Lifetime warranty

[hemitom]

I started about a year ago to offering a 2 year, 24,000 mile warranty also just to stand out from the competition. I think offering a lifetime warranty would be opening a big can of worms. Would it also include other owners of the car? What if you sell your business? Too many questions.

[Tom Piippo]

You could be sure of getting repeat business.

For years you could be seeing the same customer for every squeak and rattle that wasn’t there before you did that brake job 5 years ago.

There are companies out there (like B-G products) that will help you market a “lifetime protection plan” using their products. Very painless, very limited liability.

[Frank]

It could work if you had a well written set of conditions. Like:

only the current owner, non transferable. Must bring in every 3 months for inspection (now you can pre- book appointments. Must maintain the car as per factory recommendations. Must perform all recommended maintenance and repairs with you, not valid if any repair or maintenance work done else where with out approval from you (out of town) and so on.

Could help fill the bays. No more cheap parts, only the best go on cars now. I like it.

[Tom Piippo]

“Must bring in every 3 months for inspection”

You realize the inspections are to be at ‘no charge’, don’t you? If you charge for the inspection, the customer has a choice of having it inspected anywhere, even his brother-in-law can do it as long as he is ‘qualified’.

[Frank]

Yes, I agree – free inspection

I get to see the car every three months, customer is required to perform all factory recommended maintenance -with me – I look over the car and make recommendations to prevent breakdowns, they do the work with me-

(every six months is rotate and balance, every six months or 6k miles synthetic oil change, every 3months 3k conventional oil change) Miss an inspection or have it or maintenance work done elsewhere and repairs revert to standard warranty (ours is 3 years or 36k mikes on new parts)

Extended warranty company’s require the customer to maintain the vehicle.

They do the maintenance and repairs with us to maintain the warranty – we do the free inspections every three months

I’m going to have my attorney look over the magnuson moss warranty act.

[cornerstone]

The question for me right now is do I offer parts and labor warranty or do I offer lifetime on labor and 2year warranty on parts.Parts stores like Carquest and Napa and Worldpac only give 1 year warranty on parts. I have asked them to warranty some parts at around 2 years that I thought should have lasted longer,they did but very reluctantly.Some other part stores like Onestop and Fast under car have no problem warranting their parts anytime.in reality we dont start replacing broken parts on cars until their over 60k (I am on the west coast)and after that do people really keep their cars more than 5 years from there.Someone out there has the million mile warranty how are you doing it?

[rkealey]

Firestone sells lifetime services at a premium. 4wh alignment for

$179.95 (79.95 align + 100 premium) lifetime balance (at a premium),

rotation with 4 tires, etc. No restrictions on frequency of use.

Object is to get the vehicles back. The pitch is that the customer can

return as often as they like (“even every day forever.”) Manager

stated that most customers return on a reasonable schedule and combine

their lifetime benefits whith other service. Some never return and he

pockets the extra profit. A small number of his customers abuse the

system and he just deals with it. He figures that he must align a

vehicle approximately 9 times before he actually loses $$$$.

Hope this helps.

[Alan Ollie]

I saw this sticker on a car .I liked it at first but i was told it was

to negative.

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[Jon]

You could always give a lifetime warranty for the premium price, using the highest quality parts available or use take away selling, using a less expensive part, for the 2 year warranty. That way the customer can decide what best suits him and his pocketbook.

[trannyman]

Be careful with “….Must perform all recommended maintenance and

repairs with you, not valid if any repair or maintenance work done

else where with out approval from you (out of town)…”

Repairs are one thing, but not normal maintenance. If a dealer

requires this to keep a warranty valid then they must do the servicing

for free(or hide the cost in the service or product in the beginning

).

That’s why all a customer needs to do to maintain factory warranty is

have a sales receipt listing the oil & filter ( or whatever is

required for that service )with the mileage noted on it.

[Jon]

I just saw there is another company using a pro-rated 3yr/36,000 warranty.  First year is 100% but adjusts down at month 13.  I’m thinking this could be very smart way to go.
 

[Tom]

We have very few people ask about or mention warranty. While it is important to have a solid warranty, could it be that it is not as critical to the marketing/sales process as we might believe?

[jimbob661]

Our basic warranty is 2yr/ 24k miles with select repairs having a lifetime parts and labor nationwide warranty. This applies only to the current owner and is non-transferable. We offer a good better and best options for most repairs and let the customer decide. On our lifetime warranties we use only premium parts and our suppliers will help most of the time with labor. Sure, it costs me a little up front but the repeat business makes up for it. We have done this for a couple of years with great results. If you use premium parts you won’t have any issues!

[wistech]

Good idea, but my 2 cents. We sold a “Lifetime Exhaust System” (with a service charge, company approved) years ago backed by a national company. This program not only fail, but cost the company market share when discontinued. The cost of the warranty was too costly for the company.

Stick with 2 year/24,000 mile warranty and provide the best possible customer service. Always remember that if parts lasted a lifetime we would not be here in the first place. Good maintenance and good honest service will provide you with enough work. Just my thoughts.

[canarasimhan]

I have a suggestion.  Instead of giving a lifetime warranty, can we think of Warranty given on the work done? There are two things involved, the parts and the labour.  We can buy the OE parts directly from the manufacturer where he gives us the warranty against failure.  The other one is the quality of labour which we offer.  Any premature failure due to faulty workmanship, has to be redone free of cost to the customer.  If the part has failed prematurely due to its own inherent quality issues, we must tie up with the manufacturer to provide a free replacement to us.  Here we may charge the labour to the customer but not the part of the cost.  We will be able to recover the cost of the parts through “Free Replacement”.  As regards our own quality failure, we save the cost to customer by absorbing the cost ourselves.   This means that we have to ensure we do our tasks without any failure.  Sounds simple but not really so when put into practice.  We will have to employ measures to reward quality work and  penalise its absence.  Our internal processes will have to be streamlined  and strengthened.

C A Narasimhan