Ducati Aylesbury

As much as I don't enjoy doing things like this I'm afraid to say that I am far from impressed with the service both myself and my beloved S4R were given on Saturday during the compulsary 600 miler.
Following a most exhilerating 90 mile trip down there on a glorious summers morning I was greeted by your normal service desk happy, smiling, pleased to see you type chappy, or am I thinking of somewhere else ????
Anyway after a lovely three and a half hour wait in their air conditioned waiting area with tea and sandwiches provided....... sorry drifting again.... sat outside in the baking sun next to the rather expensive butty van, I was told the bike was now ready and everything was fine.
On closer inspection I was relieved to see that they had actually done the service it was supposed to have, in fact that was from the butty van, as I could see the chain wax that was all over the swing arm, number plate, exhausts, seat cowl, seat, frame.... oh and the chain.
Anyway didn't want to complain too much as at least they had serviced it.
HOWEVER.... when I asked the happy, smiling... in fact now grinning like a cheshire cat (my apologies to all cheshire cats) which was a little worrying,service desk chappy just how much I owed him... well was I in for a surprise..... £220.00
Oh well only a little over the quote I thought and so paid up.........
Curiosity got the better of me on the way back... I know should have checked it while I was there but I was a little worried in case they tried to get the shirt from my back if I stayed any longer.... so I decided a much earned breather was needed and a look over the invoice.
MUCH to my surprise I found that they had not charged me a penny............ for labour ???????? but had charged me £21.00 for an oil filter and £35.00 for the oil...... per litre . That equates to £140.00 for oil on a 996cc engine, which is 20 quid more than BMW charge for their special motorsport oil for the M series.
To say I am a little p****d is probably an understatement.
To top it all I spent nearly three hours trying to get the chain wax off everything except the chain and then on a little run to Barmouth yesterday the rear brake light switch decided to drop off thanks to a nut vibrating loose, and I thought they checked things like that .

Sorry Ducati Aylesbury but you certainly will not win any votes from me, in fact I will go as far to say that you have just lost a very good, spend happy customer... And thats the first time I have ever said that about any Motorcycle dealer.

In hind sight Ducati Wolves would have been a safe bet, less in fuel and at least Tony and Scott know their stuff.

[NattyBoy]

Sorry to hear that mate...not good is it - and im sorry to say that my 998s owning mate frequently has these sort of experiences. Im gonna get my 2nd (3000 mile) service done by Snells..and then its over to the capable (independent) hands of Louigi Moto who fettles my 888.

Cheers
Nat

[crust]

Ring up another dealer and ask them or the price of a filter - usually £7 - £10, then oil, usually £40 for 4 litres shell Advance, then phone them up and complain.

Get an explanation of their racketeering, mention that UKMOC are curious as to how they justify these ridiculous prices.

Personally I reckon the blokes made a mistake.

Did he have a shaved head?

Crust

sorry to hear this ...our own fatbloke and PeteS4 have had good dealings there.....
me thinks you could call them and mention UKMOC and how you feel...


...(and knowing Fatbloke he will also have words)..

Originally Posted by crust

Ring up another dealer and ask them or the price of a filter - usually £7 - £10, then oil, usually £40 for 4 litres shell Advance, then phone them up and complain.

Get an explanation of their racketeering, mention that UKMOC are curious as to how they justify these ridiculous prices.

Totally agree - get back on to them straight away - if labour is free, then your first service should cost around £45 - mine did (at P&H Crawley), and I got a job sheet to show exactly what should have been done... what were they doing for 3.5 hours???

As crust said, this could be a simple mistake... made by someone simple?

xxx

I bought my new S2r from Ducati Aylesbury on 17th August. A couple of days later I figured I was going to need the 600 mile service pretty soon as I was racking up the miles. I phoned Aylesbury who told me that the soonest they could do it would be in 3 weeks and that I wasn't allowed to go more than 100 miles or so over the 600 miles. I was told that I should have booked it in on the day I picked up the bike, but I wasn't. It would only have made a couple of days difference anyway. I was looking at having my new bike laid up for 2 weeks as I waited for the service - not good especially with the bank holiday looming.

I enquired about the cost and was told it would be £230. I was horrified as my wife's new Hornet 600 was £45 for the same service. The explanation that I was given was that it was a Ducati! The service guy told me that labour is not free on the 600 mile service. He also informed me that as I would be having the bike serviced with the supplying dealer, the £230 price included a subsidisidy of £100 so I was apparently getting a bargain!
I then phoned Riders of Bristol to see if they could do me a better price and service time. They could only fit me 2 days earlier and their price was £240.
I went back to Aylesbury and told them that Riders were only £10 more expensive, so what happened to the £100 subsidy? The service receptionist couldn't explain. They said that if was unhappy I should go to Riders then!

As both Riders of Bristol and Ducati Aylesbury are in the middle of nowhere I didn't fancy sitting around for 4 hours with nowhere to go. So I called Pegasus in Reading. What a difference. Polite efficient staff.
They could fit me in the next week. I had my bike serviced by them on Thursday, less than 2 weeks after picking it up. They had it done in 3 hours and it only cost £217. That's cheaper than the supplying dealer with their £100 subsidy, who you would have thought would have been keen to hang onto my business. Pegasus also sorted out a couple of things that should have been done as part of the PDI check by Aylesbury. They removed various pieces of white tape from around the frame and several silver tapes off the swing arm which are fitted at the factory to protect the bike whilst being assembled. They are also now working on a problem with the fuel mixture and balance of the injection as the bike is running lumpy. As I hadn't ridden a Monster before I thought that it was just the nature of the bike, but the service technician wasn't happy with it and is endeavouring to sort it out - but that's another story. Odd though how Ducati Aylesbury didn't notice it.

Pegasus are only a 10 minute walk from the town centre so there is plenty to do whislst they service your bike. I strongly reccomend them.

Make your own mind up about Ducati Aylesbury - I have.

Originally Posted by BoozyBOB

sorry to hear this ...our own fatbloke and PeteS4 have had good dealings there.....
me thinks you could call them and mention UKMOC and how you feel...


...(and knowing Fatbloke he will also have words)..

I never have any spanner work done at Ducati Aylesbury.
All my work is done by Dave Wood
I think Ducati Aylesbury are good for buying your bike from
you can normally get a good deal,
But as far as the workshops concerned ....................no comment

[CK & AK]

Suggest anyone else getting quotes like this, phones a few other dealers, as I have NEVER heard of a 600 mile service costing over £160 (except from a 'Ducati' own store).
At this time of the year, any good, reputable dealer/workshop will be quoting at least 3 weeks.

My M1000 service was approx £135 from an authorised dealer, who is STILL quoting similar prices for those who havent brought the bike from them new.

Try W M Snell at Alton, for good old fashioned service & courtesy

[gary tompkins]

DWR is now picking up an awful lot of the service work that Ducati Aylesbury used to do, leaving them to warentee work mainly.

I wonder why?

£240 for a 600 mile service is a joke. A lot of good indepenant service agents would only charge a little more than that for a 6000 mile service.

Originally Posted by gary tompkins

DWR is now picking up an awful lot of the service work that Ducati Aylesbury used to do, leaving them to warentee work mainly.

This is the only place I will take my bike to have any work done on it, servicing, modifications etc

My 600 mile was £45 as part of the deal on buyin the bike,just had a look and they charged me £37 for oil(still to dear for me as I work in the trade and no the mark up on oil)
£140 is a jike though,did they go to the north sea to drill it out for you?

[farl]

I'll second what's been said about Snell's ~ top service and helpful. Good ride down from Walton to Alton along the Hog's Back too. The 620sie I brought new from DLS had the first service thrown in, thought that was the norm.

Originally Posted by farl

The 620sie I brought new from DLS had the first service thrown in, thought that was the norm.

It's been said before in a number of other threads about this subject - but just to re-cap: basically if you pay list (or close to list) for your bike, then the dealer you bought it from will more than likely do your 600 mile service FOC as part of the deal - or if not totally free, then just the cost of 'consumables', which as said above is typically around £37-45 for oil and filter...

However, if you squeeze them on the OTR price (and lets face it, it's quite easy to do that these days as there are a lot of Ducati dealers out there with stock bikes to move this year), then they are going to try and claw it back in whatever way they can - they aren't a charity afterall...

Therefore, typically with compaines like Ducati Aylesbury who are renowned for discounting the OTR - they make their turnover shortfall up by expensive service costs...

xxx

Blimey how offputting - £200 for 600 mile service Glad I don't have to deal with that sort of crap and can use who I like for servicing now.
Thats a bloody rip off

Originally Posted by Chappers

This is the only place I will take my bike to have any work done on it, servicing, modifications etc

Who, what, where are DWR?

Will