[speedzak]

This issue is not something to do with the oil quality, quantity etc.. It's about business and profit.
If you run a business, you'll have some policies. This is a free country and you can determine any business policy as long as it complies with Indian penal codes. It is your duty to see whether your customer will like it or not and choose whether appease the customers or make more profit. If you decide to go ahead with your right policy, then your customer shouldn't determine to stop it. Will you like it?
If your customer doesn't like your way of business, he will be asked to move on to where he can meet his demands.

It's a different matter of warranty being void due to the non acceptance of their oil. This is just stupid. There should be some procedure in which a customer is able to fill in with his oil of choice without making the warranty void. And this should be done by the manufacturer.

[akshay4587]

Recently Hyundai A.S.S refused to service my Accent when I asked to them to put in Mobil 1 instead of their usual oil.
they also refused to carry out other Jobs involved in service apart from oil engine.
their answer was "SAAR AGAR SERVICE KARWANI HAI TO HAMARA OIL DAALNA HOGA" ( If you want to get the car serviced,you will have to put in our oil).

[mmmjgm]

Originally Posted by akshay4587

Recently Hyundai A.S.S refused to service my Accent when I asked to them to put in Mobil 1 instead of their usual oil.
they also refused to carry out other Jobs involved in service apart from oil engine.
their answer was "SAAR AGAR SERVICE KARWANI HAI TO HAMARA OIL DAALNA HOGA" ( If you want to get the car serviced,you will have to put in our oil).

AFAIK, Hyundai puts in oil gratis during the paid services.

Heck, if you really love your car (read - giving great service to you) let them put in their oil, take the car out of the service station, place in your own oil and voila !

I've always done this, so this is my personal and sole financial consequence, it may not matter to others.

cheers
M M

[leodelg]

Bimal had created a similar hungama when I took my Baleno there for service and asked them if I could buy my own engine oil. For the next service, I took it to a place in Indira Nagar (forgot the name). They had absolutely no issues with me buying Shell synthetic engine oil. Like people mentioned earlier, I guess it is an issue with only the large service centers.

[phamilyman]

I am quite surprised by the customer freedom rhetoric going on here.

Here is a question - I had put Castrol GTX Diesel (bought from the local market) in my VDi at 6k km. Had I got it done at MASS - and they complied, tomorrow if the engine seizes/[insert random problem here] BECAUSE the engine oil i had put in, was spurious - then how does one reasonably expect companies to sort out their warranty claim.

PS: Of course its about money. However, the above logic is impossible to counter. Else for warranty, why even bother going to MASS - just get the usual tuneup post free service at any local service center, no?

[condor]

phamilyman ... tomorrow if the engine seizes/[insert random problem here] BECAUSE the engine oil i had put in, was spurious - then how does one reasonably expect companies to sort out their warranty claim.

Letting the A.S.C do the oil change using oil sourced by them is (at the very least) an implied understanding/agreement that they are following the manufacturer's specified oils (& parts). So, if tomorrow something fails like phamilyman has explained, then the A.S.C will not be able to raised any objections due to use of non-specified oils & parts.


If one gets the oil change done outside, then the onus is on the owner to prove that he has followed the steps specified by the manufacturer of the vehicle. The owner may know, but how does the A.S.C or the manufacturer know this ?

Oil change also includes changing the filters. It does not make sense to change the oil alone, or the filters alone -one at a time. The procedure is better done when both these are changed at the same time. So if you get the oil change done outside, the filters will also be changed outside.

Kind of keeps cascading, right ?

One thing I have found is that the work done by the A.S.C for me has been a one-attempt job. Have never had to go back for correction, unlike the repeated attempts that another service center took - one that was an ex-A.S.C.

After all, it is the manufacturer who is providing the warranty - through the A.S.C. So, take your pick - the convinience of using oil you have purchased yourself, or the peace of mind of having a valid warranty.

You can / will need to meet the requirements of the method you choose.

The A.S.C may be buying in bulkd and charging in retail, but is he over-charging you ? No.

Is the A.S.C using sub-standard oil /parts ? No.

Is there harm being caused to the engine / car because of this relatively lower rated oil (than the one that you want to use) ? No.


And how can you be so sure that the oil you have got is an original of that particular brand ?


So, when there is no harm, no over-charging, for the parts that are of manufacturer specified /rated parts, there should not be much reason for complaint.

speedzak : There should be some procedure in which a customer is able to fill in with his oil of choice without making the warranty void. And this should be done by the manufacturer.

While it will be good, one factor is simplicity. Logistics are involved. Keeping things simple, following a standard procedure, will also get things done faster - for & in the A.S.C.

[speedzak]

I agree with MMMJGM (did I get it right?).
For somebody who has lots of love for his car and wants to keep the manufacturer warranty intact, he better fill his oil of choice after the oil change done by the A.S.C!

[nitrous]

The A.S.C may be buying in bulkd and charging in retail, but is he over-charging you ? No.

Of course, he is overcharging!
Is he showing us a sealed 1 Litre bottle that he's going to empty into the engine and charge us the MRP on the bottle?

[condor]

Zak, got to agree with you. That is definitely an approach one can consider.

Looking at the costs: (all numbers are indicative)
Mineral oil from A.S.C = approx 600 for 3.5 liters
Synth oil from market = approx 4000 for 3.5 liters.
Addnl labor charges to get second oil change : 250 (?)

850/- for this additional step does not look bad. Sell that oil to a taxi owner who can happily use that oil.

condor : The A.S.C may be buying in bulk and charging in retail, but is he over-charging you ? No.
nitrous : Of course, he is overcharging!
Is he showing us a sealed 1 Litre bottle that he's going to empty into the engine and charge us the MRP on the bottle?

* Why should he show you the 1 litre bottle ?
* Why is it illegal for him to buy by the barrel & charge you per liter ?

For that matter, in India, that 5 liter bottle of oil costs almost the same as 5 x 1 litre bottles. Why should one single out the A.S.C for this practice ?

The A.S.C is not flouting MRP norms. What he does is Not over-charging.

What would you do if you were in a re-selling business ? Buy single retail packs at a small discount & sell at the retail rates - or try go as high up in the supply chain that you can, so that you can have better margins ? You cannot over-charge : charge over MRP values. The option open to you will be to try & reduce your input costs.


The (normal) customer wants to pay as low as possible for a service he has received. How is the A.S.C going to even attempt to meet that expectation .. ?

If the A.S.C has to charge the customer a only relative % of the cost of the input materials, then the A.S.C will have to charge a high % of his input materials - which will be not acceptable. Add to this, the customer will also have to be charged a % of the infrastructure costs (including space, taxes, electricity, any misc costs, salaries, etc etc. Do you want him to start doing that ? Or let him get his best input prices while not charging anything more than the MRP ?

[phamilyman]

Originally Posted by nitrous

Of course, he is overcharging!
Is he showing us a sealed 1 Litre bottle that he's going to empty into the engine and charge us the MRP on the bottle?

Like its illegal to charge a profit. They are still charging MRP,no?

MRP = maximum recommended price, not must retail below this price!!

I mean everyone here and anywhere else works for money, not charity.

Everyone likes to have clean, spacious nice ASCs, but if they make some 50 bucks in 3L of oil, I just fail to grasp the logic.

And on this very forum, people recommend paying hundreds per sqft for dampening materials like Dynamat - isnt that daylight robbery?

PS: Leaving our own self-righteous fundae aside, I know of lotsa people who file fake insurance claims. Several of my friends changed for eg, pulsar old console to new one by strategically using a hockey stick - insurance footed the bill.
Its no difference when it comes to warranty. Companies charge only a coupla thousand for 20k km of extended warranty because it means additional business to the ASC (given those 40,60k services ain't cheap) - its business all the time, fellas!

[condor]

phamilyman : Everyone likes to have clean, spacious nice ASCs, but if they make some 50 bucks in 3L of oil, I just fail to grasp the logic.

Without going too far : We are okay to spend on synth oil that retails at 5+ times the cost of mineral oil, but we dont want to pay the A.S.C anything more than his cost price of mineral oil.

We want A.S.C's that are located in the center of the city - or close to our office / residence, but dont want to pay more than what we have paid all along, from years ago.


Isnt it like : the company a person is working for saying that his expenses must not be too high, and that the salary the company will pay him is 20% over his total expenses ?

[NetfreakBombay]

Originally Posted by nitrous

Is he showing us a sealed 1 Litre bottle that he's going to empty into the engine and charge us the MRP on the bottle?

Retail price of most consumables is written specifically on price board in A S S and that price comes from company.

I asked specifically this question to service center while refilling and the response was you can note down the price displayed on that board and call Maruti to confirm.

A S S can't charge arbitrarily, prices are monitored by company as well.

[vinaydas]

of lately tata service centers are not giving priority to palio's.. i gave my palio to them for service,normally they take 6-12 hours to service the vehicle..mine took over 2 days
and they dint check the vehicle properly also..
as soon as i left the service station i drove around 40kms then suddenly my vehicle switched off.. and dint start.. my local mechanic came,inspected the car and said the timing belt had worn out..
then i immediately called the tata service center(prerana motors on old madras road)
he said its perfect..
my mech gave me a temporary solution by fiddling around with the belt..
i drove it to prerana again.. he took the vehicle for checking again in the morning and called in afternoon and said timing belt is perfectly alright a small idling problem that's all.
i reluctantly took the vehicle home...
next day i was on the way to college.. all of a sudden the vehicle switched off and refused to start.
i called my mechanic,he towed the vehicle to his shop 2 days later i get to know the cam shaft was screwed up and along with the timing belt charge the total bill came to 12k.
I swear never to go to prerana again.

[viper_711]

Originally Posted by dadu

Yes, it was patchyboy and at Manipal Motors only. Read his thread here.

Post#1 and #13, they allowed him to use his own oil.

Thanks Mavrick and Dadu for pointing out a similar issue.

Mavrick - Khan's S10 is out of warranty so on paid services he can probably get away with any oil of his choice. The moot point in my case is refusal to record an oil change hence, automatically making the warranty void.

[viper_711]

Interesting conversations have been generated by the original post.
My take on some of the views expressed:

A.S.S. of course reserve the right to be profitable. They do make profits on the basic servicing of the car too. Such would be the premise of their business model. The consumables/parts/accessories just make it more profitable.
A free service does not mean free consumables. If this was the case a customer has to accept whatever OE brand the A.S.S. provides. In case this is paid and only the labour of changing the oil is free, why should a customer not have choice?

Previously, on my Indica TDi, at Concorde Motors, I have filled in exactly the same oil they were providing but I got my own can from the market out of fears of adulteration. After a bit of protest they had agreed.

The point here is refusal to note that an oil change has been done thus making the warranty void.

A business can have its policies - but these have to respect consumer rights. When a manufacturer is specifying a grade of oil and nominating an agency to act as a service provider, the prime role of the service provider is to provide the service. Either they should offer a choice of products (which I did ask them and they said only castrol 15W40 mineral oil) or they should allow a customer to use a product of his/her choice.