I'm going to declare three joint winners, all of whom are within about £100 of the bill which was £1,420.
Congratulations to
@Spiderweb,
@Milkfloat, and
@SpokeyDokey,
each of whom win a no expenses paid trip to a glass palace of their choice where they can look at shiny new cars and be patronised by smarmy salesmen.
The bill was roughly made up of £400 for the tyres, about the same for the brakes, £200 for the service and MoT, £100 for the aircon regas, nearly as much for the injector clean, with the rest of the work making up the remaining couple of hundred.
As mentioned upthread, the original equipment discs and pads are probably one of the more relatively expensive items.
Tyres are about on par with fast fit, and I think I've seen those places quote close to a hundred for aircon regas.
I've had some premium service from the main dealer in the shape of the gadget laden courtesy car, and the convenience of everything being done under one roof appeals.
An independent may have been a bit cheaper for some of the work, although I hear just as many horror stories about them as I do main dealers.
The main dealer I used has looked after the car since I had it and always done a decent job as far as I can tell.
From what I can gather, the price difference often isn't that high for a bread and butter car like a Vauxhall, so it's more a case of sticking with a garage I trust rather than the type of garage.
The wisdom of spending £1,400 on a car that's worth barely twice that could be questioned, but a nearly new replacement would cost me close to £15,000.
At one time I'd have been excited at the thought of a new car, but I can't summon much interest in one now.
Current thinking is to run the Meriva for another couple of years to get some value out of the latest big spend, then I shall probably bite the bullet and get something else.
