Ah I see Harry, I get you. When I was running my own small garage business business, I never even used to charge my better customers for bulbs (except h/lamp).
Harry Monk:
Driveroneuk:
Assuming the vehicle was in daily use, one wonders why 3 defective bulbs had not been spotted & rectified.Because bulb faults mysteriously appear in between parking the truck outside the workshop, and the truck going into the workshop, even if they had been working perfectly for the last six weeks.
Sudden Bulb Failure at £15 a time is a recognised problem for anybody who runs a truck and puts it in for inspection. That’s why the owners of truck franchaises drive around in Aston Martins.
If you tell the garage that you only want to be advised that a bulb needs changing, then they have to do that.
Not many r@m service providers will be happy with that. They are on unstable ground of allowing vehicles with safety related defects go with simple advisory notes to customer. Something VOSA won’t be overjoyed with either. I would always recommend have bulbs written in to the contract at inspection intervals. But if you are changing them adhoc then ensure they are working prior to submission.
ObviousRichy:
Harry Monk:
Driveroneuk:
Assuming the vehicle was in daily use, one wonders why 3 defective bulbs had not been spotted & rectified.Because bulb faults mysteriously appear in between parking the truck outside the workshop, and the truck going into the workshop, even if they had been working perfectly for the last six weeks.
Sudden Bulb Failure at £15 a time is a recognised problem for anybody who runs a truck and puts it in for inspection. That’s why the owners of truck franchaises drive around in Aston Martins.
If you tell the garage that you only want to be advised that a bulb needs changing, then they have to do that.
Not many r@m service providers will be happy with that. They are on unstable ground of allowing vehicles with safety related defects go with simple advisory notes to customer. Something VOSA won’t be overjoyed with either. I would always recommend have bulbs written in to the contract at inspection intervals. But if you are changing them adhoc then ensure they are working prior to submission.
The r&m provider may not be happy, but there is more to it than this. Part of the contract may well be that whoever pays the maintenance bills under the contract will not be responsible for charges relating to certain items, one of which is sometimes replacement bulbs. It would be unusual for instance for an inspecting garage to replace a defective tyre.
If it is sensible, the garage doing the inspection will be insisting on whoever collects the vehicle signing a disclaimer relating to any unroadworthy defect.
However providing a satisfactory procedure is followed by the operator, which involves a paper trail to prove that the defective bulb was replaced before the vehicle went on a public road, then Vosa should not have any problems. ie collecting driver signs inspection report indicating that HE renewed the bulb, or makes out a start of duty walk around check sheet noting the same thing.
Where a problem will arise is if either the fault was not just a bulb, or if it is a top marker light which cannot be reached from the ground. But this can be sorted at the contract stage so that who does what is understood.
Exactly, when an inspection last year showed up a cracked brake disc, KTS Renault phoned me up to tell me, and said “We very strongly recommend that you don’t drive it until it’s repaired”. If I’d said “Well, ■■■■■■■■ to you, I’m going to drive it anyway” then there’s nothing they’d be able to do to stop me.