The diary of a breakdown ...

 

Prologue

I was taking J down to Melbourne for an appointment with her new rheumatologist.

We had planned to drive down, stay the night in a hotel, do the appointment the next morning and drive back.

It was particularly important as it was her first appointment with her new rheumatologist, and we’d decided I should be there as well in case we had to discuss any changes in disease management,

As we usually do, we decided to stop in Euroa for lunch.

As I was turning right into the main street of Euroa the car did a little wobble as if we had gone over something in the road. I looked in the rear view mirror but could see nothing.

Then various lights came on on the dash – traction control, hill start, ABS and the check engine light, and the red automatic transmission oil temperature light started to pulse.

The car seemed to drive perfectly well but we decided to stop, have lunch and see if it settled – it could after all be a sensor fault.

Act One

The fault didn’t settle. Initially the red automatic transmission light didn’t come on so we decided to try driving it. We managed about a kilometre before the automatic transmission light began to pulse.

We doubled back to the park in Euroa, and called the RACV.

After the usual explanation that we were actually members of the NRMA, the RACV’s sister organisation in New South Wales, despite living in Victoria – a heritage of our living in Canberra – they dispatched a roadside assistance truck.

The mechanic used a portable scanner to check the car, said it might be a transmission fault, cleared the error messages and suggested we drive it to see if the lights come back on.

He also suggested that if they did we should drive directly to the garage on the edge of Euroa, as they were approved RACV breakdown repairers and had a more sophisticated scanner than his handheld one.

Well, we set off, and after around 250m the lights came back on.

Despite the car driving normally, it was clearly foolish to continue in case we had a catastrophic failure, so we drove to the service centre.

They helped us arrange overnight accommodation as they were unable to check the car thoroughly until the next day.

We managed to get J’s appointment rescheduled at no cost, and despite the very short notice, the hotel was happy to cancel our booking, which was very generous of them.

Act Two

The service centre scanned the car the next morning, and then came the bad news, it was a complex problem and not one they could fix, meaning it would have to be towed to a transmission specialist. We had NRMA Complete Cover that includes a reasonable amount of towing, so that wasn’t a problem. When and where to take it was a problem, and they suggested that I google for someone closer for where we live.

We tried the Subaru dealer in Wangaratta, but their service department didn’t return our call (to be fair, they did, but on the next working day). Another transmission specialist in Wangaratta did say it was probably the solenoid, but they were unable to do the job.

They also said that in their opinion there was no one competent in Wangaratta and that we should try Shepparton.

Shepparton is almost as far from home as Euroa, and not easy to reach from Beechworth by public transport, so we decided to try Wodonga.

We found a transmission specialist in Wodonga, Shane’s Transmissions and Autocare, who after looking at the scan results, agreed to do the job.

Unfortunately, due to the ANZAC day long weekend they would be closed until Monday.

We told the RACV service centre that we had found someone to do the job, and as the next day was the start of the ANZAC day holiday, we would get the afternoon train home as there was a connecting bus service from Wangaratta to Beechworth.

It seemed pointless at this stage to remain in Euroa as nothing could happen until the following Monday, and it meant we could get our cats out of the cattery, and we had our old backup car available while things were being sorted out.

The RACV people said they would contact the NRMA and let us know how much we would have to pay to get the car transported to Wodonga.

When I called the service centre later that afternoon to touch base they were still working on our invoice. Obviously, nothing was going to happen until after the public holiday, so we left things as they were and said we would call them after ANZAC day to touch base.

I duly called them on Friday, and found that they had arranged for the car to be towed to Wodonga first thing on Monday. Even better, they had managed to persuade the NRMA to pay for the tow leaving me only the cost of their initial diagnostic services. Things were looking up.

Act Three

I called the transmission shop on Monday to check that they were up to speed with things as they had been closed on both the ANZAC day public holiday and the following Friday.

They were, and obviously nothing more could happen until the car was delivered. I did say I would call them the next day to touch base to confirm delivery of the car.

That left the problem of our out of pocket expenses for our involuntary overnight stay in Euroa and our train journey home.

Rural train journeys are so ridiculously cheap in Victoria, even more so if you have a Seniors card - $10.60 for a combined train and bus ticket for the two of us to get home. At that price it seemed hardly worth claiming, and the cost of a self catering unit in Euroa for a night was not exactly excessive either.

(We were offered a rental car, but since we have an old and battered second car at home, and given that the next day was a public holiday and we only had minimal luggage we decided on the train home as the better option as we would inevitably have had to return the rental car to somewhere inconvenient.)

So, I went to my NRMA’s website and logged in.

There were three ways I could contact them, phone, enquiry form, or Facebook messenger.

Facebook messenger was a non starter as I’d deliberately taken myself off social media a year ago. It was basically a kind of ‘dumb phone’ moment when you realise you’ve limited yourself – after all everybody uses Facebook, don’t they.

Calling the phone number was a non-starter – the NRMA’s contact number diverts to the RACV in Victoria.

I realised later that I’d misread the text they’d sent me about having the vehicle towed to Wodonga – the number they’d given me was a general non diverting contact number, not one for the vehicle recovery unit. Echoing a well known tv advert, I’ll know next time.

So, that left the enquiry form. I duly filled it in asking how to submit the invoices – there was no way to upload the invoices as part of the enquiry. However the automatic acknowledgement did say that if I had documents to submit I should reply to the message and attach them.

That provoked a response – I got an email back in a few minutes asking me to call a number and quote a case number – when I called the people in the call centre of course had no idea what I was talking about, especially as they’d been accidentally locked out of my file.

However they took my details and promised to get someone to call me in the next ninety minutes.

While I was waiting, Shane from the transmission shop called me to say that they had the car, and he’d had a look at it and it looked to be a common fault with Subaru Imprezas and readily fixable.

The price was not cheap, but I’d been doing my googling and the quoted cost was around the average most repair shops quote online for a similar job – the good news was that, fingers crossed, they should get it done this week.

And for the record, the NRMA did call me back – a bit later than they promised – and after a little bit of conversation agreed refund our out of pocket accommodation and travel costs.

Act Four

Sooner than expected, the next day in fact, the transmission people rang.

The fault had been as they expected and had been a relatively straightforward fix. We piled into my old, somewhat battered, Subaru and rattled down to Wodonga.

J drove the car back and I followed in my old car in case of problems.

There were none, case closed.

Epilogue

We had been debating getting a new car and tying ourselves in knots over the classic ICE/Hybrid/Electric conundrum.

Well, rural charging infrastructure is poor, and one thing we like to do is go away to somewhere remote in the country or the coast for a few days every so often.

That pretty much rules out electric as a viable option. In a couple of years time it might be an option but now, no.

If we still lived in the city and only drove around town, it would most definitely be an option, but living rurally, no.

So that comes down to hybrid or petrol. Given that we don’t drive vast numbers of kilometres these days it probably doesn’t make a great deal of difference, especially as we’ll probably keep the car for ten years, so I think it’s a case of setting a budget and going car shopping...