Service history
 

Buying a used car these days can be a minefield and lack of a paper service history is a real pain. Nowadays with everything online, it's at least a phone call to find out where, when and by whom a car has been serviced. I like a nice, fully stamped service book but those days it seems are gone.

They were never reliable anyway, I can recall service books being forged to look more impressive, even blank books available that your friendly garage would stamp for a fee. Milage sir, what would you like it to be?

Condition was and is everything, all else is suspect.

One reason I keep my cars a long time, better the devil you know.

Paul.

If you really want a service history ebay can supply the books and a selection of stamps to fill it up. Individuals paper receipts from garages for things like clutch or timing belts have a slightly better value, but as Paul says the condition you can see is the key, the rest is open to question.

(and lets not consider my sister's car which has a good service history, duly stamped by Kwik-Fit, which she also abuses every day)

Condition is key. A service history with receipts is the icing on the cake, but I put more emphasis on the MOT history. That shows the mileage between tests and also shows if there have been any fails and what the failures were. This, in my opinion, gives a good indication of how well a vehicle has been looked after, or not as the case may be.

ITS' comment on MOT history reminded me of a colleague at work who spent a lot of time through the courts getting recompense for a car he bought from a dealer with all the right paperwork, turned out to have a false mileage which was clear to see in the online MOT history, 40,000 miles had 'disappeared' from one MOT to the next.

The online mot check is a boon for sure, i check every potential purchase. I am more interested in finding where and when the car I am looking at has been serviced, back street garage, specialist, or main dealer

Ditto . . . . .

Stan.

A few were caught out when the online history went back as far as it did but all those cars presented for fist mot with 12k on the clock....many are over 60k

Was offered the chance to have mine rolled back by a new “box” purchased by a garage not too far away.... becoming big money when so many cars o;pcp or lease deals with 6/8k miles £4K in excess mileage charges or a few hundred in cash.....

Garage still not tracked it down, shame, one owner car just come off a private plate and presents well, alloys hardly marked, looks to have been well looked after.

Wee car had a service plan valid till 2019 but did not see inside of a garage till 27k miles, missing first service by 11k. Damn and blast search goes on