New Here | Service Intervals

[Jonesey_MFC]

Hello everyone, 
Im Marc, and a newbie to VW, while has just ourchased my 2017 GTi Performance yesterday
I’ve done some reading on the forum and through my manuals prior to this post but I just want to ensure my understanding is right before discussing back with the garage.

Car was last serviced: 03/10/2023
Since this date the car has only covered 1,700 miles. 

When I questioned the service due in Oct’24 (for every 12 months)  - the garage advised the car had only covered 1.7k miles since the last service, and technician at the garage they use advised it’s in long life which is every 24 month, and that the service interval on the car still advised 9,200 or 345 days. 

I plan on doing avg mileage between 8-10K miles - should the car be serviced again in Oct’24 and should I request the garage to cover this service or will i be fine to wait as per the computer and service interval 9,200 miles.

Any support and advice would be appreciated or if you can point me to the right post. 

Thanks
Marc

[willni]

Welcome!

You're going to get a mix of answers here, but in general service every 10k miles or once a year at a minimum whichever comes first.

A few of us prefer the oil change every 5/6k miles or once a year though.

[Jonesey_MFC]

Thanks for the reply 👍🏼

But in short - I shouldn’t be following the internal computer guidance. 

If I’m only planning on 10k per year- I’ll be looking at June-July’25 before the 9,200 miles are covered and then it won’t have had a service from Oct’22-June’25

I didn’t think this would be the case. 

[joe6]

By my calculation it will be due a brake fluid change this year (after first 3 years and then every 2 years) but as Will says you will get various opinions on oil change routines. I tend to do every 5/6 k miles or 6 months which ever comes first. Some think that is overkill with modern oils but I am old and habits tend to stick

[SRGTD]

Thanks for the reply 👍🏼

But in short - I shouldn’t be following the internal computer guidance. 

If I’m only planning on 10k per year- I’ll be looking at June-July’25 before the 9,200 miles are covered and then it won’t have had a service from Oct’22-June’25

I didn’t think this would be the case.

VW have two service regimes;

• Annual time and distance where services are the sooner of 9,300 miles (cars under three years old) or 12 months and for cars over 3 years old, the sooner of 10k miles or 12 months.
• Flexible / long life where the car monitors the engine oil quality and ‘tells’ you when a service is due. On long life servicing, cars can travel up to the sooner of 18k miles or two years before a service is due.

So whichever service regime you follow, your car ought to be serviced before June ‘25.

VW’s recommendations on whether you should opt for Fixed or flexible servicing is at the link below. From a personal perspective, even though oil technology has advanced over the years I wouldn’t want my car to go up to two years between oil and filter changes, so my car is on time and distance servicing.

https://www.volkswagen.co.uk/en/owners-and-services/servicing-and-parts/service-plans/service-schedules.html

[DSGboy]

I came to think that Flexible Service intervals were developed for the LEASE CAR / Company car market so that penny pinchers could get away with maybe just one oil change before the car returned to VW at age 3.

 Cautious & careful lolder guys like me who like to maintain warranty insist on an annual trip to VW Dealership for service.  Even if I over under 1200 miles in 12 months, haha. Over servicing seldom harms.

[SRGTD]

I came to think that Flexible Service intervals were developed for the LEASE CAR / Company car market so that penny pinchers could get away with maybe just one oil change before the car returned to VW at age 3.

I seem to remember when VW first introduced long life / flexible servicing, it was promoted to fleet managers as a way for them to manage servicing costs on their fleet of vehicles. As you’ve said, private individuals who lease their cars on a three year lease also see it as a way to ‘manage’ their service costs as it means that many lessees are able to get away with just one service during the lease term.

Cautious & careful lolder guys like me who like to maintain warranty insist on an annual trip to VW Dealership for service.  Even if I over under 1200 miles in 12 months, haha. Over servicing seldom harms.

Agree that over servicing is much better than under servicing. I’m a ‘high mileage’ driver compared to your 1,200 miles a year; I cover a modest 4,500 miles a year on average . IMHO up to two years between services on VW’s long life / flexible service regime is a long time for a minor issue to develop into something potentially more serious and costly to fix; another reason why annual servicing works for me. Prevention is better than cure .

[Watts]

I kept my Audi on long life servicing which worked out to once every 20 months on average. I had it for 12 years and 100k miles with no problems. The over cautious servicing really is just to quell the inner demons, modern oil can take the extended periods.