Maintenance checks and failed MOTs: an opportunity for garages
Regular car maintenance could avoid almost all MOT failures and many accidents. It can also protect drivers from sudden bills they cannot afford.
Modern driving is not a luxury. Governments soapbox us about carbon emissions, but the next minute, they are rubber-stamping developments to create larger and fewer hospitals, colleges, shopping centres, post offices, industrial estates and business parks, requiring more people to travel every day to reach jobs and basic facilities.
A driver without their car often means a family without its lifeline. By encouraging vehicle owners to take up maintenance contracts, garages can perform a valuable public service and secure a steady cash flow at the same time. Effective maintenance turns drop-in strangers into loyal clients.
The cost of failure
Government statistics for 2015 showed that the average driver paid £272 to fix faults discovered in an MOT, plus the £54.85 charge for the MOT itself, spending £326 in total. That is the average, and it includes relatively new and occasional-use vehicles. Drivers most dependent on aging vehicles for commuting and everyday necessities often pay considerably more and turn to credit card debts to get back on the road.
Some people even decide they have no choice but to keep driving without the MOT.
By budgeting for a maintenance contract at the same time as they budget for their car insurance, drivers can spare themselves the risks and anxiety that an MOT otherwise entails. Many commercial enterprises operating several vehicles already use their maintenance contracts to negotiate lower insurance rates. For more information about motor trade insurance, check out https://www.quotemetoday.co.uk/motor-trade-insurance.
Maintenance checklist
Many of the services garages could be promoting to signed-up motorists are very simple but difficult for drivers to perform alone. They include things like testing the lights and changing faulty bulbs; almost 40% of MOT failures are caused by issues with lights.
You can also use to predict the weak points of a car by make and model.
Other simple tests include checking wheel hubs for corrosion and tyres for wear; checking shock absorbers bounce correctly; filling minor windscreen cracks; testing the handbrake; replacing the wiper blades; topping up the radiator, brake and transmission fluids; examining the safety belts for fraying; looking for cracks in number plates; and examining the exhaust for leaks or loose mountings.