With regular services and MOTs become more and more important as a Volkswagen gets older, people often find that they need to rely on replacing some of the VW parts, which came with their car when they first bought it. Often, official Volkswagen garages will offer to replace these items for a driver when they take their car in for service. However, there is no legal obligation that a person gets the work done there.
This is important to note because official dealerships often bump up the price of such items significantly beyond what other people charge for them. Anyone who has received a phone call from their official Volkswagen mechanic while at work informing them that to pass their MOT, their car must have a vital windscreen wiper replaced will know this. They will likely have Googled the price of the part online, and found that the amount they find on their screen is one quarter or a tenth of the price the garage is quoting.
Naturally, a large part of the cost will be made up of labour, but it is it the part section which is also bumped up beyond all recognition. Clever shoppers do not have to put up with this price inflation. They can fight back and get important components of their car much more cheaply than the official dealerships are offering them for.
The first port of call in the quest to find a part for cheaper has already been done. We mentioned above that a person is likely to Google the cost of their part. There they will find any number of online suppliers who are willing to supply the item for a lower price than almost anyone else around. What is more, the results are tabulated right there in front of a person’s eyes so they can quickly see which is the cheapest place to source the item from.
However, as always, buyers should beware. Just because a decent price has been found on the Internet that does not necessarily mean it is the most advantageous way to get a part. Indeed, there are often better deals to be found by moving offline. Checking trade magazines such as Auto Trader can prove invaluable. Many companies advertise in there, and individual buyers who have managed to come across genuine working Volkswagen items may put them up for sale in the classified section.
Similarly, local newspapers will often have car components for sale for scrap and at low costs. If a person can salvage them before they hit the rubbish heap, this can often provide big savings. The next logical stop off in trying to find a decent priced part would be the scrap heap itself. There are often old models of cars with perfectly fine working pieces, which are not being used.
Many people forget that the official garages and forecourts are not the be all and end all of motoring. There are plenty of independent garages out there that stock official regulation items which can be fitted into a car without voiding a warranty. In fact, they are often more reliable.
They pay wholesale price for their VW parts and rely more often on committed, regular customers than passing trade. Therefore it is totally counterintuitive for them to try and rip a customer off. They will keep their prices low and realistic in the hope that a person trusts them more often with their trade.