My 997 CS will be 2 years old on the 1st March and I have been considering the benefits of extending the warranty for another year with PGB. Like many I'm trying to cut down on expediture during these tough times. I have considered selling my car but the dramatic drop in value means that I'm better off keeping it and to be honest I love the car. However I am keen to keep running costs to a minimum whilst being sensible about its up keep. So at present I am faced with the following overheads:
1. 2 year service including brake fluid change.
2. 2 new rear tyres (Michelen Pilot Sport 2's)
3. Waranty extension.
Having searched the forum for tyre suppliers I have contacted both Wembley Tyres and Elite Direct who are preared to supply and fit the tyres for £250 + VAT which I am very pleased with. I am happy to extend the warranty however I wanted to have the first service carried out by a local independent specialist JZM. JZM will service the car for approx £380 compared to the £600 required by my OPC. The problem is that if I subsequently buy the waranty from Porsche they will insist on carrying out a full service on the car because it does not have a full porsche service history! That would void any cost saving I made going to JZM. As many of you know we are all entitled to use an independent during our initial factory waranty under the block exemption rules that apply to manufacturer's waranties. Porsche have applied conditions to our extended waranties to try and ensure we don't do this. I personally believe that certain independents do a better job than local OPC's so I'm happy to make the saving. I decided to approach Porsche GB with the following proposal:
"If I were to buy my warranty on the 6th Feb then, at that point in time, my car would not have been outside the network thus qualifying. If I then decided to have my car serviced by JZM on the 7th Feb then I would simply be making use of the block exemption rules that apply to intial manufacturer's warranties. As my extended waranty would not start until the 1st March, I could not see how choosing to service my car at JZM would have me in breech of their conditions". This would secure an extended waranty on the car but afford me a considerable saving on my first service. The response was varied but I managed to get a final answer confirming that I was ok to go ahead on that basis and the notes have been recorded on my file at PGB. I know that further work after the 1st March will need to go theough an OPC to remian covered by the warranty but my main concern was trying to keep my immediate overheads down.
As a long standing Porsche customer I am disappointed with their attitude to customers at present and I think their views on warranty extensions are creating ill feeling from clients. People are being refused waranty extensions for silly reasons such as having tinted windows (even though they were fitted by the OPC at purchase), for having a battery that isn't original and to take the biscuit they even had to check that the Paintshield film on the front of my car was ok because it isn't an approved part!!! Seriously that took half an hour to confirm!! God knows what they'll do if they find out that the dealer put Diamond Brite on the car [:-]!! My local OPC has confirmed that warranty applications and approvals have fallen off massively, a fact also confirmed by Porsche Reading (OPC). I'm sure that Porsche have their reasons for making these changes but its hard to accept them when they seem so biase towards the manufacturer and dealer network.
The above said I have never owned a car without a warranty and would feel happier keeping the car protected but these new waranty conditions are hardly designed with treating customers fairly in mind. I appreciate many will have their own opinions and in truth if times were easier then I may have simply opted to bite the bullet and pay £600+ for the OPC service - but they're not. Each to their own but I'm sure there must be other owners that have either had similar experiences or have other interesting views on what seems to be a hot topic at the moment.
] Keep trying to tell the I want a Turbo for 17K brigade, they are not cheap to run they argue with conviction, little do they know [
