Thunder Road, Cwmbran

[sdwboss]

Hi all

Long time since I last posted here, since then I've sold my Honda CBF125, bought a restricted Suzuki Bandit 650, had fun, been knocked off at a roundabout, and now have been waiting for 73 days while it's been rotting deep in the bowels of the workshop at Thunder Road. Now, I don't know if it'd be right to name anyone, so I'll refer to the service manager by his job title 

Basically, the story is that I was rear-ended by a car on the way to work, early in November last year. Hey ho, nothing broken and everything's getting paid for by the other driver's insurance. Now, Thunder Road came to pick the bike up the same day, it was very badly damaged, but not quite a write-off, and the service manager there estimated a fix time of 2-3 weeks. Now, it was nearly 2 weeks until the insurance company got their act together and authourised the repairs, so fair enough, that's not Thunder Road's fault, but as far as I'm concerned, from this point on, on 21st November, the clock started.

I called about 3 weeks after this to chase up, after speaking to someone there who didn't know what was happening, I got a call back from the service manager. Aparantly they were still waiting for the parts to come in, so I left it another couple of weeks and called. Again, I spoke to someone who couldn't find the book my bike was written in, so had to wait til the service manager was in... Now the story was that they had some parts in, but not all of them, so again I left it nearly 2 weeks again. At this point, around 5th January or so, they'd already had the bike being worked on for over 8 weeks, and I was promised that the manager would take their van and go down to Bridgend to pick up the parts that they needed on Monday 9th January and fit them the same day, and all would be well and sorted. Can you guess what's happened? They'd need another week, but aparantly I wasn't to worry, because it would definitely be sorted by Monday 16th, (which is when the service manager is on holiday).

I didn't call them Monday. Or Tuesday. I left it til today, feeling sure that my pride and joy would be back in on the road after spending more than 10 weeks off it. Nope, still not ready.  From what I can gather, the bike's been valeted, and while doing this it was noticed that the choke was broken and so was some sort of clutch component, and that they'd have to order some more parts for it, which would take a couple of weeks....... Except the service manager is on holiday (remember?), so he has to order them when he comes back...

I've been a loyal customer there since I started riding my 125 that I bought there nearly 2 years ago, but they can rest assured that I will NEVER be spending any more money in that shop.... I remember waiting several weeks while that little bike was being serviced (Oh, I'd bought a 2-year service plan for it of course, which I passed on to the poor fool who had it when he bought the machine off me. I can only hope he found somewhere else to service it). And again, I remember waiting 3 weeks while they found out why my Honda 125 kept cutting out - because of a widely-published fuel pump recall... Utterly, utterly useless.

I know where I'll be buying my replacement kit, next bike and all my servicing - South Wales Superbikes.

[Rhosyn]

That doesn't sound good at all, 

[walt-n-his 955]

  not good at all , thanks for the heads up, hope you get it back soon..

[Day7936]

They quoted me £670 plus vat to fit and supply new stanchions and MOT my hornet I nearly fucking choked!!!!

[skippy17]

not good m8 yeah go to SOUTH WALES SUPER BIKES.skippy's  had 5 bikes from them and never had a prob with servicing or guarantees  speak to chris in the servicing dep g8 bloke.

[robert9008]

thats really bad i use the bridgend branch and thank god have never had a problem. They need to pull there finger out. hope you get it back soon.

[sdwboss]

Thanks guys, I've heard the Bridgend branch is much better - it's a shame I live closer to Cwmbran

Hopefully in a few weeks I'll be able to learn how to ride again, it's been so long 

[blueracer]

Everybody has a storey mine is bought my bike from Thuder Road Cwmbran  and never had a problem with anything not even the Service Manager but everybody has their storey

[sdwboss]

Well, what an interesting day!

It seems the general manager got wind of the situation - the bike was all fixed and back in my garage yesterday, and he invited me down to the shop today to talk about what's happened. He was very apologetic, and I really felt he understood what an awful experience I had with this bike - he also offered me a very reasonable deal on kit and a future service as a peace offering

I thought it was very decent of him to invite me down, and it's nice to see that my custom is actually valued at Thunder Road! So all in all, a good resolution, and I'll definitely still be calling there in future!! Now I've just gotta learn how to handle those 33 horses again!!

[blueracer]

Happy days then dude  they are not that bad at Thunder Road Cwmbran    

[sdwboss]

Happy days then dude  they are not that bad at Thunder Road Cwmbran   

It seems not! A bit of a mess-up but very pleased with the way it was eventually handled

(Now I can have a look at any tasty bikes they get in! )

[pricey]

Well, what an interesting day!

It seems the general manager got wind of the situation - the bike was all fixed and back in my garage yesterday, and he invited me down to the shop today to talk about what's happened. He was very apologetic, and I really felt he understood what an awful experience I had with this bike - he also offered me a very reasonable deal on kit and a future service as a peace offering

I thought it was very decent of him to invite me down, and it's nice to see that my custom is actually valued at Thunder Road! So all in all, a good resolution, and I'll definitely still be calling there in future!! Now I've just gotta learn how to handle those 33 horses again!!

some bike shops do look in here from time to time so the more people post good or bad things about them then perhaps they will sit up and take notice 

[blueracer]

Well, what an interesting day!

It seems the general manager got wind of the situation - the bike was all fixed and back in my garage yesterday, and he invited me down to the shop today to talk about what's happened. He was very apologetic, and I really felt he understood what an awful experience I had with this bike - he also offered me a very reasonable deal on kit and a future service as a peace offering

I thought it was very decent of him to invite me down, and it's nice to see that my custom is actually valued at Thunder Road! So all in all, a good resolution, and I'll definitely still be calling there in future!! Now I've just gotta learn how to handle those 33 horses again!!

some bike shops do look in here from time to time so the more people post good or bad things about them then perhaps they will sit up and take notice 

You are absolutely right there Pricey

[sickpit]

Not a good experience with them at all. Recently bought a 600 bandit from Fowlers in Bristol, it came to service time so I decided to try Thunder Road Cwmbran.
£180 for the service which was expected but still a bit pricey compared to others but let it slide as thought it would be a good job. Was advised that I needed a new front tyre and rear brake pads so decided to book it in the following Tuesday as I was of work. Was told to booked in for 09:00. Turned up on the day and was told the parts were not there, not to happy but again what could I do, thought it was a genuine mistake. Booked it in again for Saturday at 09:00 again.

Turned up and was told that they would look at it around about 14:00,  was fuming by now as booked the bike in at 09:00 for a reason and you expect this time to be the time they can fit your machine in, was getting fed up with their incompetence, I had no way of getting home and it was lashing down with rain, bearing in mind the showroom is in the middle of an industrial estate. Walked a mile into town and called a friend to pick me up.

Got a call at about 15:00 saying they had changed the tyre but found that the caliper was seized and would need to be split and overhauled. Thought that this cant be right and told them it had only had a full service a week ago. They asked "with who" quite condescendingly. When I advised them it was by them you could hear they were panicked. Read out the service menu from their website( which incidentally has now been taken down and directs to to a page cannot be displayed screen). The menu listed check and clean brake calipers and test they are fully functional.  Was told that this was not the case and the test is just a visual inspection? £180!!!  for them to just look at the calipers and say they are fine. Argued that they obviously had not carried out this part of the work that I had paid for and raised the point as to what else didn't they do that was on the menu.

Guy on the desk did not say a word and just blankly handed me a copy of the receipt for the service which is very vague and does not fully list what was said to have been done on their menu.
No customer facing skills at all, all he could muster was, if you need to complain talk to the manager, asked to speak with the manage and was told he was not in for a few days.
Will never go back to them for anything and would warn others not to bother as well.

[blueracer]

Thats not good    Always have had good feed back with Thunder Road but shall be more carefull in future with them