Dealership Inspection

[Chim_Girl]

I'm in the market for a used BMW and wondered if anyone had used a franchised dealer to do the pre-purchase inspection?

If so, was it worth it? Can you give any idea of the cost?

Thanks.

[mustard]

Had Robert Sterns BMW (Evesham, soon to be Worcester) check over our last purchase a very long time ago, when I was younger and less wiser. Think IIRC they just charge about an hours labour, nothing found or reported and its been giving good service ever since (tooo good a service )

[Seesure]

Had both a main dealer and the AA inspect mine prior to purchase, each came up with the main issues but then they missed other things that the other spotted. On the balance of things the dealer came up with the better information, I guess more experience of the car / model helped here.

Dealer charged about £100 and the AA was a bit more but did include the HPI check.

[chumley]

Doesn't Rob Ingleby also offer a BMW service? May be worth a try?

[chim_girl]

Just for the record, the local BMW dealership will only do a visual check, no guarantees, no report, nothing indepth. Can't really expect much for only £35.00. Not really enough information for me, but thought it worth noting here, just incase anyone else ever needs it.

[Marshy]

You can ask a BMW dealer to do their full approved used car check. But! Pick your dealer. The people that inspected my car picked up a load of minor faults, someof which were valid, some of which were blatantly not actually faults at all. This makes me wonder if they were just hoping to line their pockets with future works.

And they missed the gearbox fault which cost me over a grand. Grumble.

Mixed bag, then, for me.

[jj.]

Yeah, and sometimes it doesn’t show up much at all. When I was looking for mine, I had an approved BMW check done on a used 5 series. It missed the fact that both front wings had been re-sprayed (I noticed grit in the corner, and over spray onto the headlamps!). It was a perfect car, except I wasn’t sure of front accident damage, so I payed for the check.

After pointing out, the wings, they just said, nothing came back on their computer relating to body work undertaken – basically, if it wasn’t done by BMW, they have no record…!!!

Main dealers, you got to love em…!
jj

[Marshy]

Oh god, that reminds me of the other E34 I bought... for a while. Bought approved used from a dealer, turned out to have had a big rear end shunt and had also been resprayed all down one side.

They bought that one back for the sticker price.

Still, free motoring...

[chim_girl]

Here I was wavering; wondering if paying a couple of hundred for an inspection was a bit over the top.

Rob Ingleby has said that he could take care of the inspection for me, I feel much happier putting my faith in him instead of some random person from the RAC.

Sadly, didn't get the car I was after, so the inspection question is a bit redundant for now. Back to Autotrader and the PH Classifieds. : sigh: