Extended warrantee questions

[MOTOR31]

My oilhead will be getting to the end of the factory warrantee in August. I was told, briefly, by a salesman that I could get an extended warrantee for it before the factory one expired. My questions are:


Does the extended warrantee come from the factory?
If not from the factory are there multiple providers or one?
If multiple providers, are there one or two best choices?
Does it cover the same items / issues?
Is it honored at all BMW shops?

Finally based on the above questions has anyone had good / bad experiance with it? I'm particularly concerned about the brakes and trans./ clutch issues that have been listed previously in other threads.

Thanks in advance.

 

[MOTOR31]

HHmmm over 40 looks and no one has any info regarding the warrantee situation?

 

[AntonLargiader]

HHmmm over 40 looks and no one has any info regarding the warrantee situation?

I would think that all of these are questions you should ask the guy selling you the extended warranty.

 

[dbrick]

Like Anton says.
Read the contract that's offered. Note the exceptions. It might be productive to ask the Forum about the particular contract that's offered; others may have had experience with that particular warranty company. I don't think that all dealers offer the same extended warranty contracts.

 

[burnszilla]

Ted Porter at the Beemershop recommends 'Western Service Contracts'. He finds them easy to deal with and they have the best coverage. BMW of Santa Cruz sells and recommends them too. They cover 4 years with unlimited miles. The warranty is better than the BMW factory one. They cover items like throttle cables, from what I'm told.

I'll be buying an extended warranty from them later this year.

 

[roostershooter]

I think Motor31 was looking for real world answers, as in someone on the Forum who had experienced the extended warranty first hand. Many times the fine print is over looked by the guy who is selling the warranty, and not looked over with a fine tooth comb by the buyer. I think that was all he was asking.

 

[det130]

I haven't posted here in awhile and there was aa lively discussion on the old BMW home page forum a few months ago about this issue.
I don't do extended waranties, but if you want one, I have heard several good things about the Western one that was mentioned.
About your question about who provides them, they are insurance policies so a sepearte comapny genearlly offers them. You really ahve to read the fine print to see what is covered.
My feeling on these products are that they aren't worth the money. I figure if something is defective, it will be noticeable prior to the end of the reg warranty.
If you get one that covers moving parts and you worry about things wearing out, by all means get one. If your bike is running fine and you care for it, I think they are a waste of money. Sales people love them as they get really big commissioins from them.
Hammer

 

[burnszilla]

I'm going to be putting 20,000 miles a year on my bike. If the final drive fails after 36,000 miles the extended warranty will have paid for itself.

 

[MOTOR31]

I posted the questions here to get "real world" experiance, not the salesman's opinion.

I also asked who provided them as I was unsure if there was only one company, if it was an extended factory warrantee from BMW, or if it was some product offered as an incentive by some liability insurer. I am certainly able to read fine print and definitely understand that it's nothing more than an "insurance policy" against future repairs. I am also aware that the fine print does not reveal if they settle claims easily, promptly and are supported by dealers all accross the country.

I wanted to know if people with actual experiance had real knowledge about it and could provide the results of their experiances.

There was no attempt to cause some massive discussion or to downplay the "coverage" or need for it. I just wanted information. I have to make a decision about this in the next 2 months and make sure I am near a dealer that provides it.

 

[AntonLargiader]

I wanted to know if people with actual experiance had real knowledge about it and could provide the results of their experiances.

OK, then tell us what policy it is and hopefully someone will have had experience with it.

 

[MTNBMW]

In a former life I was a service writer at an independent repair shop. The extended warranties that we sold were the ones that we felt would provide the customer with the best service, because we were the ones that had to deal with the irate customer if the warranty company would not pay. The best question that I learned to ask was "what is not covered?" instead of what is covered!

 

[saab93driver]

You will want to make sure that the ABS brakes and components are covered. I got a policy from Pinnacle which covers that on my 02 R1150RS

 

[roostershooter]

I posted the questions here to get "real world" experiance, not the salesman's opinion.

I also asked who provided them as I was unsure if there was only one company, if it was an extended factory warrantee from BMW, or if it was some product offered as an incentive by some liability insurer. I am certainly able to read fine print and definitely understand that it's nothing more than an "insurance policy" against future repairs. I am also aware that the fine print does not reveal if they settle claims easily, promptly and are supported by dealers all accross the country.

I wanted to know if people with actual experiance had real knowledge about it and could provide the results of their experiances.

There was no attempt to cause some massive discussion or to downplay the "coverage" or need for it. I just wanted information. I have to make a decision about this in the next 2 months and make sure I am near a dealer that provides it.

I certainly did not mean to imply that you could not read or understand the fine print of extended warranties. I was merely trying to convey to the ones who posted, what I thought you were needing. Sorry if I was misunderstood.

 

[BRADFORDBENN]

Just remember that the people who run the warranty service are in it to make money, they are going to exclude as much as possible. They are also going to make those exclusions as subtle as possible to detect when signing the contract. So my advice is to read the contract completely before signing. Do not let someone rush you into signing it.

 

[larrydk]

extended warranty

It was kind of weird when I bought my R1200S that an extended warranty was not offered. I just figured it was a BMW, they're not offered?

Any other bike I've owned...Ducati, Kawa, Honda, Suzuki, an extended warranty was always available.

Of course at 36,000, 3 year standard warranty (which I believe is an industry best), is an extended warranty really needed?

 

[MOTOR31]

Two bike Mike, that reply I made wasnÔÇÖt aimed at you. You obviously understood where I was coming from and what I was trying to get, thanks buddy. You were trying to help, unlike anton, I suppose who didnÔÇÖt seem to have anything to add nor information about what I asked.

Thanks to Burnzilla and Saab93 who provided names of companies to check out. I can now start calling BMW shops and see if either of those two companies are offered and compare the coverage and costs. Since there is no BMW dealer in my area I canÔÇÖt run down the street and ask, much less get comparison info, particularly if I donÔÇÖt know the company names or how they worked out for others.

I had figured that there would have been several folks who had actual experience with these warrantees so wanted to get info from the customer side rather than just the dealer.

Since I bought the bike used with very few miles and it's already towards the end of the factory warrantee time period I don't have much hope that anything that will go bad in the first 20k would be caught by the warrantee. To me the extended warrantee, depending on coverage, might be a worthwhile gamble given the high cost of replacing the power brake equipment should it go belly up. Retirement means fixed income so making the $'s count is important.

 

[AntonLargiader]

..unlike anton, I suppose who didnÔÇÖt seem to have anything to add nor information about what I asked.

Maybe I misunderstood what you asked. Reading your post, it seems that your salesman is offering some sort of extended warranty and you wanted us to tell you the details about it without knowing whose policy it was. You still haven't told us, BTW. Several people around here have different ones and if we were ever to find out what policy was being discussed, I might have asked these people (note the past tense).

If you are simply asking around about extended warranties in general, that's different. Neither of your posts indicate that, though, at least not to me.

 

[MOTOR31]

Anton,

The salesman just mentioned in passing that there was an extended warrantee. He did not provide any further info other than what conditions my bike had to meet to qualify for one. In otherwords I have seen no documentation, have had no info regarding coverage and did not even know, until yesterday the names of any companies that provided the warrantee or even if there was more than one.

That is why I asked the specific questions I did. I have to start this from scratch and definitely wanted to know if it was even worth considering based on peoples real world experiance. If I had documentation to read I am perfectly capable of reading the verbage, particularly the exclusion pages, which I feel to be the most critical ones.

 

[grumpole]

Like Saab93driver, I have a Pinnacle warranty on my 2002 R1150RS. I bought the bike used, and the fact that it had the extended warranty was a factor in the decision to purchase. After an inspection by my local deler and $40 Pinnacle transferred coverage to me. My dealer tells me they are an easy company to work with. Obviously I hope I never need to.

Peter Anstey

 

[deilenberger]

As a general comment - since it seems to have come down to a general question on extended warranties:

Do you feel lucky?

The insurance company - as Anton pointed out - is in business to make money. They are betting that you have a great bike that costs them no repair money. You're betting you have a POS bike that will cost the insurance company more than the warranty cost - after all the deductions (and there will be deductions) and exclusions (and there will be exclusions.)

The insurance company doesn't have to be lucky. They have the facts/figures/warranty claims to analyze and figure out how much they need to charge and still pay claims and make a profit. They're REAL good when it comes to crunching numbers - it's sorta their reason d'etre so to speak.

Consider that the dealership gets a percentage of the money paid for the warranty as an incentive to selling it to you. In the auto business - the markup is typically 100% - if the policy costs $1,000 - the dealer keeps $500 of it. I would guess the same in the bike business. That means the warranty company is figuring it would cost them less than $500 to fulfill the terms of the agreement they have with you. Consider the interest you would gain if you banked the warranty cost for the term of the warranty. Add that to the cost and decide if you think your bike is going to barf something that costs more than the sum. If so - then buy the warranty. If not - bank the money.

Personally - I've been "lucky" once on an extended warranty (my first BMW car) - where the insurance company lost big time. All the other times (and there have only been a few) - it's been break-even or they made money off me.

YMMV and more than certainly will..

BTW - getting pissed off at people because they didn't understand your question isn't the way to win friends and get decent answers out of people. And that's me talking in moderator mode.. so a word to the wise... no one owes you an answer here.