Mercedes breakdown number broken

[Essarell]

As above, been trying to get thru to MB breakdown since Thursday, just constantly on hold, anyone know what’s up?

[swisstoni]

While we wait for an answer, do these manufacturer recovery setups just farm the jobs out to a 3rd party specialist ?

And, what is the response time and reliability of these compared to, say the AA?

I often see free breakdown offers from banks, insurance and manufacturers etc, and wonder what you are actually getting if you go for it.

Edited by swisstoni on Saturday 1st April 11:53

[Sheepshanks]

Which number are you calling?

I think MB use RAC now so I’d try calling them directly.

[Essarell]

I did finally get thru, started the call at 8am and just left it playing the v annoying music and voice announcements till 10:30, apparently they’ve just switched over to a new IT system (yep, that old chestnut) and it hasn’t gone quite to plan. It sounded like they were processing my vehicle manually as none of my details seemed to enter easily and the lady had to put me on hold and presumably find my car a n other way.

Anyway no contact yet from the Breakdown response, maybe the pigeon they dispatched got lost.

Bit miffed at this one as I held MB up with what I had experienced as excellent service but lately it’s gone to s&@t. The dealership experience has really declined, I run 2, an E-class and an SLC, the SLC was returned to my wife without the requested MOT being carried out and our Eclass returned without a Active Breaking system failure being correctly diagnosed.

[Dewi 2]

Essarell said:

I did finally get thru, started the call at 8am and just left it playing the v annoying music and voice announcements till 10:30, apparently they’ve just switched over to a new IT system (yep, that old chestnut) and it hasn’t gone quite to plan. It sounded like they were processing my vehicle manually as none of my details seemed to enter easily and the lady had to put me on hold and presumably find my car a n other way.

Anyway no contact yet from the Breakdown response, maybe the pigeon they dispatched got lost.

Bit miffed at this one as I held MB up with what I had experienced as excellent service but lately it’s gone to s&@t. The dealership experience has really declined, I run 2, an E-class and an SLC, the SLC was returned to my wife without the requested MOT being carried out and our Eclass returned without a Active Breaking system failure being correctly diagnosed.

Any type of poor service drives me nuts. It now seems to so often involve telephones.
"If you are calling about nonsense, press 6 - - - You pressed 6 - - - thank you, now we will take ten minutes to explain the terms and conditions, play you some musak, suggest you use our website instead of bothering us, then probably cut off your call."

However, I did need MB help a year or so ago and perhaps was lucky, because an RAC man soon appeared.
My main dealer has always been very good too, although I do purposely make a visit to talk, rather than phone their dealer group call centre who I soon discovered, don't know anything about cars.

I guess that good people have left your main dealer and it might be the less knowledgeable replacements who have let you down. Of course it makes such a difference when employees are really on top of their jobs and also pleasant with customers. My knowledgeable service adviser chief, has been at M-B for more than 20 years and is still full of enthusiasm. Hope his employer knows how valuable he is to the firm. Communication about servicing progress has always been excellent.

Your dealer might need some mystery customers, or an undercover boss.

[Sheepshanks]

The dealer I went to for many years used to be great then they started referring me to their call-centre, then they wanted everything done through the MB's MyService.

I switched to an indie at that point. I think it's quite incredible that there are five MB specialists around the dealer. I get the impression that the dealership has no interest in anything other than doing basic servicing where they can knock out an A service in 30mins or a B serive in an hour - hugely profitable work.

[Essarell]

That’s the impression I get, it’s Sytner now and they want to give an impression of great service but in execution it’s poor with appalling communication.

[Dewi 2]

Oh dear.
After praising my main dealer (above), perhaps I had better be prepared for a decline down the slippery slope.
It only needs a change of dealer group ownership. I think there might now also be an attempt by M-B UK, to sell their cars directly online.

Presumably the cluster of five indies around the main dealer, could be experienced technicians setting up their own businesses, after leaving that main dealer.