Richard Higton

Review of AutoGuard & Insurance

Autoguard Warranties sent me an email asking How ...

Autoguard Warranties sent me an email asking How they did? following my recent experience of their service and I would hate to disappoint them. I first had the misfortune of crossing paths with Autoguard Warranties on September 2019 when I purchased an Audi A5 which was no longer covered by Audi under warranty. Therefore I felt it was sensible to purchase a comprehensive warranty at the same time as buying the car which was offered at a discounted rate.

For the first 8 months of ownership I fortunately did not need to contact the warranty company as there was no issues with the car. However, after a Covid-19 lockdown trip to the supermarket I pulled into my street and noticed blue smoke in my interior mirror appearing to come from the back of the car. I tried to park the car immediately and received a gearbox malfunction error and an inability to select reverse gear. After front parking the car I contacted Autoguard explaining the situation and they recommended the car was recovered and the issue investigated. So I used one of their preferred repairers to recover the car and diagnose the cause of the oil leak. I received a phone call from the garage 48 hours later explaining there was a leak and the warranty company would not cover this. I was obviously dissatisfied with the limited information and the repair rejection from Autoguard so took matters into my own hands and working with the garage carried out my own investigation. It quickly became clear that the Autoguard warranty booklet does not cover leaks of any kind. However, the primary cause of failure was not a leak, but the gearbox oil filter housing had cracked causing the gearbox oil to leak onto the hot engine undertray and producing blue smoke as well a complete loss of oil from the S-tronic gearbox and therefore mechanical drive. Having completed my own investigation and established the root cause I felt it was one very clearly covered under the warranty brochure mechanical part suffering a sudden mechanical failure and covered under listed parts S-tronic gearbox and that the company had made an honest mistake effectively rejecting the claim based on a consequence of the primary failure. I contacted the Autoguard Claims Adviser who I believed rejected my claim who then informed me it was in fact his supervisor and I asked for him to call me instead. I eventually received a return call, explaining all the above information and expected him to agree to cover the costs of replacing the component and the lost gearbox oil. Instead I was met with a rude, ill-informed individual who told me that oil filter housing was not a mechanical part, it suffered wear and tear which wasn t a sudden failure and therefore was not covered as well as telling me well done for being able to read the booklet. I have a background in mechanical engineering and was able to disprove both of his points (I had an Audi walkround video of the car from a service 3 months previous with no evidence of cracking or leaking to the affected part) however he refused to accept this or approve the repair request therefore referred me to a complaints procedure that would take 8 weeks. I explained this was unacceptable as I require my car for commuting to work therefore explained I needed my repair request approved within 48 hours or I would pay for it myself and take Autoguard to the small claims court to recoup the repair cost. My email was subsequently escalated to the Supervisor s manager and then to the Operations Director who said they would cover the basic costs of the repair.