CLK-SLK

I just went over my new SLK's Maintenance Booklet 2006 Passenger Cars and noticed that contrary to my 2004 CLK and my wife's 2004 SLK the free "Basic Maintenance Service" for the 2006 models has been dropped.

The documentation for both 2004 cars states:

MAINTENANCE FOR YOUR MERCEDES IS INCLUDED
Basic maintenance service - just think of it as another standard feature that comes with your Mercedes-Benz.
Basic maintenance is included for the duration of your New Vehicle Limited Warranty. So when the Flexible Service System in your Mercedes calls for basic maintenance, the technician at your local authorized Mercedes-Benz center will do the work at no additional cost for you.

This means that this service is free for 48 months or 50,000 miles, whichever comes first. And this has been my experience with the other MB cars - no charge.

In accordance with the 2006 documentation only the "First Visit" between 1,000 and 3,000 miles is free. All other routine maintenance work has to be paid - even during the warranty period.

I think this is really an amazing step into the wrong direction, given that the MB warranty is nothing to write home about in the first place. (Compare that with, for example, Hyundai's warranty.)

I would like to know if all of you were aware of this when you bought your SLKs and what you think about this development.

Greetings,
Rainer

bloflin

This new policy started last year with the 2005 models.

CP1

Welcome to last year.

viper

Costs savings for MB. They have to find the money somewhere to fix their reliability problems.

wil_sutton

I know, I know... I was pretty pissed off about that too. It was included with my ML, and I bought the SLK from the same salesperson, who told me the maintenance would be included when I ordered the car back in March of 04. I was not happy when I picked my car up from service last week to find a bill for the maintenance. Started with the 05 models, but apparently the sales people weren't told or trained to tell us about it. It's the only car I own that I have to pay for service on (except the VW, and that's only because it has 150k miles on it...).

redvettx2

At this point I don't care about the maintance issue. I just wish they cared about what kinda crap they are churning out and a little customer satisfaction. Looks like MB could give a rats *** about there customers.
Welcome to the Yugo of expensive luxury cars.

ML God

Poor little angry man

redvettx2

Just what I would expect from ML God. This is how a dealer or MB now thinks.
You get burned and tough ****, smile and eat it. Welcome to the new MB.
They will make it up in volume now.