please advice - shock absorber warranty

auras1

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Hi,
I have a problem with right front shock absorber (fluid leak).
I went to Mercedes dealer but they say that shock absorber is not cover in warranty!

I wrote to "CustomerService.UK@cac.mercedes-benz.com" and they reply me with this:

"Thank you for contacting the Mercedes-Benz Customer Assistance Center Maastricht N.V.

In regards to your warranty query, I can confirm that the shock absorbers are considered a wear and tear item and would therefore not be covered within the warranty period."

You have some advise to me?
From my point a view the shock absorber is not a wear and tear item.
 

television

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The shock absorber must be a warranty item, and covered under the guarantee

Welcome to the forum,,A tyre or brake pads are wear items
 

whitenemesis

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If it can be shown the shocker had a manufacturing fault, then would be a warranty claim. Otherwise the fluid leak could be caused by a worn seal, so wear and tear.

How old is the car? How many kilometers have been covered?

The OP is in Romania, so presumably only 2yrs warranty
 

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If it can be shown the shocker had a manufacturing fault, then would be a warranty claim. Otherwise the fluid leak could be caused by a worn seal, so wear and tear.

How old is the car? How many kilometers have been covered?

The OP is in Romania, so presumably only 2yrs warranty

Be fair,,so can any oil seal any where on the car could fail and that is not wear and tear,,if the rear crank seal failed and the engine seized up would that not be a guarantee claim
 

whitenemesis

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I think it would be a fair claim if the car was only a couple yrs old and only covered <20k.

I think it reasonable for a shocker to survive that long without failing due to wear.

In practice shockers go on for many, many thousands without leaking but there still has to be a cut-off below which any manufacturing faults would come to light.

If it was my car I would challenge the decision.
 

jberks

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Under UK law they couldn't get away with that reply. Not sure of your country though. We have a rule that something should be of sufficient quality to do its job. Clearly a shock absorber thats failed in 2 or even 4 years of normal use is not and therefore by law they would have to replace it.
Is this a new car or a used warranty?
I had a differential seal replaced last year. It had failed 'due to wear and tear' but when I argued that at 60,000 miles and 4 years it should not have failed, MB agreed to cover most of the cost. Given that you have a warranty I would expect no such argument. After all, ANY failure could be categorised as wear and tear. Sure brakes and tyres are consumables but I have never replaced a shock absorber and wouldn't expect to until I'd reached 120,000 miles at least.
 

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We had a rear shocker replaced under warranty on the Caravelle, just over 2 yrs old and 25K miles. The oil was leaking and Claire noticed it by the smell as it was burning off on the brakes. No issue with warranty and as it is van based I would expect the shocks to be pretty heavy duty on the Caravelle.
Need to know how many miles the car has covered and how old it is however over here I would be expecting it to be covered by warranty even though it is a wear and tear item as it has failed rather than worn out.
 
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A

auras1

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Hi,
I am from Romania and I have two years new car warranty with unlimited mileage.
My car have 2 years old and I have 65000 km mileage.
 

jberks

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I guess it does depend on what the terms and conditions would be, plus the local laws. As has been said, we probably have better consumer laws in the UK and get better warranties as a result. The US is stronger still and we often hear that the Americans are getting something free that we are paying for.
 

Rory

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I'm not sure you'd have much more luck in the UK, especially once out of warranty. My daughter's SEAT Ibiza failed MOT and both the dealer and SEAT UK told me all suspension components are regarded as wear and tear items.

Failures have definitions - a wear failure is something that is both partial and gradual. To be honest, other than something like a brake pad, it's hard to imagine a better example of a wear failure than a seal gradually starting to leak. Now if it suddenly burst, then that would be a different matter.
 

jberks

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I'm not sure you'd have much more luck in the UK, especially once out of warranty. My daughter's SEAT Ibiza failed MOT and both the dealer and SEAT UK told me all suspension components are regarded as wear and tear items.

Failures have definitions - a wear failure is something that is both partial and gradual. To be honest, other than something like a brake pad, it's hard to imagine a better example of a wear failure than a seal gradually starting to leak. Now if it suddenly burst, then that would be a different matter.

I believe there is a further aspect to wear and that is expected lifespan. If a seal starts to seep on a 10,000 mile 1 year old car that I'd call that a premature failure, which really is what a warranty is there to protect against, otherwise everything has a lifespan and if you ignore lifespan in warranty claims then you could argue that an engine blowing up at 3 months old is also wear and tear - after all, it was bound to pack up at some point! Just because its 20 years and 300,000 miles early is just a matter of timing - which surely is the point here? If the same seal starts to seep at 6 years and 100,000 miles then I'd call that wear and tear.

I had this argument with MB on a diff seal. The result was that they paid for the repair despite the car being 1 year out of warranty. Even brakes would fall under this if, say, they wore out in 4,000 miles. That wouldn't be wear and tear, that would be premature failure.

Hence, we have to ask the question, is 2 years a reasonable lifespan for a shock absorber? I'd have to answer no and on that basis demand a replacement FOC.

This I believe is also enshrined in UK law under the sales of goods act which, whilst a 3 year warranty is normal, you would have strong legal case if something failed at year 4 or 5 and you could show that was unreasonable.
 

Rory

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I believe there is a further aspect to wear and that is expected lifespan. If a seal starts to seep on a 10,000 mile 1 year old car that I'd call that a premature failure, which really is what a warranty is there to protect against, otherwise everything has a lifespan and if you ignore lifespan in warranty claims then you could argue that an engine blowing up at 3 months old is also wear and tear - after all, it was bound to pack up at some point!

Obviously reasonable expected life does come into it, but the main purpose of the warranty is to protect you from sudden failures - like the engine blowing up. That's a "catastrophic" failure - one which is both sudden and complete.

Clearly, probably more than anyone else on this forum, I would hope that Mercedes would repair things within the warranty period without question, and would accept out of warranty issues too.
 

Alex M Grieve

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It is always difficult to know where to draw the line - and definitions don't always help.

For instance, an injury at work is defined as a problem that results from a single insult (e.g. a trip resulting in a fracture), whereas ill health caused by work is defined as prolonged, repetitive exposure to the problem, (e.g. dust or vapour damage to the lungs).

By these definitions, contracting malaria whilst at work is then an injury (result of a single mosquito bite), not an illness.

??????????????????? :confused:
 
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