Does this make sense? Filling automatic gearbox's

[AudiA8Quattro]

I wouldn't take any notice of that.
If the box is going to fail, it will fail if you change the oil or not, if its that far gone.
Plenty of transmissions are apparently 'filled for life', a good example of this is the zf transmissions fitted to the old Audi A8 and BMW 7 series. These boxes were 'prone' to failure around 90-100k miles.
Audi claimed the box was filled for life, but even zf engineers disagreed with them apparently.
Changing the oil should prolong the life of the box, if its not too far gone.
Also as Wayne said, its a good opportunity to check the old oil for metal particles which would indicate the box is on its way out.
Its up to you, its your car 

[Matty-MK3]

Yeah, maybe I'll take it into a garage to sort, so that if it is going to go, I can blame them. 

[Wayne]

I wouldn't take any notice of that.
If the box is going to fail, it will fail if you change the oil or not, if its that far gone.
Plenty of transmissions are apparently 'filled for life', a good example of this is the zf transmissions fitted to the old Audi A8 and BMW 7 series. These boxes were 'prone' to failure around 90-100k miles.
Audi claimed the box was filled for life, but even zf engineers disagreed with them apparently.
Changing the oil should prolong the life of the box, if its not too far gone.
Also as Wayne said, its a good opportunity to check the old oil for metal particles which would indicate the box is on its way out.
Its up to you, its your car 

Bmw 5 series has the same ZF box as the 7 series, I had one and the box is filled for life, interesting really as some say to change it others say leave it, I had my oil replaced at 95k and it made a one hell of a difference, changes were much smoother etc plus the oil that came was shocking.

To be honest mixing old and new oil may cause harm, I would run fresh oil, the clutches should cope with it all ok.

[Paul86S2]

I cant see how replacing the box oil with new of the same type could make the clutch's slip. Changing to a differant type / formula could cause a problem.

All auto box's rely on having clean oil without any foreign matter. It seems that "lifetime" oil may be a bit of a sales ploy that doesn't work in the real world.

Mercedes had lifetime autobox oil, but on a recent company car service with a 3 year old 40k mercedez the main dealer recommended an oil change and said it was part of the service schedule.

Same with cambelts you buy a new car with an 80k cambelt change recommendation but by the time you reach 40 or 60 k you find the dealers now recommend a cambelt change because they have had a few warranty claims.

I would personally change the oil, if you are not 100% confident then get a garage to do it for you. Auto box's are very sensitive bits of equipment and need to have the right ammount of oil and it needs to be clean.

Paul