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AA

MichaelC said:
The automotive variety.

Blimey. There was I thinking this is going to be a long wait today, lots of overheating cars and such like. Twenty five minutes wait for the AA man. And about a further forty minutes wait for the recovery truck. I was astounded, pleasantly.
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Yes we had similar times a few weeks back with the AA. Only the second time ever I have had to use them. 20 mins or so for the first chap then a big truck and a people carrier came 45 mins later to take us and the car back home.
 
Green Flag don't have their own mechanics so I guess the quality of service relies on your local garages. My last Green Flag call-out for a suspected dying battery resulted in a local van turning up. Without a spare battery. Despite GF website blurb mentioning that their technicians carry batteries and fit for free.
The tech got the car started so in theory I could have driven to a local garage and paid them for a new battery plus labour, however since the car was on my driveway I decided to source my own (GF could only supply an estimate of cost - despite knowing my make/model/reg - and seemed to stress the point that I could probably get one cheaper) and have them pop back to fit for free.
True, Green Flag cover was cheaper than AA / RAC...
 
I have a family AA subs. My daughter living in S Wales is the only who has ever called them - flat battery (cos the boot light light was on), flat tyre that sort of thing. They always been very prompt in turning up. Went to AA after wife was left pretty stranded by Green Flag in Shropshire. We learnt later that the Green Flag contract for that area was changed soon afterwards, but it does show that Green Flag can be rather variable.
 
The AA is great but I always got annoyed by the way you had to ring each year to get the best deal, otherwise it ended up increasing in cost each year quite significantly. I ended up with the RAC bundled in with my car insurance.
 
My vote too - when my car battery died, the AA man did a 60 mile round trip to get, and fit a replacement.
(yes I know AA got paid for it but even so I count that as good service)
I suspect most AA members get the membership bundled in with a car purchase or insurance.
At one time we had 3 different memberships active, none of which we paid for directly.
 
Big fan of rac too , called them out twice , the first time I had to pay 120 quid for engineer as we hadn't joined a family member yet. That was discounted, soon took outfull membership
 
a friend of my wife's car broke down in Dunvegan, Isle of Skye two days ago....
'phoned the AA to see what was keeping the yellow van......was looking for a Dunvegan St in Glasgow!.
Call centres South of the Border seem to think the world ends round about Scotch Corner!.
 
denni55 said:
a friend of my wife's car broke down in Dunvegan, Isle of Skye two days ago....
'phoned the AA to see what was keeping the yellow van......was looking for a Dunvegan St in Glasgow!.
Call centres South of the Border seem to think the world ends round about Scotch Corner!.
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Dragons after Carlisle, aren't there?
 
I’ve used them a few times. Never had a problem. Broke down in France once and they were superb, car taken to a garage, taxi to hotel, hotel paid for and a hire car until mine was fixed. Turned out it was only the fan belt, but I broke down late on a Saturday morning, so it was Monday before it was fixed.
 
We have Greenflag through our bank account or at least that we had the last time we called them out. Relatively minor issue and quick to sort. Just checked the banks t&c’s And they only cover cars up to 16 years old. Bit of a bugger as my E500 is 17 years old and my Volvo V70 is 18 years old.
 
I've been a member for years simply because, originally, I ran wilful, fun if daft choices for modern traffic; then in the last decade, a really silly summer car - for which the annual coverage cost for a bit of piece of mind is well-spent/ part of the budget.

Anyway - today I had reason to call the AA - the most embarrassing kind of call, sensible car ran out of fuel 2miles from home on way to filling station (memo to self, do not believe the OBC at 35mile 'range' ...)

Anyway, fired up the app, it found me, they called me, van arrived in 25mins*; no payment, you get this free... polite, efficient, responsive.



It 's saddening the AA as a whole group seems to be in hock for £Bs when what they actually set out to do, the orig core business, is still done very well.



* when obvs as ' a bloke stranded, safely, on a side road, no dependants in car, no serious problem etc' I am, and should be, the lowest category of priority - happy with that.
 
Mr AA Man did observe they don’t often have to deal with XK8s but he was game for the challenge and seemed very disappointed that he couldn’t get her running for us. This was only my third call out in 34 years!
 
My last call-out was, oh, 5yrs ago, for sudden coolant loss in a bike-engined car; a hose had started to let go. Chap attending smiled the whole way through at playing with something unusual, then followed me for 10 miles to make sure the fix took - it was actually a very simple cause, easy fix, & introduced me to Kraken tape (https://www.lemark.co.uk/misc/kraken-self-fusing-silicone-tape/)



(which I duly bought myself a reel of, and haven't needed since...)
 
My grandfather worked for the AA from just after WW1 through to the 60's and early 70's.
In WW1- he was in the (horse) cavalry and learned to ride a motorbike. Joining the AA was a natural step for him as it was largely ex-services and organized like an army.
When he retired he had risen up the be divisional controller of the SW regional based in Bristol. "Driving" a huge desk.
For many years after his retirement the AA would send a car and driver to take him and my grandmother to where they needed to go.
The "sell off" was of course a travesty for him.

I think he would not recognize the list of services that AA and RAC have become - but then there were many fewer cars......
Ho hum.
 
Stunsworth said:
I’ve used them a few times. Never had a problem. Broke down in France once and they were superb, car taken to a garage, taxi to hotel, hotel paid for and a hire car until mine was fixed. Turned out it was only the fan belt, but I broke down late on a Saturday morning, so it was Monday before it was fixed.
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In the early 80s, I worked two summer seasons in the AA offices in Boulogne-sur-Mer. Great fun. It was actually a franchise operation, run by M. Gregson, an ex-pat. The tool kit consisted of a wall of telephone directories and yellow pages, one for every department in France. The call came in, we took a number we could call back on, usually a bar or café, out came the relevant directory and then we rang round the garages until we found one that could do the job. Hotel fixed as necessary, again using the directories.

The other part of the job was sending on the spare parts. Sometimes even parts for european-made cars had to come from England via the Dover office. A French Renault clutch cable wouldn't fit a right-hand drive model. We met the ferry in the firm's clapped out 2CV van, checked the parts over and then took them down to station to send them off via SERNAM, the railway parcel service, equivalent of BR Red Star.

For other bits of Europe, we passed it on to our German partner, the ADAC, but we still had the odd die-hard preferring to call us. We had one Aussie who was doing a European tour in a VW Bully ring us from somewhere different about once a week with yet another problem. We had a little pinflag on the wall map to chart his progress ! Last know heading to northern Norway !

Since 2003 I've been a "Plus" member of the ADAC. 79€ a year gave me full european breakdown and recovery, including the UK, car hire, medical cover and emergency helicopter repatriation in case of a medical emergency (though I never did find out whether that would have been to here or Germany!). Unfortunately, Brexit has put paid to that, so for the first time in ages, I'm going to need to look for european breakdown cover. My new NFU car insurance gives me basic AA cover in the UK.
 
Operajulian said:
My grandfather worked for the AA from just after WW1 through to the 60's and early 70's.
In WW1- he was in the (horse) cavalry and learned to ride a motorbike. Joining the AA was a natural step for him as it was largely ex-services and organized like an army.
When he retired he had risen up the be divisional controller of the SW regional based in Bristol. "Driving" a huge desk.
For many years after his retirement the AA would send a car and driver to take him and my grandmother to where they needed to go.
The "sell off" was of course a travesty for him.

I think he would not recognize the list of services that AA and RAC have become - but then there were many fewer cars......
Ho hum.
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Quick update.
I spoke to my surviving aunt. In fact my grandfather joined the AA in 1907 !!! Just as it started. He then joined up in 1916 ( a bit late ) for WW1 and after returned to the AA. My aunt said that as a child they would be taken to see her father "line up" the AA men each week and inspect them. Just like in the Army. Most embarrassing she said for her and her brother & sisters. But there you go.

I doubt they line up for inspection these days.
 
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