Replacing disks & pads on the Vito - car dealership versus commercial dealership

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BTB 500

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Aug 7, 2005
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Location
Shropshire
Car
R129 SL500, W639 Vito 120, S205 C300
In 6 years / 49k miles I've only had the front pads changed once on the Vito. It's a big heavy beast and automatic to boot (not much in the way of engine braking), so no surprise that it's going to need new disks & pads all round in the near future.

The car dealership in Ascot now services M-B commercials too, so as they are only about a mile away I got a quote from them as well as the commercial dealership in Aldershot that we've used for the Vito before.

The surprise was that the car dealership quoted nearly £200 less (£500 vs £700)?!
 
Curious. I thought that commercial places were meant to be cheaper.

How much of the bill is for parts? Have you considered providing parts from ecp or other? From my experience, garages can buy discounted parts but don't always pass of the savings.
 
Don't know what the parts/labour breakdown is - both just quoted a 'fitted price' (excluding VAT from the commercial dealer, including VAT from the car dealer). Interestingly the rear disks are £198 and the fronts are £177.12 (both fitted incl. VAT) :dk:

I'm sure there'd be a saving getting the parts elsewhere but I need a parktronic sensor replacing too (which has to be colour coded), and I've only got a 3-day window between trips to get everything sorted. So easiest to just book it in at a dealer.
 
Up here the commercial dealers are stacked out with work, whereas the car side is having to be more competitive due to the competition.
 
Also interesting that a fairly upmarket main dealer (Ascot is a pretty affluent area) would start taking commercials. When we first got the Vito their parts dept. wouldn't (or couldn't, not sure) even order some mats for me.
 
A little update on this. The Vito went in today to have the work done (new disks & pads front & rear, fix to an exhaust bracket, new parktronic sensor).

Had a call to say it was ready, and the bill was £817. "Erm" I said, "you said it would be just over £600"!

Turns out they got the original quote wrong to the tune of £200 ... should have been almost exactly the same price as the commercial dealership had given!

To their credit they admitted the problem was their own and honoured the original figure, so I ended up paying £602 :thumb:
 
These guys are close to you. Worth trying them next time -http://www.starmotorservices.com/services_offered.htm
 

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