Last year I had some work done on my VW Touareg in Italy during our vacation. It was labour intense and the quote for the same work in CH was 4.000 CHF and I ended up paying 1.200 Euro in Italy. THe parts they changed were appr. ½ price and they charged 56 Euro/hour instead of 200 CHF in CH!1 So a big difference!! It was an aut. VW garage and I got a 2 year global warranty on everything they did. They even upgraded my infosystem and maps for free. (appr. 300-400 CHF normally).
It was a huge VW garage close to Venice and since we didn´t need the car during our stay it was a perfect deal...we even got a "loaner" for free that we hardly used (brand new VW Touran)
I will definitely go to Italy or Germany again to get service or repairs done. Smaller services I do at the local VW garage (not AMAG) and that seems reasonable.

What she said. That's not "some" service center but the "official" Audi ones (BMW and Merc as well... but each has an own shop independent of each other next to the car rental agencies). I used the one in Stuttgart repeatedly and free parking is hard to beat. Put on top the cheaper offers for vacation packages compared to ZRH and you are happy to do the drive...

A strange thing is happening. in my request for a major/large service, I am being asked what I want serviced. well if I knew I would not ask for a "major service". Am I doing something wrong or is it the way things are.

Another thing, in the UK, the VW service is clearly indicated on their site with everything that they would service clearly written. Why can I not find something similar (although I understand I will not find a price) on any of the German/Swiss VW sites. could it be that I am simply not looking in the right places?

In May I had to replace all brakes on my Opel with 90k km. I asked for a quote in Winterthur and it was 1 500 CHF without VAT. I also needed to do a service and had a look at the bill I paid a year ago. It was very close to one thousand.

Then I asked for a quote in Singen and when I got it I was only able to say "alles klar".

I replaced the brakes and did service in Singen, they also replaced my winter tires with summer ones. All together with VAT was less than a thousand euros. They gave me a lift to the shopping center and picked up from there when work was done. At the end I was satisfied with the price difference and even didn't do any research if I can claim the VAT back.

I was really willing to do the service of my car in Switzerland, but at some point it came to the fact that difference was for me too big significantly. It also summed up with the way the local garage did maintenance job - I had to return to them nearly every time to let them re-fix the problems. They called me recently reminding about the service, I truly said them that I'm not sure if I will visit them in the future.

A lot of things can be "left off" (eg pollen filter), or added, brake fluid change, coolant change, auto trans oil change, diff oil change (these last two are not in the service schedule for some cars). Also if you ring round lots of garages to compare likely the cheapest quote is doing less than the most expensive.

That quote was frightening. A good candidate for going abroad then or fixed price from an independent you trust (anywhere). New "white box" discs and pads for an Opel are 50 euros for each axel front/rear. 2 hours work DIY (eg Vectra). Very basic job, big mark up anywhere on this. Typically I would do that myself for < 100 euros, then rock up at the dealer for the fixed priced check, filter and oil service, to get the stamp in the book, getting the "oh your brakes look OK" (disappointed look for free ) and dealer stamp.

Well here is a recent offer I just got. Thoughts anyone?

the cost of the 50,000 km service amounted to 780 € incl. German VAT.

This price includes:
- Inspection with oil change
- Service interval
- Service interval Plus
- Replace the air filter
- Replace spark plugs
- Replace pollen filter
- Replace oil for Haldex coupling
- Replace the brake fluid
- Adjusting headlights
- Clean the roof

The cost of air conditioning shall be 115 € incl. German VAT.

This price includes:
- Check air conditioning
- Disinfect air conditioning

Disinfect is a spray can for about 10 euro, and a full refrigerant drain and recharge is about 40-60 euro.

Clean roof... guess you have a fabric convertible?

Nope I have a panoramic sunroof, which is actually does need cleaning and the rails greasing!

Ok.so an ear bud and a dab of grease then

Well it looks like I will go with the offer above as I see no objections.

one question for those in the know, how easy is it to claim back the tax on the service? is it as simple as when one does the shopping, get the tax document from the garage and simply park the car at the border go to the German tax office and have them stamp the paper, then return on another date) and ask for the money back from the garage or what?

Yes exactly the same process and you don't need to have the green form. Just the invoice is good enough

Is it just me, or is anything around cars a complete rip-off in Switzerland?

I have a 2008 Renault Laguna III that gets its regular service done in Renault workshops in Hungary, mostly. Now I have the two official invoices in front of me and it's staggering...

- labor costs are 8-10-fold(!) in CH (kind of expected around triple...)
- parts cost about 2-3x for the same items bought from Renault
- official motoroil have cost 125CHF in Zürich for 5.5l, whereas at Reifendirekt CH the same 5 liter bottle costs 35CHF(!)

I paid 1000 CHF for a revision that used to cost me 150-200EUR. I feel utterly ripped off and taken for stupid.

Guess I've been Switzerlanded.

Why just the triple? avg salary is 600€ in HU, 4500€ in CH, go figure

yeah that's fair enough

I have similar question.

It is time for the first regular service of my car.
The offer from Switzerland is 700-800 francs.
The offer from Germany 180-220 euros.

I am always talking about official garage.
The car has been leased from an importer in Switzerland
The question is the following. Service stamp from an official garage in germany will affect the european warranty?

Last time I checked, Germany was in Europe

On the same topic, does anyone have any recommendations for these repair places/garages? It seems most of the posters are from Zurich anyways so I would appreciate any information for future repairs/maintenance/mfk stuff

I found the prices differ much less between EU and CH.
If the CH prices were 800, the German ones (in Waldshut) were about 600. With the added commute and time added, it was not worth to go over the border.

Maybe we get some good and affordable garage tips a bit further away from other EFers