Wow - this makes me very sad to see Volvo doing this. Very sad indeed that I have to battle to get this diagnosis for free when they promise it to us. Also, if this is the case then they should be refunding me the $112 they charged me last January then, since they never should have charged me for that in the first place. I still have my receipt - they charged me 1 hour of labor for diagnosis for the check engine light.

good grief, that's the WHOLE POINT of the program - they get people coming in all day for their free checks, and then hopefully pay for any needed service at the Volvo dealer. Volvo would rather give away free diagnostics than have you take your car to a local shop first.

Yeah it was called Volvo Service for Life before and it has bebeen around a while.

Just to clarify, Volvo is not ripping you off. This particular dealer may be but that is different. Volvo rolled out the program and told us about it. It was up to the dealer to handle it- meaning paying the techs. For a car under warranty, we get paid and Volvo reimburses the dealership for the claim. For this, Volvo does not pay for anything. So it is up to the dealer to either not pay the tech (which won't go over well) or pay them a half hour or hour or whatever they want to do to handle it.

I just talked to another local Volvo dealership/repair center, and they also have the same "Volvo Service Advantage"page on their website, but when I just talked to the girl at the repair center, she wanted to set up an appointment and when I asked about this program, she said she knew nothing about it!?! I explained the situation to her, and that I had gone through this with another Volvo establishment and I was hoping this would be a better experience, and I even read the part about the diagnosis to her right off their own web page, but she said she knew nothing about it. She connected me to somebody else and I had to leave a message. Now I'm waiting for 2 different Volvo shops to call me back, and I'm betting neither one will actually call me.

This is very frustrating, and I think this is definitely worth an investigation. Maybe a call to my local news station would be appropriate. They love this stuff. But all I really want is the diagnosis, not to make a major battle over it.

I suspect that many Volvo dealer service departments rather resent this program, because charging $100+ for a few minutes of computer diagnostics was a nice little gravy stream for them that they don't want to give up. But they don't want to not participate in the program, as when you go onto Volvo's website to search for a dealer they have an obvious checkbox to include only participating dealers. Plus I'm sure when the Sales people are trying to sell a Volvo they tout the Service Advantage program, so Sales isn't going to let the Service side of the shop opt-out. But when it comes time to actually give away the free stuff, the hope is that most owners won't know about, or will have long forgotten, the free diagnostics.

I understand. I know it's not Volvo themselves (I hope). But it seems that multiple dealer/service centers that promise this service actually do not honor it even when it is advertised on their site. I wonder if Volvo is aware that the individual dealers/shops are doing this to the customers? I should think Volvo would not be happy to learn that they came up with this program but it is not being honored at actual shops that promise it.

What kills me here is that even when I mention it and make them aware that I know about the program, they still claim they know nothing about it, and deny that they offer it.

ES6T seems to be an honest an knowledgeable Volvo Tech who works for an honest dealer's service shop. Too bad we can't all live within driving distance of him!

Agreed.

The girl you talked to at the second dealership might just make appointments. Our appointment center sets up appointments for multiple car lines. They are not allowed to quote any prices and I would bet they don't know a thing about the free diagnosis even though we participate.

As for the hour charge for a couple minutes of work- that isn't always the case. We aren't Pep Boys. We don't (or at least I don't) simply read the codes and throw a part at it. There is very often diagnostic procedures to follow.

The dealer I work for pays us the diagnosis time, so I take the time to diagnose the problem... within reason. If they didn't pay me, I might be a little more lazy.

Keep us updated, I'm really curious to hear what VCC says.

The second dealership actually called back (the first one didn't), and the person I spoke with told me that they do take part in the program, and confirmed that the diagnostic will be at no charge. He gave me the name of somebody there I could talk to if there was any further problems with this.

So I'll know later this week how it goes when I get the diagnostic. I'm bringing a printout of their webpage just in case there are any problems. I'm still upset that the first place charged me last January when they shouldn't have.

I did call and speak to somebody at Volvo Customer Care, and explained the situation. She confirmed that it is supposed to be no charge, but each Volvo dealership is independently owned and operated, and that they can decide if they participate or not. My point was that once they claim to participate, they should not be allowed to make up their own rules. In this case, they claim to participate, but then deny it and charged me anyways last January, and tried to again when I called them yesterday. She said the only thing I could do is ask to speak to the general manager and explain the situation.

She also pointed out that they're not doing it for free because they are supposed to submit it to Volvo and they get paid for the diagnosis from Volvo. They offer this obviously to help keep the customer coming to Volvo for service. Shame that some of these managers are making up their own rules.

That is interesting because when the program rolled out, Volvo did not pay for it. Maybe that changed with the name change.

Interesting. She also referred to it by the old name. I called it by the new name and she corrected me and called it by the old name. She told me that she does not know how much or what percentage they pay back, but she said the repair dept. is supposed to submit the diagnosis work to Volvo for compensation.

I'm wondering how much any of them really know about this program.