Apple carplay android auto software upgrade

bs2014

I've recently seen some 'solo operator' doing these carplay upgrades on modern Vags bmw mercs etc Even posting on social media showing the garages they are doing it for. How are these freelancers able to get access to the software to do it without needing to bring it back to main dealer and if its so easy why are the garages retailing the cars employing someone external to do it rather than themselves? Just don't know what the catch is.

GustavoFring

There is no catch.

The license to activate it still comes from a dealer on an ad card. For each activation this purchase needs to be made. The difference is mostly down to labour markup.

bs2014

GustavoFring wrote: »

There is no catch.

The license to activate it still comes from a dealer on an ad card. For each activation this purchase needs to be made. The difference is mostly down to labour markup.

But if its only a 20 min job, the labour rate aspect difference would be barely noticeable in price?

Heres Johnny

bs2014 wrote: »

But if its only a 20 min job, the labour rate aspect difference would be barely noticeable in price?

Main dealers aren't in the habit of charging 20 mins labour

GustavoFring

bs2014 wrote: »

But if its only a 20 min job, the labour rate aspect difference would be barely noticeable in price?

Take it to a lad with his own workshop, nothing wrong with that but his overheads will be lower, just as likely so too will the labour rate.

Take it to a dealer and you're taking up space, the job will be logged, they'll have their workflow from you dropping it at the service desk. All this adds to overheads.

Incidentally a family member did it last week on a Skoda, one dealer was the price of the code plus an hours labor, another the price of the code and said they'd do it between jobs for free if they didn't mind leaving it there an hour or two as they'd been loyal customers for years.

bs2014

GustavoFring wrote: »

Take it to a lad with his own workshop, nothing wrong with that but his overheads will be lower, just as likely so too will the labour rate.

Take it to a dealer and you're taking up space, the job will be logged, they'll have their workflow from you dropping it at the service desk. All this adds to overheads.

Incidentally a family member did it last week on a Skoda, one dealer was the price of the code plus an hours labor, another the price of the code and said they'd do it between jobs for free if they didn't mind leaving it there an hour or two as they'd been loyal customers for years.

That might explain why 1 VW dealer was charging me €300 and another €150+VAT. I googled the disk online and it looks to be around €150ish to buy so dealer 2 must not be charging me labour (unless they quoted me for the wrong thing which I sense could be the case since I doubt many rural Ireland customers ask what I did!!