AA to close all service centres

Friday, October 08, 2004

The AA has decided to close all of its 122 Service Centres in the UK and is also shutting down its mobile tyre-fitting operation and vehicle inspection business.

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The AA has decided to close all of its 122 Service Centres in the UK and is also shutting down its mobile tyre-fitting operation and vehicle inspection business.

The company says it has been unable to provide a comprehensive service throughout the UK with the loss-making Service Centres, and has made the decision to withdraw from the sector today.

The AA says it now plans to ‘form a new business relationship’ with Nationwide Autocentres, the largest independent car service and MoT provider in the UK, which will take over 50 of the centres.

These will continue to carry AA branding for at least a year, the motoring organisation said, although it will be made clear to customers that work is being carried out by Nationwide.

The addition of the AA centres to the Nationwide family means the outfit will have 225 centres throughout the UK, all of which will become AA-approved outlets. The AA says it will audit the centres to ‘ensure that quality standards are in place and being complied with’.

AA chief executive Tim Parker said: ‘We believe this will provide a better service to our members and customers. The arrangement is the best long-term solution for our members and customers.’

The motoring organisation bought the service centres from Halfords in September 2001 and rebranded them as AA outlets.

The AA’s mobile tyre-fitting business, with its 130-strong fleet, has also been operating at a loss and ceases to trade with immediate effect. The loss-making AA Vehicle Inspections, which provides mechanical examinations of used cars, will close in November.

The closure of the AA’s servicing centres comes days after the chain fared poorly in a What Car? undercover investigation. See the full report in the November issue of What Car?, on sale now.