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So went to pick up the RS4 from our local Audi dealer this morning after they changed the gearbox/driveshaft oils and changed oil, re-pressurized and inspected the DRC.

They told me that when removing the front diff air duct to access the oil, two bolts were heavily corroded and the heads had sheered off so they had to drill out the bolts. Here's the funny part- they then said I have to pay an extra £181 for the cost of them fixing their mistake!!

I literally burst out laughing and asked if this is an April Fool's joke. Service manager just looked at me and sheepishly said no...

After explaining to them that firstly a couple of bolts costs about £1, and secondly (more importantly) this was their f**k up which they didn't bother to tell me about until collection, they agreed to waive the charge. I agreed to wave them good-bye forever!!

Such a shame the way things have gone with Audi. Loved most of the RS cars I had, but the dealer network is soooo <beep>.

Similar thing happened to a Fiat 500 I once owned (my wife’s before you all start)
Went in for a service and when they were meant to return it they said that the sump drain had cross threaded and wanted to charge for new sump cover etc.
I told them to keep it and repair it as it was obviously their fitter that had done it.
Had to escalate it to Fiat direct before they would do it though.
Service manager very sheepish when I picked it up!

Can i ask, how is it their fuckup if YOUR cars bolts are siezed? Steel bolts going into an aluminium gear housong WILL 100% Sieze at some point its basic science the 2 metals react to each other. Never ceases to amaze me the stupidness of customers and this is also a reason i now refuse to work on older cars. Ive had sump plugs come out with the thread before where the previous person had cross threaded it, why on earth should i have to soak that up? Luckily for me every time that has happened the customer has been right next to me but it angers me every time customers thinking their cars are brand new and nothing could possibly be siezed

I buy new cars because i want the security of a warranty and all that comes with that.
If the fitter can’t put a bolt back without cross threading it then he’s the one to blame.
Customer should not have to pay for someone else’s shoddy workmanship.
With an attitude like yours I’m surprised you have any customers.

Indeed nastro i agree with you, however the original poster is moaning of a corroded siezed bolt. Siezed bolts which is something that will always happen eventually with any car when you have a steel bolt going into a ali gearbox housing, hardly the garages or techs fault just a sheer fact of engineering.... Unless however you are suggesting every vehicle manufacturer is building cars with "shoddy workmanship" problem is you clearly have no idea of what im actually talking about unfortunately you cannot always blame the tech or garage, yes dont get me wrong some techs are useless and break stuff i see it all the time but you cannot blame any garage for charging more to remove a siezed bolt from your car that is totally out of order labour is not free. If you always buy a new car and keep it for under 3 years then i very much doubt you will have issues with siezed bolts ....... My attitude is very much treat others how i would expect to be treated, i would never expect someone to drill and retap a thread on something i owned that had a siezed bolt for free, maybe its attitudes like yours that are the issue here how you come to the conclusion a "heavily corroded" bolt that snapped is the techs fault or shoddy workmanship is beyond me and this is the problem nowadays everyone wants to blame someone

A cross threaded sump plug is difficult to prove who is the offender - the technician who 'found' it, or the technician on the previous oil change, but seized bolts - I'm in agreement with fabiogray. Working regularly on (my own) classic cars, seized bolts are 'par for the course', although if I were a business, then the extra time removing corroded / seized bolts would have to factored in somewhere. Seized bolts can make a 10 minute job into an hours job....or even longer...

When it’s a first service it’s pretty obvious who’s to blame.
I’ve had my share of seized bolts on my 50 plus year old bikes. Yet to snap the head off one though….
Not saying it doesn’t happen but sometimes you have to take it on the chin and any professional outfit would.
However, if stated in your terms at time of quoting that any issues occurring due to age / corrosion then there’s no issue.
Bitching about when you haven’t, yeh, won’t be using those firms.

Steel and aluminium Audi could, should and do know about. At least the designers and manufacturers do.
As an S8 owner I'm well aware that not only do certain bolts have special coatings to limit/prevent galvanic corrosion but also there are very specific procedures and tools for handling them.
That said, anything under the car and "exposed to the elements" is always at risk...…….

As the original poster of this thread let me clarify:

There were two things which really annoyed me here-

1. We were paying £160 labour for an Audi ‘master’ technician. I don’t think it is beyond reason to assume that a master technician would be well aware of the likelihood of these bolts seizing and pre warn me before starting the job (as both Porsche did when they had our 911 and Mercedes with our SLS). They did however find time to complete a video of the car and tell me that my tyre inflator can was out of date!

2. Once the first bolt had sheared off, instead of contacting me the master technician then went on to sheared the head off a second bolt. I would have thought that even a newly trained mechanic would have thought to stop and apply more gentler methods as opposed to just proceeding with the air gun.

This wasn’t a one man band but an Audi main dealer who is meant to know these cars and their potential weak points.

The fact that they quickly wrote off the extra charge left me feeling that they trying their luck in the first place and realised that this sudden additional charge was unreasonable.

They could probably of removed the bolts with a bit of TLC and careful application of force to undo it, but I suspect they got their impact wrench and 'oh look, it's sheared!'

Difficult to know if it was pure laziness or lack of experience, but anyone who has worked on older cars knows that a few minutes cleaning, lubing and then maybe even a bit of heat will prevent a lot of pain in the long run.