[Harry@Piekarnia]

I've had a look thru old posts with the search function but can't find any answers to my question. Apologies if it's been asked many times before or is in the wrong forum.

I bought my Cooper 20 months ago from BMW Polska. My car was ordered six months before the official launch of the MINI in Poland so I dealt with BMW Polska direct as there weren't any MINI dealers in Poland at that point. Since then I've covered 10,500km and had a total of 21 faults which required dealer attention (the best one was when the driver's side door lock failed at the same time as the passenger side headlight and I had to climb over the gear stick to get out of the car and talk to the policeman who'd pulled me over for not having working lights).

Having had so many problems I'm very interested in getting the extended five year warranty. Only problem is that BMW Polska don't offer extended warranties for MINIs. The only warranty is the two year factory warranty and then that's it. After that the only thing offered is a 'good will policy'. Great. No third year of warranty free of charge if the car has been serviced regularly (as in the rest of the EU and civilised world) and no way to obtain an extended warranty for love nor money. If I'd known that BMW Polska don't sell the same products as BMW in the rest of Europe I would have simply waited until Poland joined the EU and then bought a MINI in Germany (the warranty sold there is 550 EURO for five years and is good in any EU country).

The reason given by BMW Polska for not offering the extended warranty in Poland is that they "don't sell enough MINIs in Poland". Gee! I wonder.... Do you think that they would sell more or fewer MINIs if they offered a better warranty? Hmm, it's a tough one isn't it?


So the question is what do I do now? Does anybody know if I can buy an extended warranty from a MINI dealer in the UK (or Germany or France or Holland or anywhere else where BMW don't treat their customers like untermenschen)? If so then does anybody have any contact details they can send me? I've already been in touch with BMW Germany and they told me that there is no way any dealer will sell an extended warranty to anybody who didn't buy their MINI at that dealer. I'm a British citizen and am registered (for tax purposes) as living in both the UK and Poland so it would be no problem to provide a UK address to base the warranty at.

I'm very happy to pay the full price of the extended warranty, I'd just love to give somebody the money! I just want to be treated like any other EU citizen.I bought the same MINI as everybody else in Europe, I paid the same money as everybody else (actually slightly more), now I want the same level of after sales care as everybody else.

On another note does anybody know about the legality of BMW refusing to sell extended warranties in Poland? My knowledge of EU law says that any product which is sold in the EU must be made available to all EU citizens, regardless of the EU state which they live in. If this is the case then aren't BMW breaking EU law by refusing to sell to Polish residents?

[Harry@Piekarnia]

Come on people! 49 views and no replies? Somebody here must know something about how I can get some help? Please.

[Harry@Piekarnia]

107 views and still no replies?! Perhaps this is in the wrong forum, can one of the mods please shoot it over to whatever forum it might get an answer in please? Thanks in advance.

[Z1GZAG N]

ok

Here's a thought

If you financed the Mini when you bought it, maybe the bank or what ever company you borrowed the money from, might offer extended warranty coverage such as the credit union I financed my MCS through. It is a lot cheaper than what the Mini dealer here in the states wanted plus I don't have to buy it until the factory warranty is about to run out.

[Harry@Piekarnia]

Thanks for the thought but I paid cash for my MINI and so don't have a finance company which could offer any kind of warranty....


Anybody else got any ideas? I've given the EU commission office in Warsaw a call about this and they said it did sound like BMW are breaking EU law by refusing to sell the same product to people in the EU regardless of the EU member state they reside in but they'd have to check the excluded area to be sure. So they'll be getting back to me this week hopefully.