Volkswagen_Malaysia_Free_petrol

Nothing grabs the attention of Malaysian motorists quite like price hikes or reductions of cars and/or fuel. This new promotion by Volkswagen Group Malaysia (VGM) – up to five years of free fuel - attempts to pull at both our heartstrings at once. Little detail is offered on VGM's website, though, which piqued our curiosity.

Upon our request, VGM's clarification of the matter is as such:

This promotion applies to all CBU models (except Polo 1.2 and Polo GTI). Customers get to enjoy free petrol of UP TO five years (model dependent). Calculation is made based on current RON95 petrol price of RM2.10 per litre (or diesel at RM2.00 per litre), with two basic assumptions: 1) average kilometre per year is 20,000 km. 2) average consumption is according to the combined fuel consumption as per each model (found on the brochures).

So in essence, get a CBU Volkswagen model and VGM would cover the average cost of your fuel usage for up to five years (certain models are entitled to less). The Golf 1.4 TSI, for instance, is claimed to use 5.0 litres per 100 km, so it would need 1,000 litres of fuel to cover the average annual range of 20,000 km. That's RM2,100 in fuel costs that you'd get back from VGM. Per year.

If you think this is just another way of discounting, it is. But is that such a bad thing?