Warranty Direct

[owenfackrell]

My experiances of used warrenties are that they just aren't worth it. I had a gear box fail on a low millage renault which i thought was coverd by the warrenty but apparently it was a wear and tear item. that was fine on the laguna we had which went at 150k and not at 50k which this one did.
I now do the Roy route of things and so far it has paid off such as when the turbo went on our last car and it onluy cost me the price of the turbo to sort out (advantages to being an mechanical engineer).

[m5systems]

on AA warranties - garage threw one in when i bought my xc90 recently, but it is a little limited in what they cover - they specify a bunch of things and anything else is apparently NOT covered.

the other thing i found when speaking to them recently was, before any claim they want it assessed at an approved garage before they will take the claim on, the cost of the assessment either comes out of the total claim limit (which from memory wasnt very high anyway) and if it wasnt something covered they hit you with the bill for the assessment.

dunno if that helps but eh.........

[sunseeka]

Originally Posted by harvey07

Yikes !

Have you looked at Warrantywise (Quentin Wilson) & also Go warranties??? (via Parkers).

I can't vouch for either but they might be worth looking at for comparisons sake. Another tip I've heard is to play hard to get & Warranty Direct will reduce the price (maybe twice) or upgrade the cover to main dealer use for Indy prices

I had the Skoda backed warranty on my Vrs, as I didn't fancy any of the aftermarket options.

My new purchase comes with an Autocare Warranty (Arnolds !) but to remain valid, it needs to be serviced, repaired etc by them...and I am not sure I'l be going down that route.

I went with Warranty Wise and they were superb when it came to making a claim on my gearbox repair. main dealer wanted 4 grand to replace the box. Warranty Wise sent down an assessor who had the box x-rayed, identified the fault and found a repairer. My car was back on the road in 8 days.Bill was £1700 pounds and it was very nice to not have to worry about finding that, one day before leaving on holiday driving across France.

[harvey07]

Thanks...some good feedback.

Ironically I've just been quoted £354 by Warranty Direct for a year...only a couple of days after they'd quoted £500 + ! The reduction came after a call, during which I told them they could stick it !

I have a dilemma...my XC has over a year worth of Arnold warranty left (just transferred to me)...but I don't want to use them to service it next month, based on cost & quality. I would prefer to use my local Indy, but I know I will be invalidating my warranty...am I mad?

[undercoverxc90]

I have the same dilemma - I bought my car at trade-in price -but I really can't bear the thought of an expensive repair so have been considering a warranty. The car has only done 54k miles and is seven years old - things I'm worried about are timing belt failure, transmission and steering rack. After not going through with the warranty through WD they eventually contacted me with details of a breakdown insurance which runs alongside say, an existing RAC or AA membership. In theory, a) you need to breakdown on a journey (i.e. not at home) and b) the breakdown guys will not be able to get you on the road again and therefore c) doesn't cover stuff like Air Con, window motors etc.

Because it is a much reduced cover, it is £87 for the year ( on top of your AA/RAC etc) but for peace of mind I'm seriously thinking about it. I'm paranoid about the timing belt going early ( in theory not due for a few years ) and it seemed a 'cheap' insurance policy just in case. That said, the guy I spoke to at WD mentioned a case where the timing belt went on an Audi and it wasn't paid because Audi had fitted a substandard tensioner, which put me off!

If I felt it was sure to pay out, and I could afford it, I think I would go for the dearer 'complete' cover, but I hear too many negative reports on forums. The trouble with these things is that the majority of postings about warranty experience are from aggrieved customers how take the time to rant and it *could* be skewing our perception - on the other side the only place you get a long list of glowing reports is on the company's website and I never trust those either!

I'd definitely be interested to hear people's warranty experience before I commit

Regards

Mike

[undercoverxc90]

So, before I make a final decision on this, has anyone out there had good experience with WD/WW/other third party warranty firms?

I'm probably going to go with the WD breakdown policy as its really things like the gearbox/steering going and this doesn't seem too bad for 'peace of mind', for a year for less than £100.

I'm just aware that people usually only post stuff on forums when they have had a problem so it can skew the overall opinion.

Anyone?

Cheers

Mike

[caveman_returns]

I had a warranty with Warranty Direct when i bought an espace 2 & half years ago. The gearbox went 7 weeks after we bought it, we made a claim and they turned it down straight away saying their warranty doesn't include the inside of the gearbox only what's on the outside of the gearbox-we then made another claim as the selector cables on the OUTSIDE of the gearbox went straight after the gearbox had been repaired, they said you can't make a claim so soon after making the 1st claim and the selector cables aren't part of the warranty as they weren't moving parts.
Robdogs!

[RoyMacDonald]

They won't insure any car older than 10 years anyway so is it worth having 3 years cover on a 7 year old car with 54k on the clock?

£100 p.a. is a lot less than the rate they usually quote for an XC90 though. Is it for the "Gold Cover" ?

[raife]

In my opinion these companies will weedle out of paying at all costs.

"oh sir, you weren't wearing the approved green socks when your cam belt failed.....we cannot pay"

At the end of the day they are a company out to make profit.

Put the money in the bank, it is a gamble but £500 a year is a lot of money...

[berkshire]

I run my XC as a personal lease so have none of these issues. However, having been an avid fan of this forum for a few years if I was running an older XC I would definitely stick 50 quid a month in my the bank as others wisely suggest instead of relying on the warranties. Too many horror stories about. The warranty business is all about probabilities - not all the cars will go wrong all the time but yours just might the one. As for undercoverxc90. Mate, I would recommend a timing belt change certainly before you hit 60k. I am told it is not the mileage but the age of the component with these older models. In addition, all that paranoia just ain't healthy. Negative vibes and all that. Good luck!