This isn’t our first RV so I knew what to expect when it comes to maintenance. Scheduling service well in advance (at least a month) is the way to do it. It allows the dealership flexibility in when to do your RV, get parts in, and it helps you plan your schedule.
In a tiny campground in Kansas City, in May, we clipped (the royal we because it was me driving) another RV leaving, ironically, to get scheduled maintenance done. Things like roof maintenance and axel packing is just something you’ll have to do periodically. Technically I could do them myself but, honestly, I’d rather pay someone who knows what they’re doing. The damage, to both RV’s, was minor but we had to get an estimate, deal with insurance, and all that crap. Thankfully the estimate was provided that day since we were already going to the dealership.
Unfortunately, we were headed out of town and the dealership said they needed 3, maybe 4 days to get it done. Fine, so we scheduled it for August giving them plenty of time to get parts and line up the body shop. We made plans to be there on a specific date to drop it off and we did. We said we were full-timers so please keep it plugged in so the refrigerator/freezer doesn’t turn off. I’m 20 miles away heading to my relatives when they call me saying they can’t/won’t keep it plugged in. So I go back with coolers and empty the fridge and freezer and throw away a bunch of food and take it to my relatives and store in their spare fridge. And then I wait.
Three days later I call the dealership because I hadn’t heard anything and lo and behold they haven’t done jack with my RV yet. The service tech apologizes profusely and said they would get it in soon but since we had plans to go to Winfield for our music festival I tell them no, and I go pick it up, and leave. For what it’s worth, their service manager did offer to pay for a hotel stay if we got it done through them. The tech is no longer employed with them because of incompetency. As I told him, this is my HOME not a vacation vehicle that sits most of the year.
Fast forward another 90 days and we land in North Carolina (Raleigh area) I find the Grand Design dealership in the area and contact them via email. They asked for pictures and we got the estimate (about the same as the original estimate) and we schedule it so they could get the parts in. All of this via email!
Last Monday I took the RV in and by Tuesday afternoon it was done. No hassle. No fuss. It was so nice to get it done quickly, on-time, and on-estimate. In talking to the techs they like it when people deal with it remotely since they said so many people come in and want it done NOW.
Look, I get it. Most people that are RV’ing don’t have a lot of time and they may be many miles away from home or their vacation destination. The tech’s said that getting the parts is sometimes the hardest part (at least since the pandemic) with supply chain issues. And they only have so many service techs to work on RV’s and only so much space to keep an RV.
Speaking of supply chain issues we were in southern Georgia heading to Atlanta and stopped for lunch. When I parked I knew my exit strategy but when we were leaving another RV had parked in the spot (that said no parking) so I had to go over a curb. I severely bent one of my stabilizing jacks coming down on the curb. So we had mobile tech visit when we hit Atlanta to assess the damage. We had to replace the entire stabilizer AND the bracket that was welded to the frame of the RV. The bad news? It was going to take 6 weeks to get it. Thankfully we knew where we were going to be and had a local contact that would take the shipment if it arrived before we did (the parts arrived the day we did).
Taking the old one off and putting the new one on is a story for another time. But it also involved some patience, luck, and being nice to people.
So, my advice is be patient with them. Try to schedule in advance so they can get parts in and smooth out their workflow. Something is ALWAYS going to break in an RV. It’s just the way it is.