At around 8000 km the message "maintenance required" popped up on the dash of my 2024 Prius Plugin. That was followed by emails from the dealer telling me to bring the car in for its scheduled maintenance. This is my first Toyota so I figured I would ask here, is this just a money grab or is work on the car actually needed for warranty ect? I have decent garages/mechanics that I use for cheaper oil changes and repairs. So what is actually needed at around the 8000 km mark and should I bring it in to the dealer? I checked the manuals and there was not much info in there. thanks for the info,
if you look at the maintenance schedule, you will notice that the popup correlates to the schedule. in the us, it's every 5k miles. i don't know canada laws, but you don't have to go to a dealer for service here to maintain the warranty. 8,000 km will just be tires rotation, inspections, fluid top ups (supposedly) and checking some bolt torques. here, the first 25k are free, but if i had to pay, i wouldn't do it, diy it, or take it to a trusted mech. there is nothing serious in the first 100k miles other than oil and filter changes. air and cabin filters are easy.
Toyota Canada, commencing with gen 4, does not include the maintenance schedule in either the Owner's Manual or the other booklet, forgetting what it's called in Canada, maybe Owner's Manual Supplement. Schedule, blessed little mishmash but in existence, used to be in the latter booklet. The only way I know of to see the current schedule is to go here: Maintenance Schedule | Toyota Canada and enter your months or kilometers. It's likely close to the gen 3 though, for which I've cobbled a table format summary (attached). But do verify with the online, official schedule.There are some notable exceptions, for one the oil change interval has been changed from 8000km/6mo, to 16000km/12mo. Personally I would stick with 8k/6mo, though with plug-in, using lots of EV, maybe16k ok. I would consider a transaxle fluid change as well, early on, to flush out manufacture debris. There’s no mention of this in the schedule.
Interesting too: with our Canadian spec gen 3, there is no "maintenance required" alert in the dash. Looking at a gen 4 Owners Manual (pdf), that was still the case: When you look up the 8000 km (or 6 months, whichever comes first), it'll tell you "service #1" is due, and clicking on the link, this is what it entails: I've highlighted the one significant item. The rest is readily DIY'able. Note too, this is a generic list, your car doesn't even have all that stuff. And, you're not obligated to have them do all that. My 2 cents: rotating tires is more'n likely all the dealership will do, behind closed doors. Ah, they might top up the washer fluid, since it's readily visible. But seriously, do you want to pay someone to look at the wipers, top up washer fluid and so on?
it's like the people who write: 'i just had my prius xxx mile maintenance done at the dealer. now my 12 volt battery died and i had to jump it. i took it in and they said it was bad. you'd think it would have been tested during the service.'
