A poor review for Citroen Dealer Workshops

[JohnD]

I bought my used C5-X7 from a Citroen Dealer in 2014 and it came with 12months warranty and a full Citroen service history. For the past three years I’ve kept the warranty going which required an annual service from a main dealer. In April I got the invitation to renew the warranty for a further year but they wanted silly money for it. That together with what the dealer would want for the service would have been a ridiculous cost.. So for the first time I’ve had the C5 up on the ramps to do an oil and filter change. First surprise was that the undertray was quite different to my previous facelift C5. Next surprise was that the three holding bolts across the leading edge were all missing. Then when removing the two rear bolts, I found one of them spinning because the captive nut was no longer fixed. But the undertray came away quite easily because a previous Citroen fitter had simply broken the area around the nut out of the tray.

This to my mind is an appalling standard of workmanship.

[Kennyd90]

Sounds like the same as my under tray on mine. A bit harsh. As long as it's been properly serviced by them I wouldn't be too bothered.

[Stickyfinger]

My car was in such a state I even wrote to the CEO of Citroen.....basically he told me to p**s off as it was an old car (paraphrase) and they don't care now as it was sold privately.

I do not think any dealership of any company fairs well ................... the three year chop in date is all that matters..................

[bobins]

Far too many people have a low opinion of Citroen main dealers - and there's good reason for that
As for the bits on your undertray - they fall out and/or break for fun. I keep a supply of the piddly little metal tyre puncturing fasteners in stock as they often fall out. I've had one of the rear securing bolt's captive nuts fail as well As Sticky indicates - the first 3 years is all they're really bothered about.

[elma]

This is why I take the DIY approach.
Stung by a garage once and never again.

[411514]

I agree that it is shoddy work, but probably par for the course. Indeed, you are probably lucky the undertray is still there, I hear it is common for fastfit type garages to have a room mysteriously full of second-hand undertrays.

My undertray is just about held on with cable ties, due doubtless to the previous owners leaving oil changes to fastfit type garages.

[Gibbo2286]

I agree that it is shoddy work, but probably par for the course. Indeed, you are probably lucky the undertray is still there, I hear it is common for fastfit type garages to have a room mysteriously full of second-hand undertrays.

My undertray is just about held on with cable ties, due doubtless to the previous owners leaving oil changes to fastfit type garages.

Or doing it himself!

As a mechanic and small garage owner I can assure you that we spent an awful lot of our time correcting the disasters caused by DIYers.

The problem main dealers have is that they have to make their money from sales, of cars and spares, there is no money for them in repairs

When you consider the huge outlay required by the manufacturer in special tools, parts held in stock, cars held in stock and obligatory training courses for mechanics and sales staff it's a wonder any of them survive and most now don't they're all owned at the top of the tree by banks and finance houses.

My local Citroen dealer has, is obliged by his contract, to keep a hundred grands worth of parts in his stock room much of which will never sell and which he will unload at a penny in the pound as he has recently done with all the BX and Xantia stuff.

[411514]

Possibly, but given that reattaching an undertray is an easy yet fiddly and time-consuming job, my bet would be on a garage seeking to save time.

Whilst I appreciate that not all garages are the same, my limited experience of garages is not great.

As an example, I recently bought a Pug 1007 with 35k miles for a relative. I heard the tell tale grumble of a wheel bearing, which I thought odd for such low mileage. Never mind, should have been a £40 job for the wheel bearing. Went to remove the wheel, and the wheel bolts must have been torqued up by a giant, and the locking bolt was completely mangled, had to pay £40 for one of the mobile locking nut removal guys. Went to try and remove the hub nut, and this was completely rounded off. Had to cut this off, in the process damaging the driveshaft, costing another £80. Went to undo the hub ball joint, and the nut was missing! Tried undoing the hub to strut bolt, which promptly snapped, as it was a clearly inadequate replacement.

Turns out that the previous owner had, a couple of weeks before selling, sent the car to Hi-Q to swap a snapped spring. My guess as to what happened is that the mechanic tried undoing the hub nut, struggled, and heated it thus knackering the wheel bearing, rounded it off, and gave up. Decided instead to undo the hub-strut bolt, promptly lost it and put any old bolt he had to hand back in its place. Removed and lost the ball joint nut, jumped up and down on a six foot bar on the wheel nuts, and cracked the scuttle panel accessing the strut top nut.

The remainder of the car which, given its low mileage, has not been touched, is immaculate, no tell-tale cable ties and cracked clips. For the sake of a job as simple as changing a spring, the mechanic caused me probably two days, and £100, of grief. I appreciate that this is probably a relatively extreme example, but it is exactly why I do all my own spanner work.

[JohnD]

As long as it's been properly serviced by them I wouldn't be too bothered.

But has it? As far as I can see all they ever do is change the oil and filter. I've noticed recently that my boot door has become stiff and creaky. I gave it a spray with lubricant and it's now quite different. Obviously it never received any in seven years of professional servicing.

[ekjdm14]

I think the key is to find a decent garage and stick with them if you're unable to do it yourself or don't want to, fast-fit type centres are a prime example of a last resort IMO as they are, by their nature, likely to want the job turned around in the minimum time possible to open up the ramp for the next car. I think it helps if you can possibly stick around in the waiting room while the job's done too, any decent garage will be more than happy to let you observe as they'll have nothing to hide.


As for main stealers, I think they all (perhaps excepting some premium brands) fall foul of doing a half-assed job on older vehicles for the reasons stated. Over a certain age, any car would be better off either home-serviced if possible or taken to either a specialist or trusted local indy.

[white exec]

2.5 XM undertray bolts/captive nuts similarly insecure. Even new bolts fail to get a grip. Do wonder how the OE fit could have been so sloppy - were they ever properly matched threads? If it weren't so readily bodged (even a cable tie tongue pushed into the nut to provide some extra grip), I'd pull it all off and renew every single fixing with something decent. Shoddy, shoddy, shoddy.

[elma]

If i had a modern car I'd use an indy for a lot of work. I trust and respect the place I take the work van. Thankfully it looks like i will step straight from old fashioned to electric and skip all this canbus stuff I find so ghastly.

[Stickyfinger]

Dealers keeping stock ?......why do they have to order everything I need from Citroen and it always takes 2-3 days (or 5 if delivered from France )

[elma]

My local Citroen dealer has, is obliged by his contract, to keep a hundred grands worth of parts in his stock room much of which will never sell and which he will unload at a penny in the pound as he has recently done with all the BX and Xantia stuff.

They only keep the parts noone wants.
Remember garages are usually franchises, they have to do as they are told. £100,000 of useless stock sounds like a prity raw deal for the franchisee.

[Gibbo2286]

This company is not a franchise it's private, family owned.