road side assistance / breakdown service / towing ?

spanner

Well-Known Member
#1
After having had the need to access roadside assistance for a tow of about 87 km and finding out it was going to cost me OVER $680 even though I HAD RACQ Ultra who else do people use for those times when a breakdown requires a tow.

My rear tyre had a catastrophic failure on the last leg of my BB2500 ..... 200 km from home!

RACQ said that the max call out distance was 50 kms and the maximum tow was 20km. the balance was to be paid at a rate of $9.60 per km. I kindly told the RACQ person that that is ridiculous and he then came back with a price of $5.5o per km. That was still way too high so I got a mate to drive out for $300 and a carton of beer.

I don't know what I would have done had I been further away from home.

so ..... who do you use, who would you not use and what traps for young players are there when getting breakdown service quotes and policies?

Cheers.
 

TripleTreat

Well-Known Member
#2
Well, I just checked my NRMA Premium Care Roadside Assist and it states that I get "up to 100km towing" however a couple of years ago the Triumph required towing from halfway between Walcha and Uralla to Bellingen which is more like 200km and I had nothing to pay, which leads me to believe that my benefits have been reduced since then!!! Will be checking this out tomorrow.
 

TripleTreat

Well-Known Member
#3
Just read the fine print... Also includes up to $3000 worth of Major Breakdown cover - maybe this covered the extra? Will check tomorrow.
 

spanner

Well-Known Member
#4
cheers,

will be quite keen to see what you uncover ..... and as has been expressed to me on another forum I think I need to make a complaint to RACQ because of the information I received was quite blatantly incorrect over the phone. I 'should' have been covered for the towing!
 

TripleTreat

Well-Known Member
#5
As suspected the towing 'excess' for over the maximum 100km was covered by the NRMA Premium Care $3000 major breakdown cover which kicks in when your vehicle requires more than 24 hours for repairs to be made (or words to that effect).
 

Gatey

Premier Member
IBA Member
#6
Cant ever say Ive had any faith in road side assistance from any company as they always have some fine print thats going to cost you as much as any other freight company.
Wife and I just sort our own road side problems and leave that other stuff for other people whom seem happy to get screwed for their years of faithfull subscrition to a motor based cartage company.
Get a bike trailer between a couple of you. Have a plan and just go sort the thing for yourself.
After all its your ride not theirs.

Bit harsh?
Well maybe but for years Ive wondered why this LDR community does not a have among us a few trailers in each state to go fetch a bike back.
 

Reader57

Well-Known Member
#10
There is a 10 x 5 tandem trailer set up for carrying up to a large tourer near Swan Hill. The only problem is I sold my tow vehicle but if the breakdown is within 100klm of Swan Hill, the old ute can manage that.
 

OX-34

Premier Member
IBR Finisher
#12
I have a tiny single bike trailer in Newcastle.

I use it for ferrying my bikes around town for servicing and the like but also used it to go get Ed535 when his Eaglewing Elegante 150 scooter broke down at Buladelah during the Scooter Insanity 1000 a couple of years ago. I've had my FJRs and Teneres on there no problem.



I have NRMA Premium cover. I've used them a couple of times for towing and once three times in one day for a puncture on my Speed Triple with the fancy new (at the time) Pilot Pure tyres. They should have been called puree. The skin on a baked custard was tougher than those things.

On the singles 2000km run Wombattle blew up his 125cc Honda just south of Gundagai 500km away. It took them a while to get to him, but both Wom and the Little Mango were delivered home to Newcastle in the NRMA truck. Hot things fell out of the engine, so the 24 hour repair rule applied.
 

Gatey

Premier Member
IBA Member
#13
Well Bill I would like to see this a s topic at the muster.
Seems we all feel better knowing that our bike is in the hands of another one of us when we may be in the hands of an expert body-fixer..
But really most times its a tyre or a roo or some fuel thing and as a group we should be able to get our heads together and get a network operational.
 

Skidoo

Premier Member
#15
Sounds like a plan.
More importantly IMHO is to have contact numbers of fellow riders around Oz that may be able to help out. I've used my trusty/rusty 6 x 4 to help out many a rider, that's just what we all do. When the chips are down sometimes they offer a simple plan as we are caught in the moment and can't think objectively.
 

Gatey

Premier Member
IBA Member
#16
Good point Karl.
I've been involved in a few other retrievals over the years and one thing that is oh so important to remember from the retrievers perspective is that resolution does not come in a few minutes . No need to rush, no need to do stupid.
The only need is to go about the task of getting the bike, Loading the bike and all of you getting back home without burning the candle at both ends.
 

Tele

Premier Member
#17
I have the BMW Motorrad cover which came supplied when I bought a new bike. I have only used it once when I blew a front tyre in a no-phone zone between Walcha and Gloucester. SPOT came to the rescue with messages to my family. They called BMW roadside assist who then sought the assistance of a "local" towing contractor to collect the bike. I waited about 8hrs for my wife to collect me, and about 18hrs for BMW to collect the bike. Apparently no emergency towing people want to collect bikes on a Friday evening ......
 

OX-34

Premier Member
IBR Finisher
#18
Tele, I guess your experience is exactly what a breakdown contact list could be for...
In the case of delayed commercial/membership retrieval one of us may have been able to help. Louise may have been able to call me or TigerBill and my trusty little trailer could have been dispatched.