I just want to say that this is going to be an essay but it could potentially save you a bit of money so spend a few minutes reading 
No harm if you don't but I shall fart in your general direction.
Thought it might be useful if there was a thread showing where people could get the cheapest places to get their cars serviced and where to get cheap parts. This will I'm sure become more important as cars come out of warranty and get sold onto their subsequent owners. I have no intention of spending any more money than I need to in maintaining my car than I need to as I don't want to pay to send someone's child through university
Firstly one of the best places to get genuine parts for your 500 at very reasonable prices is www.shop4parts.co.uk. As far as I know they ONLY supply genuine parts and if you've donated to the forum you get a 10% discount which when coupled with their already reasonable prices makes things even better. They do charge about £10 for shipping of orders over 1kg so it makes sense to buy as much as possible (within reason of course!!!!) to offset the cost of delivery. I bought enough oil and filters for 3 services on my 500 for £160. S4P are the only place I've seen online who seem to sell Fiat's recommended Selenia oil at a reasonable price.
Servicing, most people seem to get quoted at least £200 for their first service on the 1.2. If like myself you thought that was a bit much, you can do what I did above and order bits from S4P along with NGK plugs from elsewhere and ask your dealer to pricematch an independent cut the cost of the service to ~£130. I'm not really sure of the costs of the other services as my car currently hasn't had any others. It's worth noting that your car doesn't need to go to Fiat for servicing to maintain its warranty as long as the garage is VAT registered and uses genuine parts, but a Fiat technician works on Fiats day in and day out so will be best equipped to troubleshoot any problems and they will have a better knowledge of common faults on the 500 than someone who has potentially never seen one before.
Another person to speak to is Chris@Souls who is always on the forum and always happy to offer good deals to forumers. His requests thread can be found here https://www.fiatforum.com/souls/228515-fiat-500-requests.html
Brakes are of course a common thing that will need to be replaced throughout the cars lifetime and one supplier which I've found to be very good is http://www.nextdaybrakes.com/ who only supply Brembo products which if you've ever watched any motorsport you'll know are synonymous with quality. Their prices are also very good and as the name suggests they ship everything next day. Now of course your dealership or independent won't be very happy if you say "Can you hold onto my car for another day? I need to order some discs and pads for my car!" so if you're wanting to take advantage of buying brake parts online you're going to have to order the bits before you need them. I ordered some front discs and pads for my 1.2 from them for £51 and they'll sit on the shelf till needed. It'll save money come the time when I need to replace them though! I've also seen Mintex pads and discs on Ebay for £38 and they're another good brand. Personally I'd steer away from any site or seller on ebay who claims to be selling something which is unamed or says that "It's who supplies the factory! Honest!" brakes are important and whilst we all want to save money brakes are not the place to skimp! if you don't know if something is a good brand then ask
Tyres are also something which your car will go through at some point in its lifetime. Prices from places like Kwik Fit and so on can be rather hefty. My favourite place to order tyres from is www.mytyres.co.uk . It is a little bit of a faff as the tyres get delivered to you and then you need to find a fitter and take the tyres and car to them. This obviously isn't for some people so another company I can recommend is www.blackcircles.com they're slightly more expensive but there is an option to order tyres and just turn up at one of their centres which tend to be dealerships and independent tyre fitters. Personally I prefer the mytyres route as it allows me to take the wheels off the car and take them to the tyre fitter for fitting and balancing and then take them back and fit them myself. I just don't trust someone else to jack the car up properly, not break the locking wheel nut, torque the wheels up properly and just go a good job.
Now it's fairly early on in the 500's life to be talking about common faults but some things which do seem to be a little fragile going from some early issues, comments from some drivers and issues that Panda owners have had (the 500 is based on the Panda floorpan and engines). Most of the issues that people have had have been suspension related, suspension droplinks, bushes on rear dampers, poor quality dampers failing MOT's due to leakage, top strut mounts, balljoints and bushes failing on front wishbones which requires the whole wishbone to be replaced. IMHO if any of these sort of bits goes then I won't be replacing them with genuine parts as suspension parts should last longer! of course only 3 and a bit years after launch I doubt many people have long term experience of aftermarket suspension components but if anyone reads this and does then please do post.
If anyone has got any tales of cheap servicing or well priced, quality parts then feel free to post in here to let others know, this isn't a place to whine and moan about how much you were charged or how much the dealer wants for a service on your little Luigiarioenzo when your old Triumph Stag only needed a service every 3 years and even then it was only 20p. That's not really helpful and that's what this thread is all about.
If anything in here doesn't make sense or you'd like it explained feel free to ask on the forum, don't PM me as not everyone can see PM's and a reply on a thread helps more people than a reply to a PM.
No harm if you don't but I shall fart in your general direction.Thought it might be useful if there was a thread showing where people could get the cheapest places to get their cars serviced and where to get cheap parts. This will I'm sure become more important as cars come out of warranty and get sold onto their subsequent owners. I have no intention of spending any more money than I need to in maintaining my car than I need to as I don't want to pay to send someone's child through university
Firstly one of the best places to get genuine parts for your 500 at very reasonable prices is www.shop4parts.co.uk. As far as I know they ONLY supply genuine parts and if you've donated to the forum you get a 10% discount which when coupled with their already reasonable prices makes things even better. They do charge about £10 for shipping of orders over 1kg so it makes sense to buy as much as possible (within reason of course!!!!) to offset the cost of delivery. I bought enough oil and filters for 3 services on my 500 for £160. S4P are the only place I've seen online who seem to sell Fiat's recommended Selenia oil at a reasonable price.
Servicing, most people seem to get quoted at least £200 for their first service on the 1.2. If like myself you thought that was a bit much, you can do what I did above and order bits from S4P along with NGK plugs from elsewhere and ask your dealer to pricematch an independent cut the cost of the service to ~£130. I'm not really sure of the costs of the other services as my car currently hasn't had any others. It's worth noting that your car doesn't need to go to Fiat for servicing to maintain its warranty as long as the garage is VAT registered and uses genuine parts, but a Fiat technician works on Fiats day in and day out so will be best equipped to troubleshoot any problems and they will have a better knowledge of common faults on the 500 than someone who has potentially never seen one before.
Another person to speak to is Chris@Souls who is always on the forum and always happy to offer good deals to forumers. His requests thread can be found here https://www.fiatforum.com/souls/228515-fiat-500-requests.html
Brakes are of course a common thing that will need to be replaced throughout the cars lifetime and one supplier which I've found to be very good is http://www.nextdaybrakes.com/ who only supply Brembo products which if you've ever watched any motorsport you'll know are synonymous with quality. Their prices are also very good and as the name suggests they ship everything next day. Now of course your dealership or independent won't be very happy if you say "Can you hold onto my car for another day? I need to order some discs and pads for my car!" so if you're wanting to take advantage of buying brake parts online you're going to have to order the bits before you need them. I ordered some front discs and pads for my 1.2 from them for £51 and they'll sit on the shelf till needed. It'll save money come the time when I need to replace them though! I've also seen Mintex pads and discs on Ebay for £38 and they're another good brand. Personally I'd steer away from any site or seller on ebay who claims to be selling something which is unamed or says that "It's who supplies the factory! Honest!" brakes are important and whilst we all want to save money brakes are not the place to skimp! if you don't know if something is a good brand then ask
Tyres are also something which your car will go through at some point in its lifetime. Prices from places like Kwik Fit and so on can be rather hefty. My favourite place to order tyres from is www.mytyres.co.uk . It is a little bit of a faff as the tyres get delivered to you and then you need to find a fitter and take the tyres and car to them. This obviously isn't for some people so another company I can recommend is www.blackcircles.com they're slightly more expensive but there is an option to order tyres and just turn up at one of their centres which tend to be dealerships and independent tyre fitters. Personally I prefer the mytyres route as it allows me to take the wheels off the car and take them to the tyre fitter for fitting and balancing and then take them back and fit them myself. I just don't trust someone else to jack the car up properly, not break the locking wheel nut, torque the wheels up properly and just go a good job.
Now it's fairly early on in the 500's life to be talking about common faults but some things which do seem to be a little fragile going from some early issues, comments from some drivers and issues that Panda owners have had (the 500 is based on the Panda floorpan and engines). Most of the issues that people have had have been suspension related, suspension droplinks, bushes on rear dampers, poor quality dampers failing MOT's due to leakage, top strut mounts, balljoints and bushes failing on front wishbones which requires the whole wishbone to be replaced. IMHO if any of these sort of bits goes then I won't be replacing them with genuine parts as suspension parts should last longer! of course only 3 and a bit years after launch I doubt many people have long term experience of aftermarket suspension components but if anyone reads this and does then please do post.
If anyone has got any tales of cheap servicing or well priced, quality parts then feel free to post in here to let others know, this isn't a place to whine and moan about how much you were charged or how much the dealer wants for a service on your little Luigiarioenzo when your old Triumph Stag only needed a service every 3 years and even then it was only 20p. That's not really helpful and that's what this thread is all about.
If anything in here doesn't make sense or you'd like it explained feel free to ask on the forum, don't PM me as not everyone can see PM's and a reply on a thread helps more people than a reply to a PM.
