toyota's digital service records. Which means that you will have to keep manual records of servicing, etc.

[Rosgoe]

Looking on the Toyota website and going into my vehicles then on line service booking  providing you have your car registered not sure if it’s the same on the app.it asks which dealer you want to use by entering your postcode it then gives you a list of dealers that you can choose from it then asks if you have a service plan or not so I assume from this that you can use any Toyota dealer if you have a service plan.

The only thing that I found with Toyota services is that they seem (not all mind you) is that they do Additional work without asking such as engine flush and or fuel injection clean as I found out when I had the auris hybrid it had only done 18000 in 5 years if it had 50000 I could justify it.

[Catlover]

4 minutes ago, Rosgoe said:

The only thing that I found with Toyota services is that they seem (not all mind you) is that they do Additional work without asking such as engine flush and or fuel injection clean as I found out when I had the auris hybrid it had only done 18000 in 5 years if it had 50000 I could justify it.

If they do something without your say so outside of a serrvice then stand your ground and say not paying.

Grompix, at the moment you can have your car serviced anywhere and the Toyota warranty stands firm SO LONG as the garage you use is VAT registered and they use parts and consumables of the quivalent specification as Toyota parts. Thing to conside ir....in case of a warranty claim the onus is on you to show the parts used were of the equivalent to Toyotas. Could be a bit of a mither.

You will have the 5 year Warranty from Toyota. After that you can take advantage of the Relax warranty scheme where if you have the annual service at a Toyota garage the warranth will be extended 12 months. That will go on until the car is 10 years old/100k miles. Thing is the service has to be done by Toyota. So its imerative now to find a good Toyota dealer if in the longer run you want to go along with the Relax warranty.. I am of course talking here about warranty and not service plans.

 

[Cyker]

Why take out a service plan at all?

What is the actual benefit of taking out a service plan??

 

[CPN]

17 minutes ago, Cyker said:

Why take out a service plan at all?

What is the actual benefit of taking out a service plan??

That's a nice easy one, it's simple: cost. You can usually negotiate a much more favourable price than the equivalent 3 x annual services + MOT included. Especially when you do it by way of a bargaining chip when making a new car purchase.

[FROSTYBALLS]

24 minutes ago, Cyker said:

What is the actual benefit of taking out a service plan??

You also fix your service costs for the duration of the service plan - avoiding any price increases.

[bathtub tom]

2 hours ago, Grompix said:

Unfortunately, my local Toyota dealer (a well-known family firm) sold out to a conglomerate last year and I was less than impressed with my last service. My Mk3 Yaris was serviced and it passed it’s MOT no probs but this time the dealer tried to pressurise me into forking out £700+ for a change of rear disk-brakes and a perforated handbrake cable tube. When I asked if it would be an MOT failure if I declined their ‘offer’ they eventually said no. The actual cost was £9-29 for a replacement rear wiper-blade rubber. A helluva saving over £700+ but £9-29 for a wiper blade rubber!!

I managed to get my rear disk-brakes and pads sorted out for £190 at my friendly local garage (there was nothing wrong with the hand-brake cable tube!).
 

I think you may have answered your own question!

[Heidfirst]

3 hours ago, Grompix said:

I notice that on the MyT (My-Toyota) website, you can take out what appears to be a ‘general’ Toyota Service Plan. Would this be usable with any Toyota dealership?

A genuine Toyota service plan is usable at any Toyota dealer.

I have a service plan via my local dealer's own offer because it is significantly cheaper than the genuine Toyota offer  but it does restrict me to using only dealers within it's group (currently not an issue as I am happy with my dealer).

[Cyker]

 

22 hours ago, CPN said:

That's a nice easy one, it's simple: cost. You can usually negotiate a much more favourable price than the equivalent 3 x annual services + MOT included. Especially when you do it by way of a bargaining chip when making a new car purchase.

 

22 hours ago, FROSTYBALLS said:

You also fix your service costs for the duration of the service plan - avoiding any price increases.

So, the thing is, I've never ever been offered a service plan that was any cheaper than just paying for the services, hence the What benefit question.

Whenever I've broached the subject they've basically said that's the price take it or leave it, and on further interrogation, even things like the cabin filter, wheel alignment, i.e. things that normally command extra charges to be done, would all have to be negotiated and added to the plan, and then would be done whether they were needed or not.

And those service plans would have locked me to that particular dealer - I don't know about the website one as that's new to me, but again it appears to be no cheaper than paying for all the services normally.

So, aside from fixing the price in case it goes up (And presumably they wouldn't refund you if it went down - If I'd had a service contract when they introduced the Gold and Silver servicing schemes, would I have actually lost out?), I really don't see any real benefit of taking out a service plan...?

 

[MikeSh]

When I bought my used Yaris a few months ago the dealer tried (hard) to get me to buy their service plan.

I checked Toyota's own offering and it was cheaper ...

[FROSTYBALLS]

Well, if you don't see any benefit, that's it. Horses for courses.

We've had service plans/packs on all our new cars since 2006 (8 over that period), and for us, breaking the cost down to monthly payments at no extra cost, and fixing the costs works for us. 

Service costs aren't going to reduce.

As regards the old Essential Care service scheme, some had service plans based on the Silver/Gold service costs. Re tailoring the plan, that depends on the flexibility of the dealer - we've had no issues previously. Also some plans we've had have offered 10% off parts and accessories.

 

[Cyker]

@MikeSh

Good grief how could they mess that up!  

I just looked and for every Toyota I knew the reg plate of, the service plan for 36 months and 15000 annual miles was £1000 so it seems like a firmly fixed price.

Unless your dealer's 'offering' included some of the other consumables like the ones I mentioned, as the Toyota website one has no provision for adding those from what I saw.

Was there even room to haggle the price down?

 

 

[MikeSh]

1 hour ago, Cyker said:

@MikeSh

Good grief how could they mess that up!  

I tend to think it was a deliberate fleecing ploy. I doubt many punters would nip off to check the 'official' plan.

1 hour ago, Cyker said:

I just looked and for every Toyota I knew the reg plate of, the service plan for 36 months and 15000 annual miles was £1000 so it seems like a firmly fixed price.

This car will likely only do about 3,000  a year, so it's just annual service.

1 hour ago, Cyker said:

Was there even room to haggle the price down?

I didn't try. It is just an instalment plan - no other tangible benefit I could see like reduced cost. And I didn't like the attitude of the person at the dealer that kept pestering me ... I'm retired, so while 8:30am might be prime time for them, I didn't appreciate it. (Nose, face, off, cut ... meh 🙂 )

I do run a service plan on SWMBO's Smart car, but that does provide more 'benefits' than the Toyota plan (it's Daimler-Benz, so it damn well needs to 🙃 ).

[CPN]

 

2 hours ago, FROSTYBALLS said:

Also some plans we've had have offered 10% off parts and accessories.

The dealer I use offers its new car buying customers a 10% discount off parts and accessories by default. (whether you buy a service plan or not)

2 hours ago, Cyker said:

I just looked and for every Toyota I knew the reg plate of, the service plan for 36 months and 15000 annual miles was £1000 so it seems like a firmly fixed price.

Wow! That's WAY off to what I've usually started negotiating at, at my dealer! Typically starting at £650ish for 3 annual services and an MOT at the 3-year point.

[FROSTYBALLS]

33 minutes ago, CPN said:

That's WAY off to what I've usually started negotiating at, at my dealer! Typically starting at £650ish for 3 annual services and an MOT at the 3-year point.

Same for me. 

[Cyker]

The 10% thing seems very discretionary - The other dealer I go to (The one with an ACTUAL PARTS DESK!!) has always given me 10% off just for the asking, and so has PartsKing when I've bought stuff off him.

As for the cost of the service plan, yours are probably annual, and that's normally what I'd do to, but to keep within the terms of the warranty I need to do them 1.5 times a year now to keep under the 10,000 mile limit (I normally do 14-15k miles a year), which is 4 services according to their website.

At least there are no MOTs - I found out last year I've been ripped off for the MOT cost since I've been going to that place; They've always charged me something like £54, but then I found out my friend has been getting them for £30 ever since he bought his Auris and started servicing it there!

 

 

[mrpj]

I think I'll pass and stick to my local trusted independent. No glass palace or "free" coffee though. Just checked on Toyota's website and they quote £900 for two full, one intermediate and two MOTs.

[Grompix]

Many thanks chaps.
You have been most helpful (as usual on this forum).
Lots of food for thought here.
At the moment I have it in mind to run through the 'generic' Toyota website service plan cost - say for three years.
...and then ring the two (yes only two) Toyota franchises in my area and see how they compare.
My nearest dealer is the one I would prefer to avoid if possible but the other one is about 16 miles away. Obviously, because of the increased travel distance I would like to have a courtesy car as part of the 'deal' (I always did when my local dealer was a family concern - and they always gave 10% off on parts too!).
Thanks again folks - I'll come with any results.
Cheers
Chris 😉    

[wildtapholer]

I would always go to a good independent garage, I'm never one to take out any extra plans, when you buy a new washer they try to palm you one off and you never need it. My neighbours car and being in lock down last year and having her licence taken off her for a medical reason, had only travelled 700 miles since it was serviced and the stealer insisted the car had to have a full service as it was due and had to be done in order to keep it's warranty. My wife's car on the other hand when I bought it from a main stealer, hadn't been serviced for 2 yrs covering 20k in that period Toyota only gave it an interim service (oil + filter) and told us it had full service history, my grip with them was that surely it should have had a full service and at the very least changed the air and cabin filter as well. Will I ever use a main stealer again to buy a car, NO