Thoughts/opinions about Extended Vehicle Service Plans

[Big Lee]

I would but no idea on which company. Your transmission will probably go out. They have a bad reputation.

You know very little about the Allison.....

[Big Lee]

My personal recommendation is only buy factory warranty from the manufacture of that vehicle. Those aftermarket warranty companies, are all royal pains in the rear. So many times, we had customers come to some dealer I worked for, they would claim to have an extended warranty, we would assume they meant a factory Ford warranty. We would figure out what was wrong, then go look up the vehicle in OASIS and find out it had no warranty. Then have to go in contact with the customer to tell them, their car had no extended warranty. Then find out they had a aftermarket warranty. Right then everything changes. At that point, I would walk off, and put the car out side, turn the keys and the RO back in. Because 100% of the time, the warranty company would tell us, they were not going to pay our labor rate, then they were not going to pay our labor times, They would come up with labor rates and time that were usually under half of what the dealer charges for rate and labor time. So we could not do the work for that type of money, but the owner of the car, insists that we are going to fix the car. So then we have to argue with the warranty company for days. Sometimes they would increase their labor time a little or maybe increase the labor rate. Then if it was a big job, they would send some guy out, to inspect the car, a week later. We would point out everything that we found, prove without a doubt, what we claimed the car needed done to it. Then the guy would leave, and tell the warranty company, that we only needed to do about half of what we claimed. But there is no way we could do what that guy said we should do, and then be able to stand behind the work. They would want us to do some half azz patch job. Which that is not allowed at the dealer, because they want to be able to warranty the work. Which you really can't do, if you do a half azz patch job.

So the warranty company would call us back and tell us that was what we needed to do the car and they would pay us when we were done. Again, we could not stand behind the job they told us to do. So we would be stuck with a torn down car POed customer and a warranty company that was standing their ground.

When I started up m own shop years ago, rule number 1, I don't do any work on cars where the customer has a aftermarket extended warranty. I don't have time to fight that battle.

I have warned both of my sisters and anyone else I know, do not under any circumstance buy a aftermarket warranty. Yea, one of them typically did not pay any attention to what I said, bought a two year old used car, and a aftermarket warranty. That created such a huge mess a while back, when her transmission took a crap, three times. She does not understand labor rates, labor times, parts prices, just she has a warranty, so the dealer is supposed to fix her car. She is very stubborn, so I am sure they had one fun time, that I am glad I was not involved in.

When your warranty company, wants to pay a dealer less than half of what they would normally charge for the same job, don't expect fast service, don't expect the same quality of work, if it was done under a factory warranty, don't expect things to go smoothly at all.

What happens, is after multiple days, of talk back and forth with the service adviser, service manager and parts manager. They sit down and look at the numbers the warranty company is offering. Many times I can tell you they want to just tell the customer to come get their car and go somewhere else. But commonly, the customer is very hot by this point raising a lot of hell, commonly female, does not understand what's going on. So these people look at the numbers, then figure decide to just take it in the shorts and accept the low number the warranty company offers. The dealer does not make hardly any money at all on the deal. They make the guy doing the work, gets to do the job for about half or less what he would normally get paid. They usually don't let him know, till he gets his next pay check. If he has been around long enough, he knows what's coming and usually does not want any part of it. Usually will put the car out on the back lot and not touch it for as long as possible, or get it passed on to some young guy who does not know any better.

If you have a vehicle new enough to get a factory extended warranty, get one, it will be so much less head ache.

This....

[DallasCoon12]

I always buy extended bumper to bumper warranties and have never lost. We always drive various luxury suvs and a lariat or higher trim f250. They end of paying for themselves. Window motors, sync problems, rips in king ranch leather etc.

I do see both sides to the argument but I think if you’ve got a lot of bells and whistles it is smart

[Big Lee]

Put the $5700in your bank account and keep driving. Don't fear the Allison. They are dang near bullet proof. I would suggest having the dealership replace the trans filters, if it is still at the shop.

[Big Lee]

The manufacturer extended warranty is always the way to go. Not aftermarket. It is cheaper to buy the manufacturer warranty at the time of purchase.