Unlimited power train warranty

Read all that "Fine Print"

 

Exactly. That's why I'm so confused as of what the stealers are trying to do. There has to be a catch.

 

They said that this is all they have for fine print
But I'm not satisfied. I'm thinking that there has to be a catch.

 

Here's what I know:

Lifetime usually means 10 years/100,000 miles

The dealers around me try to sell these extended warranties for $5,000.

I think you got a potentially nice deal with your purchase. I wish my dealership would have offered this at no cost.

Also there is probably no reason not to get your car serviced with the dealer you bought the car from, unless you get burned somehow. Dealerships still make money doing warranty work because the policy will pay them.

Dealerships have learned for the most part that they can make money in servicing the cars they sell without ripping off their customers.

Used car lots are a different story.

 

In my experience, dealerships always charge the most for any service.

I also got one of these unlimited warranties, and let's just say I won't plan on it coming through for me if I do have an issue.

 

I have unlimited as well.
Mine's through the dealer; the caveat is, I must have maintenance performed at the dealer from which I bought it.
From the sellers perspective, I think my deal makes a little more sense. Might want to dig a bit deeper.

 

Sounds like you have good instincts

 

I'd be willing to pay "a little more" to have a dealership do a repair on a brand new car. I wouldn't let anyone on the secondary market touch a new car until at least after I pay it off...then enough time will have hopefully gone buy to where mechanics would hopefully be more familiar with a newer generation type car.

 

So I was just a given a "Free" extended 8yr / 125k extended warranty from Toyota for all my troubles they can't fix on my 7 month old truck. First impressions were that the extended warranty would run consecutive to any factory warranty but it does not. The 8 year warranty runs concurrently with the factory warranty

 

A lot of dealers give out these "lifetime powertrain warranties" any more. It's just the way of the dealer hoping to get you to pay for service. They say you have to just do "recommend service", which will include every little thing they can come up with, plus following EVERYTHING in the manual. So, you take it in and the oil change person says you need a new belt, you have to replace it, even though it doesn't need it, they are just selling labor and parts.
It' didn't cost you anything, so don't worry about it.

 

I noticed that as well...runs concurrently usually.

 

Something else to think about is if a part breaks that is internal , if they cover it , they will put in all the old parts along with the one new part. . This is to get you to add megabucks because you may want to go for a total rebuild as long as the engine or trans is already apart. Example = if one piston bearing goes bad they only have to replace the one bearing .

 

The dealerships around me have "Priority for life", "Auto4Life"..."Fill in the blank4Life" that comes free with the car. But it's just Toyota Care at the end of the day.

My dealership never mentioned Toyota Care and when I drove off in the truck they handed me a pile o'literature that included three owners manuals, brochures, and (buried deep in the pile) the brochure for Toyota Care...written in Spanish! Before I drove off I checked everything and pointed out the Toyota Care Spanish version and asked for the English language one. They claimed they were out of them.

 

Honestly, if its included, take it. Most of the parts they mention, for the general "life" of the vehicle you will be using it, those parts dont break down. If they do, you have to pay a $100 deductible which isnt bad. But those can add up. You want to repair the waterpump? $100. Oh, you should probably repair the oil pump while were at it.... another $100. Welp, the thermostat is dead a month later... another $100. So they make money. The big buck repair like a seized engine that is completely not your fault (again, rare if you keep to the recommended service interval and dont abuse the truck), they might lose a few grand on it. But not nearly enough to offset the $100 deductibles they are getting from the smaller stuff.

 

This beats my last car. Everytime I go to have something fixed it was $500 minimum. My wifes car is $1000 minimum. But we don't have many problems....maybe once every three years.

Around where I live your doing well if something gets fixed for under $500.

Also if a dealership tries to give you the runaround, or is not treating you right, a friendly call to the Toyota Corp regional manager should do the trick. Give the dealership every opportunity to fix something right first though.

 

Realize, it's a marketing thing differentiating the dealer from competitors. Most buyers get "warm fuzzies" from the reassurance of the thought of a lifetime/unlimited powertrain warranty and may tend to choose that dealer over others.

The "catch" is that few new-vehicle buyers actually keep their vehicle very far beyond the factory 5yr 60,000 mile powertrain warranty. A lot of the stuff you see listed as covered parts don't typically fail until double or triple that time/mileage or longer; and/or when the covered parts do fail there are other associated non-covered parts that will have also failed and need to be repaired on your dime at the dealer.

Since you didn't pay out of pocket, if you get something out of it great, if not then you're not really out anything but the maintenance record-keeping which you'd want to be doing anyway.

 

Another thing is that when you get near to paying off your car you will get bombarded with extended warranty offers. Only go with the one's with reputable underwriters.

 

One more thing , When something fails and you try to use the warranty , they will tell you that they will not know what is covered until it is taken apart . The owner will have to agree ahead of time to pay for the whole job or they will not even start. This happened to me and I will never buy another extended warranty . Free yes but it is pretty much worthless.

 

Dealer we bought the wifes Corolla has this warranty, most likely will never use it and if we do try to use it they will worm out of fixing it for free. No biggie, I didn't pay anything extra to have it.

Doesn't say anything about fasteners inside of the engine, transmission or diffs.

When something inside fails they will try to blame it on a "Non covered" part like a rod cap nut coming off or a rocker stud nut turning loose causing engine failure.

Take it and go, it didn't cost you anything more than any other dealer would have charged for car only.