Sending my Sera for servicing and fixing.

Phew, I have a reader (Wango) in Singapore! It amazed me that an unknown person actually reads my blog! His question to me was where do I send my Sera for servicing, so I thought that, instead of just answering him (one person) I might as well put it up here, so that anyone else who is interested can also go there.

My little Sera, when we bought her, needed a lot of fixing up and we had her majorly repaired and overhauled at TOM'S TOYOTA AND LEXUS SPECIALISTS in Bangsar. Their address is 80, Jalan Maarof, Bangsar Baru, 59100 KL. Telephone numbers: +603-22822939/4899.

We have been going to them for the last couple of years - starting from when we bought our Lexus LX470 at the beginning of 2005. We had a strange problem with the Lexus where, if you were driving very slow, ONCE IN A WHILE the engine would just cut out. We sent it back to where we purchased it, and they had it for 3 days and claimed to have fixed it, but the same thing happened again! So, we had seen TOM'S when driving in Bangsar so we figured, what the heck, let's give them a try - and, YES, they DID find out what was wrong and they DID fix it - within ONE day! Since then, we have been taking our Lexus there for regular service and, of course, when we got my little Sera and it needed a lot of work, we did not even consider sending her anywhere else and, yes, we will also be sending her there for regular servicing.

They are also reasonably priced and I like the fact that they do not try and push all new parts at you. To give you an example... the entire power steering rack on my Sera was in bad shape. To put a NEW one in would have cost more than RM4K... they went and sourced a place that specialises in FIXING power steering racks and that cost less than RM800!

Of course, for cars like the Sera, bear in mind that a lot of the specialist parts (eg, windscreen, hydraulic door supports, etc) have to come from Japan... and that can take up to 3 months. I am still waiting for my windscreen and hydraulics to come in - probably by mid Feb... so as long as you are prepared for that, there is no issue.

Of course for any Singaporean thinking of bringing their cars here to get it serviced.. YES, IT IS A LOT CHEAPER than in Singapore. Even when we were in Singapore and driving a Lexus ES300 there, we used to come back to KL to get it serviced at Toyota as it was SO MUCH cheaper in terms of PARTS AND SERVICE. In fact, the Sera that we had in Singapore ALSO was serviced regularly in KL - even if you dont know where to go you can always go to Toyota themselves, and they do give excellent service.

So, Wango, and anyone else reading this who wants a good service centre, you can go to Tom's (they do ALL cars, not just Toyota and Lexus) and, of course if you have a Toyota or Lexus you can go to Toyota themselves (good big centre in PJ). Either way you will get excellent service.... though maybe Tom's is just a little bit more personal. Good luck!