We started the van to get it ready for the trip to the RV dealer to replace the toilet and check the batteries only to find out that the serpentine belt broke on us.  We will expand on that in the next post, but in the meantime, we needed to get the van towed to a garage to get the belt replaced.

To lighten up the mood a bit, here’s a cheerful song for a not-so-cheerful event.

If only it was as simple as it is in the song!

We need to back up a bit.

The company that manufactured our van, Erwin Hymer North America Group went into receivership recently.  It is clear now that the company’s warranty will not be honoured, however, since a lot of the components were sourced from other manufacturers, it is still unclear which ones of those will be covered.

We do know Dometic will stand behind their products, which is why we will be able to replace our toilet without paying for a new one.  There is some chatter that the K2S, the battery manufacturer will stand behind their product (you may need to register your batteries with them), as well as Nations Electric, the under hood generator manufacturer.

If true, it’s a bit of a silver lining for otherwise, shafted owners.

Now we can continue with the topic of this post, road side assistance.  The van came with a 2 year road assistance membership, however, we weren’t sure that we are still covered, so we gave them a call and kept our fingers crossed.

The automated messages that popped up when we called the number was a Hymer messages, chill down our spin.  This is not a good sign!   We selected option 3 for road side assistance and after a short wait we were able to speak with a rep.  Phew.  So far so good!

It looks like we are covered. Our membership is active, but when we revealed our Canadian location, some confusion ensued.  The rep thought that we may need to pay upfront and get reimbursed by Hymer.

Yes, he knew that the company was under receivership. He went to find out more and…

…we were disconnected.

There was no call back even though he took my number at the beginning of the call, so after a short wait we called again.  We had to start from the beginning, but this time the rep was able to find out some more info and confirm that we are covered and do not have to pay upfront.

The process was lengthy as they had to find a company in Canada that will work with them – according to the rep, they don’t get a lot of calls from Canada   When all of that was sorted out, the wait was about an hour an a half, so close to three hours since our first phone call.

The rep was very helpful and explained that any call from Canada may be lengthy sonce the reps are not familiar with this case. So in the event that you are in a situation where you can’t wait and need to get a tow right away, he did give me information how to get reimbursed:

You will need to send a letter for reimbursement with date of service,  your membership number, Vehicle make model, colour, and mileage, and of course the receipts (keep a copy) to:
Vas Claims Department
13901 Midway Road Suite 102-429
Dallas, TX
75224-4388
Telephone number: 1-888-920-0091

A cheerful tow truck guy showed up with a flat bed and whisked the van to the garage to be fixed.  We consider this a success.

The one thing that concerns us is that since the phone message we got when we called the road side assistance number is from Hymer, will this dedicated phone number remain active?  Should we seek and alternative number?

Let us know if you have any further information about this, or better still, if you have another phone number that doesn’t go through Hymer.

If you enjoyed this post, please follow us.  You can like our Facebook page, share on your favourite social media page, or drop us a line to tell us about your experiences.  When you shop via our affiliate links, shop on Amazon.com in the United States, or Amazon.ca in Canada, we will get a portion of the sales.