Independents to benefit from out of warranty cars

Technicians should be on the lookout for vehicles approaching 70,000 miles, according to a new report.

Over half of vehicles reaching the 60 or 70,000 mile point are destined to break down, says Warranty Direct in its new reliability survey. In particular, savvy garages should be watching out for Toyota models, which take the longest time to repair with an average labour time of 2.81 hours.

At the other end of the scale, Fiat models could be a very quick repair, taking on average just 1.5 hours.

Warranty Direct’s research into 50,000 current policies on its books found that the failure rate on vehicles over the 70,000 mile mark was around 50.7 percent.

The data indicates that the most common problems that technicians will face are axle and suspension issues, which are responsible for just under 25 percent of repairs, and electrical faults accounting for 20 percent of jobs on these vehicles.

Duncan McClure-Fisher, Managing Director of Warranty Direct, said: “Even with the much-improved reliability of modern cars, mileage will take its toll on any vehicle and parts will naturally wear out.”

Warranty Direct’s findings also show the average cost for repairs is around £420, but insists that this could easily run into thousands of pounds once labour and parts are added.

McClure-Fisher added: “You shouldn’t expect a new car to break down in its first three years but there is a reason that manufacturers, for the most part, limit their warranties to three years or 60,000 miles.”