Car Focus UK

Where I live in Essex, there are a number of petrol stations including Waitrose, Mobil, Asda, Shell and Tesco. Over the past 4 years I noticed that Tesco is persistently between 1p and 2p more expensive than all the other fuel suppliers. I am not sure that this same model applies to all Tesco petrol stations around the country, but it will be interesting to know Tesco’s reason, although I have my own reasons.

Despite Tesco’s recent poor performance last financial quarter, it is still the largest grocery chain in the UK, yet when you stop by it’s pumps you are likely to pay up to £1.20 more to fill your tank than at Shell, Asda or Waitrose. One of the reasons I think is that Tesco have noticed that its customers are not very price sensitive because the price displayed on the bill board is all that they see.

The other distraction is the clubcard points that you get when you fill up, but when you do a comparison of having to pay 1 to 2pence extra, Tesco still comes up tops leaving you no better because when you redeem your clubcard points you only get 1pence for every point, so if your redeem your clubcard points to buy fuel, all you are doing is covering for the extra 1pence on top of Tesco’s fuel cost.

If Tesco really believes in “every little helps” then it should give its customers real value for money and match its competitors on fuel prices wherever it retails fuel.

Image Credit: carsandtuning.org

The Vauxhall Corsa has evolved over the years into the supermini that it is today. This car has one of the best service intervals in its class of 20,000 miles or 1 year whichever comes first.

7 approved Vauxhall garages were called for quotes, the lowest quote for a small service was £120 while the highest was £170. The lowest quote for a major service was £175 and the highest was £289.

The servicing quotes below will help you realise there are great savings to be made if you shop around.

Image credit: carenthusiast.com

Vauxhall Corsa Service Costs

Evans Halshaw, Nottingham.
Vauxhall Corsa 1.4 16V (100PS) SXI (A/C) 5 Door
1st Service: Up to 20,000 miles or 1 year - £149.00
2nd Service: Up to 40,000 miles or 2 years - £199.00
3rd Service: Up to 60,000 miles or 3 years - £149.00

Marehay Garage Ltd, Ripley.
Vauxhall Corsa 1.2 16V (85PS) Exclusiv (A/C)
1st Service: Up to 20,000 miles or 1 year - £130.00
2nd Service: Up to 40,000 miles or 2 years - £180.00
3rd Service: Up to 60,000 miles or 3 years - £130.00

Walkers of Worksop, Nottinghamshire.
Vauxhall Corsa 1.4 16V (100PS) SXI(A/C) 3 Door
1st Service: Up to 20,000 miles or 1 year - £145.00
2nd Service: Up to 40,000 miles or 2 years - £175.00
3rd Service: Up to 60,000 miles or 3 years - £145.00

Twells of Billinghay.
Vauxhall Corsa 1.3 CDTI 16V ecoflex (95PS) Exclusiv (A/C)
1st Service: Up to 20,000 miles or 1 year - £120.00
2nd Service: Up to 40,000 miles or 2 years - £220.00
3rd Service: Up to 60,000 miles or 3 years - £120.00

Greenhous Vauxhall, Hamley.
Vauxhall Corsa 1.3 CDTI 16V ecoflex (95PS) Exclusiv (A/C)
1st Service: Up to 20,000 miles or 1 year - £170.00
2nd Service: Up to 40,000 miles or 2 years - £200.00
3rd Service: Up to 60,000 miles or 3 years - £170.00

Evans Halshaw, Androssan
Vauxhall Corsa 1.0 12V Petrol (A/C) 3 Door
1st Service: Up to 20,000 miles or 1 year - £149.00
2nd Service: Up to 40,000 miles or 2 years - £199.00
3rd Service: Up to 60,000 miles or 3 years - £149.00

Vauxhall Corsa 1.3 CDTI 16V ecoflex (95PS) Exclusiv (A/C)
1st Service: Up to 20,000 miles or 1 year - £160.00
2nd Service: Up to 40,000 miles or 2 years - £235.00
3rd Service: Up to 60,000 miles or 3 years - £160.00

Merritts, Chesham.
Vauxhall Corsa 1.3 CDTI 16V ecoflex (95PS) Exclusiv (A/C)
1st Service: Up to 20,000 miles or 1 year - £160.00
2nd Service: Up to 40,000 miles or 2 years - £289.00 (Includes Brake Fluid change)*
3rd Service: Up to 60,000 miles or 3 years - £160.00

 *Brake Fluid change is £54.00

Photo Credit: croylandcarmegastore.co.uk

Vauxhall Corsa Service Plan

Information on the Vauxhall Service plan is widely available on the web, however getting the breakdown costs are not. Vauxhall should emulate BMW and Mercedes by displaying the service plan prices on their website, this will help their customers to make an informed decision whether the service plan is right for them or not.

Caffyns Vauxhall have sample service plan quotes on their website which gives an indication of what your costs are likely to be for your Vauxhall Insignia at your local dealer. All service plans are administered centrally by Vauxhall. Prices may vary depending on your annual mileage.

Engine Size: 0000cc > 1300cc    
3 Year Plan
Total Cost: £629.97
Monthly Payment: £19.69
  
2 Year Plan
Total Cost: £439.98
Monthly Payment: £22.00

Engine Size: 1301cc > 1650cc     
3 Year Plan
Total Cost: £659.97
Monthly Payment: £20.62
   
2 Year Plan
Total Cost: £459.98
Monthly Payment: £23.00

Engine Size: 1651cc > 1950cc    
3 Year Plan
Total Cost: £689.97
Monthly Payment: £21.56
   
2 Year Plan
Total Cost: £479.98
Monthly Payment: £24.00

2 Year Service Plan includes 2 Services over 20 months   
3 Year Service Plan includes 3 Services over 32 months

If you own a Vauxhall Corsa please send us your comments on your servicing costs and service plans plus any other suggestions in which further savings can be realised. Please add your comments to this post so that we can all benefit.

Access other servicing reviews in the supermini class
MINI ::: Fiat 500 ::: Alpha Romeo Mito ::: Suzuki Swift ::: Ford Fiesta ::: Vauxhall Corsa

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The Ford Fiesta is the most popular car in the supermini class, and those who are not Ford fans admit it is a well designed car. The Fiesta has a service interval of 12,500 miles or 1 year whichever comes first.

After calling 7 approved Ford garages the lowest quote for a small service was £149 while the highest was £220. The lowest quote for a major service was £189 and the highest was £359.

Taking a look the servicing quotes you’ll realise there are great savings to be made if you shop around.

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The Suzuki Swift is supermini that has impressive figures when it comes to its green credentials. It might not have the luxury of the MINI or Audi A1, nevertheless it is a great car to run.

The lowest cost from 6 dealers for a small service is £142, while the highest cost for a major service is £330.

The service interval for the Swift engines is 10,000 miles or 1 year on the 1.3 engines, and on the bigger engines 9,000 miles or 1 year whichever comes first.

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1. Check the prices before filling, buying wisely can save you up to £2.00 on a 50 litre tank.
2. Check your tyres to make sure they are the right pressure. wrong tyre pressure can increase your consumption by 10%
3. When starting the engine from cold gradually increase speed as the engine gets warmer. Avoid high revs while the engine is still cold
4. Join a car share scheme, this scheme has the potential of saving you 2 weeks in fuel costs and even more if the number of car sharers increases.
5. Agree to work from home for a number of days during the week, if possible find a way to never have to travel into the office at all.
6. Best fuel economy is achieved at 55mph, the fuel savings between driving at 75mph and 55mph is 25%, while the savings between 75mph and 65mph is 13%.
7. Can you drive a smaller car? Superminis or hybrids offer the best fuel efficiency as well as best road tax incentives.
8. Using the car’s climate control or air conditioning increases fuel costs from 13% to about 21%. Savings can be achieved by minimizing the use of the climate control.
9. When caught up in traffic put the engine off to reduce the amount of fuel burnt while you are going nowhere.
10. Avoid carrying any weight in your car that you do not need. This means less load on the engine and less consumption.

Photo Credit: autocar.co.uk

The Alfa Romeo Mito belongs to the supermini class and to date is one of the most expensive cars to service in its class. I called 8 approved garages the lowest quote for an interim service was £160.04 while the highest was £381.23. The lowest quote for a major service was £341.10 and the highest was £570.00.

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The servicing costs of the Fiat 500 was a revelation. I must say for such a small car the Fiat 500 is quite expensive to maintain, even the Alfa Romeo Mito which I’ll be posting soon is even more expensive compared to its contemporaries. So does this mean Italian cars are more expensive to run? I can’t come to this conclusion yet, but only time will tell.

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Photo Credit: bmwtuningmag.com

The service interval of the BMW X5 depends on how the car is driven, so if the car does a great deal of motorway mileage the service interval is likely to be longer than the same car used to run around town. BMW now implements what it calls variable condition based servicing, which means you only service the car based on what is indicated on the car’s onboard computer.

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