Service History on a Used Car

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BrettS

Active member
Joined
Nov 16, 2010
Location
Mississauga
TDI
2014 Golf Wagon
Hi all.


I'm looking at buying a 2014 Golf wagon that only has about 34,000 kms on it. The Carfax report show the vehicle having one owner 6 service records. I asked at the dealership (VW) if they could tell me what these services were for but they said they they were unable too. Being such low mileage I would think all these visits were warranty repairs and given the odometer reading at each visit, they don't seem to correspond with any scheduled maintenance. For some reason, I thought that with the interconnectedness of all things, any VW dealer would be able to plug in the VIN and be able to access the service records. Am I off base here or is the dealership reluctant to share the service history of this car?

Any thoughts?
Thanks


Brett
 
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2.2TDI

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BrettS said:
Hi all.


I'm looking at buying a 2014 Golf wagon that only has about 34,000 kms on it. The Carfax report show the vehicle having one owner 6 service records. I asked at the dealership (VW) if they could tell me what these services were for but they said they they were unable too. Being such low mileage I would think all these visits were warranty repairs and given the odometer reading at each visit, they don't seem to correspond with any scheduled maintenance. For some reason, I thought that with the interconnectedness of all things, any VW dealer would be able to plug in the VIN and be able to access the service records. Am I off base here or is the dealership reluctant to share the service history of this car?

Any thoughts?
Thanks


Brett
Click to expand...
Unfortunately, VW's system is so great, one dealer can't see the history of the car if it was serviced at another dealer... I know this because I bought my 2015 at one dealer which just got it as a trade in and had no history. I ended up finding out where the car was originally bought and serviced and I managed to get the history from that dealer

I don't understand why on earth VW won't make one system that all VW dealers should use so when they type in the VIN of a car, they can see all the service history. I know other manufacturers have such a system...

So given this, the only way to find out the exact services that were performed is to find out which dealership performed them and contact them to give you the history
 
B

BrettS

Active member
Joined
Nov 16, 2010
Location
Mississauga
TDI
2014 Golf Wagon
Well bugger. That's what I was afraid of. The car had no service indications in the warranty book, but it did say the car was originally sold at Midtown VW, so I could ask them hoping it was serviced there as well.


Thanks
 
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2.2TDI

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BrettS said:
Well bugger. That's what I was afraid of. The car had no service indications in the warranty book, but it did say the car was originally sold at Midtown VW, so I could ask them hoping it was serviced there as well.


Thanks
Click to expand...
Yea unfortunately nobody actually fills out the service book like they are supposed to... The techs would have to charge an extra 0.1 labour for doing that :rolleyes:

Hopefully you can get some info from midtown vw
 
bizzle

bizzle

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May 21, 2013
Location
Southern California
TDI
2015 GSW SEL (totaled), 2013 Touareg Executive
Yeah, start at where it was sold and then work your way out from there in about 100 mile radius.

The way I found my service history was where it was sold, cross referenced with the carfax registration history, and then worked my way from there at individual dealerships until I struck gold.

The other tidbit that might prove useful is that so far these cars seem to be going back to the general area they originally came from (California buybacks seem to be resold in California, for example). It's not a 100% but a pattern some of us seem to be seeing in our purchases--but I haven't been part of that discussion for a while to see if it's still true.
 
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Silver02TDI

Silver02TDI

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Location
Toronto, Ottawa
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2012 Golf Wagon TDI Highline
Interesting... Years back when I bought my 2002 VW TDI I was able to get all service history that was related to warranty work paid by VW - they did have access regardless of the dealership?
 
bizzle

bizzle

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Location
Southern California
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2015 GSW SEL (totaled), 2013 Touareg Executive
Do you remember if the 2002 had warranty work done all over the place or was it at one or a group of dealerships?
 
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