Quote:
Originally Posted by Mr. Hankey
With BMW it isn't the dealer that always makes the decision. My BMW tech told me it's like health insurance. Something comes in that has to be fixed under warranty they need to submit it to BMWNA for approval. If it's over a certain amount, or something "fishy" (ie presence of mods) then BMW sends an independent regional rep out to look at the car and make a decision, the dealer has no say...but for most things (which are usually little) it is just documented and approved with little intervention from BMWNA.
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This is exactly right. I had my steering wheel be slightly off-center (likely from the port-install process of my MP HAS), and told my SA that I'd have them adjust it during the break-in service.
He said, "no, no, bring it right away. BMW NA gives more and more hassle to approve alignment under warranty the more miles the car has". I brought it in. And I still had to wait a day and 1/2 (for a simple alignment) because BMW NA had to send a regional tech to inspect. They said it was "because they are seeing too many cases of off-centered steering and wanted to document it and root cause it".
BMW NA and other OEMs have become much more "procedural and stringent" on warranty repairs as they collect more and more data from the cars, and use AI to spot warranty abuse or dealer leniency.
And for all of those saying that US Federal law bars them from doing x or y unless they prove a mod caused the issue, you are completely misinformed on how the law works in practice.
BMW NA or any other OEM can simply deny the warranty repair with a reason being "the vehicle has been modified". Now it is up to YOU to use federal or state law to have the decision reversed. What are you going to do? Hire a lawyer and spend thousands of dollars and a 2-3 years on the hope of prevailing in the end? That is the reality of trying to enforce a law. On top of that, you probably agreed to arbitration when you purchased your vehicle, so you have to go through that first before even having a viable lawsuit to pursue.
Net/net is BMW weighs reputational damage and customer sat/retention as the main check to being more strict in denying warranty repairs. Not federal law.
So, if you have a warranty dispute, work it out as a valued and reasonable customer and step down from the federal law pedestal.