VW Assistance renewal

[Exonian]

Here's a bit of a strange one.
Just before I flew out on holiday in July, which involved at 400ish mile round trip to the airport and back, not to mention the car standing idle in the open for two weeks, which is the time you could do with having the peace of mind of breakdown cover the most, I received a letter from VW Assistance/RAC saying my breakdown cover had expired at the end of May.
Nice timing.
I opened the letter and they quoted my £89 to renew.

Initially I was a little peeved to say the least as when I bought the car I was told they'd top up the cover for the full 12 months. I bought the car ex-demo last September and it was reg'd at the end of May 2009.
So I was going to phone them and find out what the hell was going on but was busy at work at the time and working long hours, so I let it slip knowing I had breakdown cover for my other rather old car which includes personal cover. Something is better than nothing.

Today, 19th August, I have just received another letter telling me my cover runs out in September. Okay, so the supplying dealer is now off the hook in my mental hit list having not bulsh!tted me after all.
But it grinds me a bit because if I'd have broken down on the way to Gatwick I wouldn't have called VW Assistance thinking I wasn't covered.

I work for a big company so I'm fully aware of how disorganised and incompetent they can be and I'm not immune from making the odd clerical error myself, but just to finish it off I looked at the charge for renewal expecting it to still be £89 and it was £94.
Are they having a laugh? 

[Steve30]

Are you moaning over a fiver, you tight barsteward

[am1w]

£28k car £5 extra to help it in needy times. Love it!

[Exonian]

The fiver was the piece de resistance.
Doesn't matter whether the car is worth £20 or £20k, it's the shambles of the renewal letters and whether or not I was covered for five months. The extra £5 is just the coup de grace. As I already said I've got personal cover from my other car.

I really should learn not to post up threads on here. 

[am1w]

Keep posting and threading brother!

[Exonian]

Sorry Asker, it was just the complete inconsistency of the system the prompted me to post as I'm not one normally to post up moaning threads, and all I seemed to get picked up on was the fiver.

Still a fiver is a fiver, that's an hours take home pay for a hell of a lot of people in the country and more to the point my bill had gone up over 5% in a matter of weeks.

[am1w]

Sorry Asker, it was just the complete inconsistency of the system the prompted me to post as I'm not one normally to post up moaning threads, and all I seemed to get picked up on was the fiver.
Still a fiver is a fiver, that's an hours take home pay for a hell of a lot of people in the country and more to the point my bill had gone up over 5% in a matter of weeks.

No I understand your point of view completely. The price rises never end. £5 is a huge mount of money for many families in many parts of the country who are really suffering to keep afloat and feed themselves. I can see the next few years will be full of unrest as this government's measures are overly harsh IMO.

[Keithuk]

I received a letter from VW Assistance/RAC saying my breakdown cover had expired at the end of May.
Nice timing.
I opened the letter and they quoted my £89 to renew.

Initially I was a little peeved to say the least as when I bought the car I was told they'd top up the cover for the full 12 months.

Well VW only give you 12 months free RAC breakdown cover. If you negotiated a further 12 renewal then you should take that up with them.

I've been in the RAC for 5 years after I broke down with my last car (I'm a mechanic but not a magician). At the moment I pay £50.50. Now its strange the RAC. I went online back in 1985 to search for breakdown cover and the RAC were the cheapest £45. The RAC give you a no claims discount 10% each year you don't use them. The following year the renewal came through and they wanted £58 (no usage). I phoned them and asked why. They said you get an extra discount for ordering online. I went back online and paid another £45. But then you start a new policy and you have to earn your no claims. 

[Exonian]

I've got Britannia Rescue with personal and family cover for my other car. It costs about £70 p.a.
I didn't negotiate any further VW Assist when I bought my car, the dealer just said that as the car was 5 months old they'd top up the service so it would run for 12 months from date of sale. I wasn't particularly bothered either way as I already had breakdown cover. If the GTI breaks down I'll just ask 'em to tow it to the nearest dealer and get them to sort the problems out whilst it's under warranty.
I just started the thread as you normally read threads about people complaining about dealers or VW in general. I've never had a particular problem with either VW or a dealer yet but I was a little bemused by their disorganisation when it came to breakdown cover.