Service indicator coming on early?

Hi all

I had my first service carried out on time, on 13th Nov '17, at 11,300 miles. The second was carried out on 12th Nov '18 at 23,800 miles.

It's 30th October 2019, my car is at 35300 miles, and the service indicator has switched from telling me it's due soon to telling it's due now. I wasn't expectng this to happen until the 12th November or 36,300 miles.

Right now it's no problem, because I can ignore the indicator until my service (which is booked for the 12th Nov). But in one year's time I am handing this car back (on the 8th Nov, to be precise) and I don't particularly want to have to pay for the fourth service. The lease company have said that I do not have to have the car serviced as long as it's not indicating that a service is overdue.

So, I'm keen to understand why the service indicator is already on! Does it go on factors other than just milage and date?

Cheers
Jamie

It comes on with 1000 miles to go, which for me is a big problem.

My leasing company won’t let me book a service until the warning is on, but then I have to wait 4 to 5 weeks before it goes in, during which I will do a minimum of 3000 miles, which means at 115k miles in less than 4 years I am an entire service missing.

But that’s what they want!

To be fair to the company, cars which do high mileages tend to have fewer issues and far less wear than those that are used infrequently for shorter trips as the parts are run mostly at the design temperatures, rather than cycling from cold to hot.

Thanks Richard. So yours comes on (as in, every time you start the car you get the 'routine maintenance needed' message) as soon as you're within 1000 miles of it actually being due?

That ties in with mine - I am almost exactly 1000 miles off. Weird that I didn't notice this last year.

I guess I now need to go talk to my lease company, and explain that they can't go by the car dash to say if it's actually due a service, but need to look at the service record instead!

It counts down to when the service is due and it’s the only thing my leasing company are interested in. They would certainly not entertain having work done with 1000 miles to go (I’ve done more than that since Monday, with another 100 ish to go tomorrow) hence my frustration and out of sync car.

I think it's possible we've misunderstood each other, Richard - are you saying that, with 1000 miles to go, your car starts to say that a service will be due soon?

That's what I expected mine to do, and what I think I remember from last year. My worry is that this year, with just under 1000 miles until the service record indictates it's necessary, my car is already saying that the servie is due now.

I pay for my own services, so if I have a car that's claiming the service is due early, I'm going to end up paying for a fourth service that I otherwise wouldn't.

The dealer resets the service warning - they should have done so correctly in the first place. It is only a reminder - if it comes on it does not mean that your car will fall to pieces if you ignore it for a while. So talk with your dealer and have them reset the indicator at the appropriate mileage.

Hi Jaap. I'm not at all worried about the car - I understand that there's no real risk to running a few days late! My concern is that, having covered 11500 miles over 50 weeks (and therefore not having run the last service interval down) the car is indicating it's overdue. If it does this again when I hand it back next year, the lease company will try to charge me for an extra service.

So get your dealer to reset the service reminder to the proper mileage.

Are dealers able to change the mileage remaining until the next service with any degree of control? I thought that only option they had was to tell the car that a service has just been carrried out and re-set the clock from that point. If they are able to go in at a later date and override the count, ie tell the car it still has x miles to go, then that's fine.

I can ask when I get this service done, of course.

I just spoke to my dealer. They are mystified; the only control they have is to tell the car that a service hs been carried out, and that tells the computer that it has 12500 miles and 364 days to go. They cannot explain why the car is showing that the service is already due when I have both days and miles left!

All very odd. They sugggest that I contact my lease angency now, and warn them that he car is doing this, and get their agreement that we'll go by the stamp in the service book and not the car computer.

It might be a solution to reset the warning when the car reaches the next appropriate mileage and not when the service is actually carried out.

jamiewakeham said:

I had my first service carried out on time, on 13th Nov '17, at 11,300 miles. The second was carried out on 12th Nov '18 at 23,800 miles.

Click to expand...

You only have to get it serviced once a year after 10,000+ miles ?!? Why is my dealer making me go in every 5 months / 8,000 km ??

It varies by region. Continental Europe has 20.000 km/ 1year service intervals.

A lot of discussion elsewhere in the Forum regarding the engine oil quality in North America :?

Well, had the service done yesterday. They are still mystified as to why it started saying 'maintenance due now' early. But the service book is stamped correctly, and if it pings up early again next year I will drop in and ask them to reset it.