I have a 2014 FJ with less than 3,000 miles on it which I hope will outlast me.
My problem is that I am a university professor whose house is overflowing with paperwork and I am constantly losing things, like tax returns which made applying for my last mortgage a living hell for example.
On the other hand it seems like whenever I call up a Toyota dealership about anything they know exactly what has been done to my vehicle (the scheduled maintenance as scheduled and some minor body work from a very low impact fender bender) if I give them my phone number.
My question is: If one does not have the original paper copies that record scheduled maintenance, what was done and when it was done is one at a disadvantage as far as maintaining the value of their vehicle or are computerized records considered sufficient these days?
I have brought it into the dealership for scheduled maintenance as suggested in the owner's manual but I cannot find the original paperwork.
I am trying to get my you-know-what together but since I do not have a family old habits of disorganization are very hard to break.
I guess I should just get remarried but so far no takers at my age.:smile:
I personally don't use a dealership for ANYTHING, but I think a printout of the entire vehicle history from one would be impressive to any potential buyer.
if you, or its previous owner, have all of the work done by the dealership they enter the data into a national Toyota database, by your VIN number, so you can count on them keeping the records for you
Also, any good shop, if you use them regularly, will be doing the same.
When I bought my 8 year old FJ I was able to get the dealer who had serviced it (in another state) to send a paper print out of it to me. VERY useful, to know when drive belts were replaced, what service campaigns had been applied, and so on.
If you do all of the work yourself, or use several different shops, then it will be all up to you to keep track.
You can sign up here and using you VIN number find all service records and stuff on your vehicle for stuff that was done through Toyota. I don't know about the stuff done elsewhere though.
Is it just me, or is the Toyota Owner's website the flakiest website ever? I've been entering my VIN every other day for almost two weeks and it refuses to save my vehicle info... On top of that, when I try to view the service history or vehicle specs, it always tells me "Our site is currently undergoing maintenance, please try again later."
Not just you. I have never been able to activate an account. Sometimes it would send the activation email and other times it would say there was an error. When it did send the activation email and I clicked on the link minutes after receiving it, I was informed that the activation link was expired ...
@LHB - norm356 is 100% correct. If you're using the Toyota dealership for all your scheduled maintenance, there's no need to keep printouts of anything, it's all in the national database which can be accessed by any interested party with the VIN number. If you ever do any service yourself, or use a shop other than a Toyota dealership, then you'll want to keep a copy of the invoice documenting the service. I like to keep my paper copies anyway in a file I have for maintenance each of my vehicles, whether it was done at the dealership or not. Don't ask me why, it just makes me feel better haha...
I hear that javylsu. It's like if I don't have it on paper it never happened.
I don't know how old you are but I suspect you are a child of the analog age.
My hobby is my record collection and my high end two channel stereo on which I play them (which cost me more than any FJ will ever cost anybody--brag, brag).
I had a date recently with a girl much younger than me who had never heard a vinyl record in her life.
She was totally blown away by the idea that there was a "place" on a slab of vinyl on which the song she wanted to hear was located and that I could find it just by looking at the record.
In turn, I am blown away by things like "The Cloud." I am much more comfortable when I can hold something in my hands which is why I asked the question about paper records in the first place.
I reckon it's completely safe to say that I have officially crossed the line into "old fart-dom."
And I never even saw it coming.:crying
We did have a good time that night however. Some things will always be analog:smile:smile
Get a small spiral notebook. Put a pen in the spiral. Leave it in glovebox AT ALL TIMES. Keep service record there.
Works for me, and am not very organized either.
So I just logged in and updated my mileage on the owners site. It worked with no problem.
The only fault I see is in one of their maint records from the stealership.
I took it in for a check engine light that kept popping up. (evap system)
One time they just reset it for me, the next time they said they did a test on the system.
While doing said test, looks like they changed my brakes or some ****... I'll be giving them a call soon!
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