Servicing StopReviews 274

The old adage of if it seems to good to be true it probably is too good to be true. Sucked in by the low advertised cost of a full service. I even asked are there any hidden costs? Any add ones I should know about? Operator told me no. The cost is as stated unless the garage find anything when they have the car an they will call you before doing the work. Which they did and told me on top of the price I had already paid I had to pay an additional £228 for
Oil surcharge (specialist oil)
Renew: Brake fluid (Service Advisory)
Perform: Engine diagnostics (Service Advisory)
All of which I expected to be included in the cost advertised for a FULL SERVICE. £172.33, which I paid upfront.
Turns out this full service cost me £400 way over what the Ford Dealership would have cost me!
Once they have your car they will not release it until you pay in full. When I said I don't want the extra work doing they said thats fine I wouldn't get a refund on the price I had already paid and my service record would not be updated with this service. Meaning I would have to pay again for it to be done elsewhere.
To add insult to injury the one thing I asked them to check, the tyre pressure malfunction, wasn't even looked even though when they rang to tell me how much extra I had to pay they said it had been done.
Rip off if you ask for my opinion.

I booked my car in for a service and MOT. The next day my car was picked up and taken to the garage as agreed. A few hours later I received a call from a Service Stop agent telling me that my car had a number of parts that needed replacing. I asked for a quote and was shocked by the amount they were asking. I said I didn't want to proceed with any work as I was confident I could get a far better price elsewhere. The agent then became very aggressive and started to use strong arm tactics to make a sale. The agent said that if I didn't get the work done I would have to arrange for my car to be picked up. Although my car still had a valid MOT the Service Stop agent tried to this as an opportunity to make me accept his grossly inflated quote. The agent the told me that my car was legally unfit to drive and started again with the strong arm tactics. After being bullied by the agent I then called the garage who was actually carrying out the work and they told that my car was legal to drive and that they would deliver my car back to me that evening. The Service Stop agent had clearly lied to me. I also took the service report to another garage and asked for a quote. To no surprise it was £450 pound cheaper.

It would appear that Service Stops business model is built on the premise that they are acting as agents for local garages getting them extra work while putting massive margins on top that customer has to pay. They don't add any value at all. You are far better off going to a local garage directly therefore avoiding the ridiculously inflated charges and the harassment from there staff.

Overall my experience was very poor and I would not recommend them to my worst enemy. Don't believe their fake trust pilot 4.5 star rating they put on their website!

After Servicing stop done my car annual service, they firstly overcharge the service-literally almost 50% more than another garage I actually prefer to use. After the service I had problems with my car, several issues including loose parts, battery constantly dying - never happend before. We have left emails, trying to contact them, use the chat function but still no support of contact. I will never go back to them and will not recommend them at all.

TAKE MONEY UP FRONT AND DONT DO THE WORK. AVOID THESE CRIMINALS.OR YOU WILL REGRET IT PAD THE COSTS OUT MORE THAN MAIN DEALERS AND NOTHING DONE SEEMS LIKE THEFT TO ME.

I wouldn't even give 1 star (but not an option). Absolutely disgraceful. I wish I had read these reviews and not their own website reviews prior to booking. Professional looking site and offered good priced service. I booked to take out the hassle of messing around but it has caused more issues. Poor customer service and communications, just turn up and take your car off whenever they feel like it, to god knows where. Service today £85 and then emailed quoting £300+ work that needed carrying out, used bully boy tactics, refused to allow return of car until work was carried out. In the end I only got an additional £65 for specialist oil and refused rest of work to be carried out and stuck to our guns. Managed to get name of garage etc. but no paperwork or proof of service or work done, and book not stamped and car oil looks same. Reported to trading standards. Avoid at all costs if thinking of using these scammers! Wish we had!

An intoxicated driver collect my jaguar for full service. Garage called and said it needed suspention parts? Two days after an mot I think not. Then when car was returned no water in washer bottle having emailed servicing stop customer service 3 times and no response turns out after a check at another Garage and the dash cam they forgot to turn of my car was not serviced never to be trusted.

My car was booked for a full service and paid in full. After collecting the car I was contacted from multiple ends demanding more money and a list of jobs The car needs. And threatened that the car would not be released until I paid. I had urgent hospital appointment the next morning so I had to pay around 46 pounds extra just for releasing the car. They have done something that the fairly new BMW with ******* miles on the clock doesn't feel right now. I requested them for an itinerary of work they have done. So far no response. I would dread going through such cowboys. Please please keep away from these cronies

Absolutely appalling, shoddy company! BE WARNED... DO NOT USE THEM AT ALL... I booked my car in for a full service, paid £79 - it was collected from my home. Didn't hear anything all day despite me trying to call (twice) to ask how it was all going. At 5:30pm I get a call from some random guy called Chris who basically tells me there's a long list of things wrong with my car! After 10 minutes of him waffling on (scaremongering) I agreed to pay for 3 of the items as he said they would not be able to release my car and produce a full service report without those items being addressed! The other 5 items he spoke of where BIG TICKET items that he estimated would cost a minimum of £750+ vat. He talked about a vague, strange knocking noise that needed investigating... I was appalled... I ended up paying £216 (to fix the 3 key items) on top of the £79 I'd already paid in the morning. I was so cross... I knew I'd been ripped off and couldn't do anything about it as they had my car...! I WILL NEVER USE THIS COMPANY AGAIN... ITS JUST A BIG MONEY MAKING SCAM! PLEASE STAY AWAY FROM SERVICING STOP!

Avoid this company like the plague - total con! They offer a competitive service quote but it's all downhill from there! They claimed my car needed repairs of almost £800. I questioned this and the person I was speaking to became flippant, claiming I would be putting the return driver at risk by not authorising the repairs! I was also told I would have to pay an extra 24.99 for 'specialist oil' otherwise the car would not be returned! They also claimed I had authorised this - I had not. The man who returned the car said he put ordinary synthetic oil in the car - so the company lied. This final extra cost was 46.77. I tried ringing to question this final amount but I was on constant hold and I gave up after some 40 minutes. I will be contacting trading standards.

Said the extra work would be over £900 when we asked the garage direct they said they could do it for £270. Ended up being shouted at by the local garage owner so we had the work done elsewhere. Unfortunately, we had already paid for the MOT and Service and of course, you have to pay for the 'special oil' £24.00 + VAT. AVOID!

Have had an atrocious time trying to get my car repaired. Spent over £3500 in advance and waited 4 MONTHS for my car to not be repaired. They never answer the phone or emails.
Quick enough to charge you, then never do the work and leave it for an independent garage to do properly the first time.
Never use them.

Terrible, terrible service. Unbelievably expensive, loads of hidden charges (many of which are for things most garages include in their service as standard. £25+VAT for oil?!). Impossible to contact them by telephone once they've taken your car and they just keep finding more "essential" work and hitting you with more and more requests for payment. My MOT & service, quoted at £111 ended up costing over £1200. For a 10 year old Peugeot 107. I could have replaced the car for that! I usually expect to pay in the region of £150 - £200, depending on what work is required. Even factoring in the additional repair work I knew was required in the exhaust, the price was indefensible. Genuinely horrifying experience. Never again!

I booked a service through Service stop and had a collection date and time. No one turned up. I contacted them and they told me lies over the phone. Then I rebooked and nothing happened. Do not use them as its a complete waste of time.

If I could give a minus star rating these would get it. Do yourself a favour and just use a local garage. The low cost advertised services are soon bumped up monumentally once they have your car hostage. You canntot speak to the actual garage and be prepared for at least an hour on hold to speak with your 'service advisor'. If you do one thing today, AVOID this service.

Avoid at all costs. All other derogatory reviews are very accurate. Arranged full service and MOT which I was advised would be done locally only to find the garage used was some 40 miles away. Original date was cancelled and although it was done some 4 days later, as seems to be there normal practice, along came the demand for extra works and costs sighting totalling unnecessary work. One cost was a demand fo £66.50 to replace front number plate, then came the speal for uprated oil and the need to replace brake fluids, all at highly inflated prices. This seems to be there natural makeup. Just AVOID them at any cost, they are full of bull$#*!.

Booked for between 8 and 12, then they phone and cancel after we waited in all morning, they insisted on the money upfront, but they will take 3 weeks to reimburse me... avoid.

Some of the bad reviews on here seem to be about this company being late to pick up the car. I think they're much worse than that, essentially a big scam. They take your car, say they will do a service & MOT then ring you later in the day to say they've done other work which they are very vague about. The amount varies but I was charged an extra £400. It is made very clear that unless you pay immediately you will have a problem getting your car back. They say they will send you an itemised invoice but then never do. When I got my car back I realised they had failed to do the most basic things (side light bulb needed replacing, 3 tyres worn). Now, a few weeks after a "full service" the car won't start. I know they're cheap but please, please don't use them. At best you will be scammed, at worst you could be involved in an accident due to the negligence of this company.