Changed the passengers seat airbag today and found this

[Carpy25]

You all know the story intermittent airbag dash light coming on , reset it and its off a while but ends up on more than its off
followed all the normal guides first unbolt the seat and cut off the plug and solder the wires up , but VW had beaten me to it so ended up redoing their repair and cleaning the plug connection in the floor , light out , light back on a few days later , next I replaced the harness about half inch from the floor plug to six inches after the joint I'd just redone , light out , light back on a few days later , as the same code was coming up  decided the next action was replacing the airbag picked up a second hand bag off eBay and fitted it today
hell of a job I've striped seats before but this one had tension straps all over the place , when I finally got at the air bag I found this

   

a joint where the wiring harness runs across the bottom of the seat back frame

   

VW had been here first I'm the second owner had the car from 46K and its got a full VAG service history  it must have been a big job for VW to put a joint in there why didn't they just replace the bag
lights off now and fingers crossed

This may be useful to someone the cheap reset tool I bought , it resets airbag lights not many do 

  http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/290987216944?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

Rob 

[Ruggy]

Is it quite an accurate code reader? I'm planning on getting VCDS but it won't be unil later in the year and I've got the airbag light I'd like to clear.

[Carpy25]

only had the airbag code , read other sections  no codes showing , reads the airbag code as 1280 (I think ) which is the VAG code for passenger seat airbag
for £12 you cant go wrong 

[Ruggy]

Ok cheers, I'll order one as a stop gap.

[arris]

Im sure the lad at work had this issue in his jetta.

And when he spoke to VW they had a service bulletin about this problem, and that is the official VW fix apparently.

[Carpy25]

Im sure the lad at work had this issue in his jetta.

And when he spoke to VW they had a service bulletin about this problem, and that is the official VW fix apparently.

It had the normal joint under the seat as well this joint was inside the back rest along the bottom rail of the seat back you would never have found it unless you were replacing the airbag

Rob

[dTEA]

That's madness. Although not to be unexpected. I can't believe it's an MOT failure with the warning light on and this is still VWs response.