Do you remember the time that you settled on that four-wheeled purchase sitting outside your house, apartment or office.Perhaps you spent weeks or months searching for the right car, scouring the classifieds, spending inordinate amounts of time scanning through Dubizzle or visiting dealerships in your particular emirate. And, when you finally made the decision, I’m sure that you could not wait till picking it up. What an interesting experience it can be for many of us – but did that initial flurry of desire last beyond a few days or weeks? Did it go the distance? Do you still look at your car with an admiring glance as you walk away from it, or do you sneer with unbridled hatred, longing for the time when you can finally part company?
To have a car isconsidered as a relationship, pure and simple, and while some are born to last forever, many are destined to fail in the worst circumstances. When any relationship hits the skids and breaks down, there is a cost, whether financial or emotional, so we should do everything under our control to make sure we prevent the potential pitfalls. But what if we feel that we were led up the garden path before making a commitment? Perhaps it’s too late to do anything about it, but at least we can be forewarned for next time.
What I want to say? The costs of owning a car that we may not have known about, or thought about, when deciding of what model to buy. It’s a problem that came to light recently when I was talking with a friend and I mentioned that I’d had to take my car in for a service the previous week. “How often do you do that?” quizzed my accomplice. When I replied that it was every 15,000 kilometers, she told me that hers had to be done every 5,000; something I couldn’t bring myself to believe. I told her that there must be some mistake, that there’s no way a brand-new Nissan Juke would need to be seen in a dealership so frequently. So I started making a few calls.
Sure enough, when I contacted Nissan in Dubai, the PR people confirmed that all the company’s cars require 5,000km service intervals. Why, I asked them, can my Volkswagen Scirocco go three times the distance of a GT-R, Primera, Tiida or Sunny? Surely they’re tested to the same extremes during their research and development processes? “It’s what the manufacturer stipulates,” was the gist of the email reply.
I thought I’d go back to my friend and ask how she ended up with such a financial millstone around her neck, especially as she’s normally extremely careful in all matters fiscal.
“When I bought it in 2011, I was pleased with the reasonable purchase price, but what I hadn’t bargained for was the number of times I needed to have it serviced.
“Rather than taking it in every 10,000km, I had to take it in at 1,000km, again at 5,000km and then every 5,000 after that. Because I regularly commute to Abu Dhabi [from Dubai], this meant the car was going in every six weeks. And, again because of the high mileage, I was advised by the Nissan service agents to have extra services to help maintain my car.
“As a result, I end up paying an average Dh1,000 every visit, which in my opinion is too much. I have asked to reduce the number of times I take it in to every 10,000km but have been told this will affect my warranty. So I am stuck in this rather expensive service cycle. Two years after buying the car, I have 40,000km on the clock and am about to book my ninth service. Surely, that is too much.”
