10 year old service cost plus warranty

[Ala Larj]

Hi all,

My GS has now reached its 10th birthday. An intermediate service is immediately due. According to the Lexus website this should cost £340. However, this is for a vehicle less than 10 years old and includes the extra year relax warranty. Of course, I am no longer able to get the relax warranty and will have to pay for the next year of warranty and roadside assistance. I cannot find any information about how much my service will cost bearing in mind I am no longer eligible for the relax  warranty. 
 

What have others done when in the same predicament? Is it worth staying with Lexus and paying for the warranty and roadside assistance or go independent and buy the warranty and AA separately. The AA roadside assistance is very good value through Lexus but the warranty seems expensive. 
 

I know it’s reliable (so far) but if something does go wrong it could be very expensive. I have had recourse to Lexus warranty before and have found them very amendable with no quibbles. I do not want to change the car as it’s probably the best I have owned and can’t think of anything suitable to replace it. I’ve heard of independent warranty companies being very difficult to deal with and try everything to get out of paying for any issues. 
 

Has anyone here had experience with independent warranty companies and/or what would you do in my situation?

Thanks very much. 
 

 

[Linas.P]

Nothing you can do - service cost the same regardless if your car is eligible for Relax or not... this is one thing that really bugs me and I really hate they have discontinued what was called "Lexus Essential Care", that was amazing value for money as all services for cars over 5 years old was about 50% discounted (not exactly half, but near that). I mean sure - it made no sense to continue it for car under 10 years old once "Lexus Relax" was introduced. Why would you discount service by 50%, when you also offering industry leading warranty? So I get why they did it, but in my opinion they really should have kept discounted service for cars that do not qualify for Relax e.g. my car has only 80k miles, but it is nearly 17 years old, so I just don't benefit from Relax and now I have to pay full price for services as if I do.

As to why they did it... I would speculate they don't really see people who drive cars over 10 years / 100k miles as their customers, little benefit, a lot of trouble (to service rust buckets), besides whereas you can expect somebody with 3 years old car to be interested in upgrade to new model, and somebody with 6 years old car to be interested in 3 years old car that was just traded in by previous guy... it is clear that people that drive 15 years old 150k cars are not interested in anything else. I know it sounds cynical, but they not offering Relax or service plans out of kindness of their heart, it is calculated business decision to bring you into dealership with intent of maybe interesting you into upgrading, that is core idea behind courtesy car as well - they give you their latest model to drive, whilst your old car is in for service... and then they ask you "how was it, maybe you interested in buying it". Sadly they kind of stopped doing it, it used to be the case that they always give you slightly better car than you have, but since introduction of CT all courtesy cars became CTs, later UXs, and obviously now ES. Anyhow - long story short, I think they don't really want to work on cars above 10 years / 100k, it is more of liability so they just structured it in such way that you drop off the cliff after 10 years. 

At least my local dealer does discount service when I mention "Essential Care" and that is good will 20% discount, but it is still rip off to pay basically £280 for glorified filter + oil change.

If I were you, I would honestly ignore warranty and roadside assistance. Just think about how many times you actually needed it and used it in Lexus... In total I had it probably for 8 years, have never used roadside assistance and I have used warranty once on RC and it was a biggie... BUT... it was a biggie because they wanted it to be. It was seat repair and they went to town on it, replaced everything apart of leather and foam, every electrical and mechanical part was replaced for £4,200 and a lot of that was labour. On one hand you may say "sure it is worth £300/year" for warranty even if it happens once in 10 years... on other hand - the used seat would have costed me maybe £300. And once you have car over 10 years old, I think it is resonable enough just to find used seat at breakers and replace it. Perhaps pay another £100 for the leather to be transferred from your seat if you can't find matching colour.

What other concerns do you have? 300h are more or less bullet proof, if they are anything like GS450h of previous gen (which they are unlikely to be) and there are issues with Battery, then it costs £600 to repair... likelihood of it happening is low and even then hybrid warranty is up-to 150k and 15 years if I am not mistaken, also long as you keep doing hybrid check with them. So I really cannot see any reason to have warranty on Lexus that is over 10 years old. I know it may comfort you to have it, but it is just not rational. Not because they never go wrong, but because even when they do you end-up paying less for repair than it would have costed to have warranty, having warranty on Lexus is kind of false economy. Other things that could go wrong on older car are like shocks and suspension, but they are not covered by Lexus (or really any) warranty anyway.

What to do with service - sadly I don't know, I prefer having it service by proper service centre but paying £280 (with 20% off) for just oil change is steep.