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Good Dealership experience

cruelass

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I got my 07 SS serviced at a local dealership yesterday. I know it would be cheaper to do it myself, or a local mechanic but because when i bought it i got an extended warranty i have to have it done at the dealership comply with it. Anyways I take the car in an they ask whether there were nay issues. I replied that there was an intermittant squeal from the belt and the harmonic balancer was wobbly. I got the usual "they all do that" but they will have a look. The tech rings back after a few hours and tells me they will change the balancer and the sway bar to strut links under warranty. He said that normally i would have to pay for the links but he would get them in under warranty which was good. Also got a couple more things done including an injector clean and throttle body service. Added a little to the cost but would of been a lot more if the other stuff was included. Car goes great now and the engine seems to be a lot smoother.
 

Voodoo_SV6

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McGraths in the Shire?
 

cruelass

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Yeah thats them. People love to rip on the dealers but I have had good experience with McGraths.
 

commodore665

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It's good to hear that , I thought it was just me who gets a good deal and good service from a dealership , mine is Rose Town Holden in NZ , its been a family run dealer for ages .
 

Tasmaniak

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It's good to hear that , I thought it was just me who gets a good deal and good service from a dealership , mine is Rose Town Holden in NZ , its been a family run dealer for ages .

Uniform help?
 

Sean880

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Yeah thats them. People love to rip on the dealers but I have had good experience with McGraths.

Yes - very good people to deal with. Purchased one of my previous new cars from McGraths.

For Sydney people, Barry Smith Holden in Pennant Hills are also good.
 

vq~gangsta

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I think most dealers are pretty good in the quality of work they provide, they just charge a lot more than anywhere else - leading to the nickname 'stealerships'.

Only bad dealer experience I ever had was from a Holden dealer at Meningie (a small south australian town well outside of Adelaide). I took my car there to get my air con compressor replaced because I was regularly working in the town and was very short on free time. They quoted me one price for it, but when I got the bill they had whacked on another $200 for an extra two hours labor. When I asked why, they said it was because they worked out the schrader valve also needed replacing, and since it was a mandatory fix they didn't bother telling me about it beforehand or asking my permission.

I kicked up a bit of a stink about it and they ended up just charging me an extra $100, but I later found out that changing the schrader valve is actually a 10-15 minute job and most good mechanics would normally replace it while doing the compressor and the system was degassed anyway. I contacted holden customer assistance about it but they basically refused to get involved and said what each individual holden dealer does is their own business.

I suppose ultimately holden dealerships are like any mechanic, some are good while some are basically crooks.

I recently got a quote from a Holden dealer for a trans service and they quoted $400. I then contact my local transmisison place and they quote $165. I did a bit of follow up to find out exactly what each place does for their trans services and ended up learning that Holdens take the cars to that same local transmisison place to get them serviced. The only difference was holdens always got them to replace the oil strainer while if you did it through the trans place they only did it when required, but even with the trans strainer the local transmission place charged $205. So in getting a trans service from Holdens, they take it to a local transmission spot to get the work done then charge you $200 for the privilege of their involvement - stealership indeed!
 

Tasmaniak

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commodore665

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Now if only it wasn't an offence to borrow the uniform.
:rofl:yeah , uniform may help , possibly my South African accent and that our police vehicles get serviced there as well .
 
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