I went in to the dealer to have my oil and filter changed. After a few minutes, someone came out of the office. They gave me this maintenance schedule. My E has 20k on it. They told me I needed "C" services. Some of the services listed suprised me. :shock: :twisted: [/SIZE]

Incredible, a $150 oil change and wiper replacement. Oh yea and 20 drops of oil on the door hinges.

I know....I just had the oil and filter changed.

Wow, my dealer calls that the free 20point inspection... It is almost criminal, because you know they feed that line to little old ladies on fixed incomes just to scare them... :rolleyes:

good to hear that it did not work. Read your owners manual and do what it says....that's what they made it for. My dealer has a big list of things that are not in the manual too!

I went in to the dealer to have my oil and filter changed. After a few minutes, someone came out of the office. They gave me this maintenance schedule. My E has 20k on it. They told me I needed "C" services. Some of the services listed suprised me. :shock: :twisted: [/SIZE]

I never get more done than is required for my warranty. Now I'm glad.

Incredible, a $150 oil change and wiper replacement. Oh yea and 20 drops of oil on the door hinges.

Plus a 4 wheel alignment

The Dealer recommended schedule is completely different than the manufacturer recommended. Use the one in the back of your owners manual.

I pointed out politely to my dealer that theirs and Honda's are different !

Plus a 4 wheel alignment

Good point - that will run you $75 most places. Add $25-30 for an oil change, new wiper inserts for $15 (parts) or actually $20 if they do the rear as well (doesn't specify) and suddenly it's not that unreasonable for a person who doesn't have the know-how or desire to inspect all the listed stuff. The key to me with these multi-point inspections is do they really check all that stuff and provide you sufficient feedback on the state of everything.

Of course one might ask if a car at 20K miles really needs an alignment unless you know you've bashed some curbs or see some weird tire wear. Even still, $150 may not be all that bad for this stuff for the right person. My guess is the Dealership isn't out so much to make $$ off you doing this service but it's the $$ they hope to make off you if/when they find a bunch of stuff that needs attention and they can gouge you for it - brakes are an infamous example of something that you get taken to the cleaners when you have someone like a Dealer fix them for you - not very hard to do yourself and man is it a lot cheaper to do so.

Don't forget the "adjust if necessary" included on the idle speed and parking brake cable. It doesn't sound too bad to me, assuming that in most cases the checking and adjustment wouldn't get done at all.

Stipulating to the relatively small number of dealers that have actually been found to be fraudulently scamming, I've never been able to figure why so many people assume that ALL dealers are gougers because they charge more than it would cost you to do the work in your driveway.

I usually do the light work that I can do, IAW my service manual, but recently left my E at my local dealer (Leith, Raleigh NC) for several days while out of town. I'm at about 105K, and I wanted a thorough checkout of the many things (primarily power train and suspension) that start to show their age about at this point. They replaced a couple of things that were recommended and one that they found, but nothing without asking. They handed me a printed report of all inspections, complete with existing measurements and replacement standards.

I spent a few hundred, and don't feel I was screwed at all. They did the work I couldn't or wouldn't have done myself, and charged a price commensurate with their overhead costs (which are considerably higher than my driveway).

I understand that the OP was from 2006, but it illustrates a reason for having, reading and understanding the contents of the Owners Manual.

Should you have lost yours, the Maintenance Schedule(s) for your Element (I recommend following the "severe" usage schedule) can be found at https://www.ahm-ownerlink.com/pe_registration.asp?proddiv=P

The site also gives you a private place to record all your performed maintenance, upgrades, and the radio code.