I’ve got a 1 year old Citroen van. Got a message on the dashboard saying change oil. The van has a 2 yearly service interval so I phoned the local dealer who said bring the van in and we can look at it, might be a warranty job or just an oil change.

Turned out the van just needed an oil change. The bill was £217! And that was after the dealer had discounted the labour charge down to £95!!

Asked at the garage how much a service was and they quoted me £470! I might sound snobby here but at the end of the day I’ve got a Citroen van and I’m being charged similar kind of rates to a prestigious marque of car. I’ll be shopping around the other local Citroen dealers when I need a service this year. Black MY2013 SD4 GS Auto, Wood Company Armrest, Freel2 sticker.
Gone MY2010 Freelander 2 Manual TD4.e S, Alaska White.

Warranty doesnt come free I'm afraid

But you were ripped off IMO Jules

Being a Scot I always ask 'how much will this cost' before I do anything else. Its also good time to barter the price down if you can. Updated- Waiting for a Scotland v England 6 Nations home win. 24th Feb 2018
Gone-1972 88 SWB Soft top
Gone-1981 24v FFR Lightweight
Gone-2009 Freelander 2 TD4 GS manual
Gone before it bankrupted me- 2008 Discovery 3 TDV6 Auto
2013 Freelander 2 SD4 GS Auto

My brother had his DS serviced early back in September last year (due Jan 19), and the only components that were replaced were Air Filter, Pollen Filter, Oil Sump Gasket and Nut, plus Oil and Oil Filter.

The princely sum for this, (completed within 2 hours) came to £525!

I've told him not to bother with a main dealer next time (if there is a next time!)

I’d have asked why, on a vehicle with a 2 year service requirement, was it telling you it needed an oil change after 1 year. Somethings wrong and should be fixed under warranty. I keep hearing stories like this on dpf equipped vehicles such as late Evoque, DS's and Transits. Two of my mates have this problem with their Transits . One says “OK” and pays £175 a time, the other one argues “Warranty” and gets it for free. Past: FL2 TD4 HSE Auto
Evoque SD4 Dynamic Lux Auto
Present: Audi A3 S Line.

He'd already had an oil change under warranty after 7000 miles! They weren't prepared to give him another one, as apparently 18000 miles is close enough to 21000 miles by JLR's rules, so he had to pay for a full service early.

He tells me that all the DS' are renowned for only managing to go 7-8000 miles between oil changes, it's apparently a well known dilution problem.

I'll stick with my euro 5 unit - 16000 miles/1 year interval (at a fraction of his service price paid), thank you very much!

Steve D wrote:

I’d have asked why, on a vehicle with a 2 year service requirement, was it telling you it needed an oil change after 1 year. Somethings wrong and should be fixed under warranty. I keep hearing stories like this on dpf equipped vehicles such as late Evoque, DS's and Transits. Two of my mates have this problem with their Transits . One says “OK” and pays £175 a time, the other one argues “Warranty” and gets it for free.

I wonder if anyone has tried sucking say 1 litre of oil out of the dipstick hole and pouring a fresh litre in say every 5k miles? Presumably the oil dilution issue only occurs on cars that do a lot of short journeys? 3 x FL1 2 manual + 1 auto
5 x FL2 4 manual + 1 auto
Now Discovery Sport P250 MHEV SE

dorsetfreelander wrote:

I wonder if anyone has tried sucking say 1 litre of oil out of the dipstick hole and pouring a fresh litre in say every 5k miles? Presumably the oil dilution issue only occurs on cars that do a lot of short journeys?

Does the engine have the technology to actually measure the oil dilution or is it worked out in the ECU by dividing the days by the miles driven by the engine running time by the engine temperature etc and decide that it must be diluted? Would the dilution warning disappear if the oil was changed? If not, its a programming issue. Also, if it was dilution, I'd just change the oil and not the filter - that'd just be a waste of time and money and I'd leave the filter until the service.

If it is genuine oil dilution due to use, it'd be cheaper to buy a vacuum oil remover and change just the oil when the light came on. Past: FL2 TD4 HSE Auto
Evoque SD4 Dynamic Lux Auto
Present: Audi A3 S Line.

Yorkshire war cry coming on:

 FL2 MY10 TD4 GS traded in at 2 years
FL2 MY13 TD4 GS Current

Don't most modern cars have a system that measures the quality of the oil ?
I know Vauxhall display the oil in a % on the dash screen which is the quality of the oil measured as a % of good (100%) to bad (0%).. I wonder if Vx also suffer from oil dilution
Also my daughters 2015 BMW 116d fitted with the 2.0L diesel does the same as you have to ask the on board computer to check the oil as there is no dipstick. The engine revs increase to about 1800rpm I think, while the systems check the oil and then report on the screen

AFAIK I dont think any car has a small mass spectrometer built into the sump . At best it measures oil temp, oil pressure and oil level. Oil "wear" is calculated using an algorithm. Jules

you had best tell that to Vauxhall then as when I asked the dealer about it on both my Insignia (14 plate and 16 plate 2.0 cdti) I was told its not the oil level displayed its the oil quality. when I checked the level was at the top but the display was on 30%

As far as I know Jules is correct it works on the number of times the engine is stop/start and dpf regeneration cycles.