BMW wanted to charge me £44 for a rear windscreen wiper but were surprisingly competitive on tyres.

Belenus

BMW Series 1 seven years old.

I used a BMW Dealer and Service Shop for the first five years as I bought a five year service plan when I bought the car from BMW at 3 months old and only 220 miles. It is a 34 mile round trip to the nearest BMW Dealership so since then I have used a local and trusted independent 3 miles from my home. We plan to keep the car indefinitely so BMW FSH isn't really important any more.

I took the car to that BMW dealer for a MOT last week as it needed a non urgent free recall check and they offered me an MOT for £10 plus a free health check and a free wash and inside valet.

An MOT advisory was a split rear windscreen wiper and they offered to fit a new one for £44. I presume most of that is the labour charge and they probably have a minimum charge of 15 or 30 minutes regardless of how long the job actually takes. No thanks I said. I bought one on eBay for £4.45 including delivery, It arrived within a few days and took me 30 seconds to fit.

There was a Major Defect Fail on a front tyre with splits to the cords and an advisory on the other front tyre with less serious splits. Those tyres were down to about 3mm so I agreed to have two new tyres supplied and fitted. The rear tyres are quite new so there was no point moving them to the front and putting the new ones on the rear.

I held my breath awaiting the price but was pleasantly surprised when he quoted me £105 each including VAT. I had envisaged having to swallow their usually expensive prices as I would not want to have to drive the car away with a dodgy tyre and any saving on the cost of the tyres would have been offset by having to pay for another MOT locally. I was also conscious of my potential liability should that tyre fail and cause an accident.

They are Bridgestone Potenza S001 RFT 225/45R17 91W Run Flats and normally cost a lot more than that from BMW. They quoted me £249.14 a pair last year but I bought cheaper elsewhere.

I'm half convinced they made a mistake and quoted me for non run flats.

Thanks for reading my little story.

Sandtree

Belenus said:

I held my breath awaiting the price but was pleasantly surprised when he quoted me £105 each including VAT. I had envisaged having to swallow their usually expensive prices as I would not want to have to drive the car away with a dodgy tyre and any saving on the cost of the tyres would have been offset by having to pay for another MOT locally. I was also conscious of my potential liability should that tyre fail and cause an accident.

They are Bridgestone Potenza S001 RFT 225/45R17 91W Run Flats and normally cost a lot more than that from BMW. They quoted me £249.14 a pair last year but I bought cheaper elsewhere.

I'm half convinced they made a mistake and quoted me for non run flats.

So £249 down to £210?  A nice saving but its not a massive swing

Black Circle have them at £104 a corner so highly comparable and whilst its been a while since I last got tyres it seems most places have realised the days of crazy prices have gone and most are comparable to the online retailers now. The difference is that BMW wont be offering the £68 Taurus tyres 

littleboo

I find some of their prices to be competitive, but most not. I needed a new battery fitted, £263 from an independent BMW specialist, £186 from the main dealer.

SaverRate

BMW price match on tyres. Took my Wife’s mini there multiple times for tyres and they actually bettered our cheapest quote for tyres!  

Belenus

littleboo said:

I find some of their prices to be competitive, but most not. I needed a new battery fitted, £263 from an independent BMW specialist, £186 from the main dealer.

Useful to know as my battery is original and therefore seven years old so may need replacing soon.

The car has stop/start so batteries are not cheap.

Belenus

HarryDavies01 said:

BMW price match on tyres. Took my Wife’s mini there multiple times for tyres and they actually bettered our cheapest quote for tyres!  

That explains the competitive price although the 34 mile round trip means I will be unlikely to go back there just for tyres or other consumables. The only reason I took it there was the free recall needed doing so I had to visit sometime and the £10 MOT offer more than funded my petrol costs.

Last year I used Tyres on the Drive for the replacement rear pair. Although there was a bit of a saga with them twice turning up with the wrong tyres. it all got done in the end at a competitive price with no travelling time or petrol costs for me.

Taking the car to BMW took me about three hours in total. My wife drove it there on Wednesday morning and then took a bus into Portsmouth for shopping so that doesn't count as she likes to visit the shops there anyway.

I had to go by bus on the Thursday afternoon to collect the car. I am 69 and I recently applied for and received a free bus pass and I used it for the first time.

It is fifteen minute walk to the main road for the 700 bus to Havant which takes about 45 minutes and then a 50 minute bus ride from Havant to north Portsmouth which goes a very circuitous route. Then a 10 minute walk to BMW, time paying and checking the car and a 20 minute drive home.

I actually enjoyed my first trip on a bus for a very long time. I sat upstairs at the front on the 700 and enjoyed the view of a route that I know well but normally only see from the driver's seat of my car.