Hi dx, No I'm not 100% certain. I do have paperwork that I will go through to check. Sorry but what is a SAR and how do I do one?

Hi dx, Sol=solicitor? Excuse my ignorance. I think I have a fair bit to learn on here before I proceed with whatever course of action deemed sensible. One thing I can tell you is I am up for a fight

Hi Dx, Thanks for the reply. I believe it was brought by Tesco originally, but will get back to you on that. It has been handled by a couple of companies/solicitors one was Incasso, another Shoosmiths.

Hi Ford, Thanks for the reply. Sadly much of the paperwork I had was lost when I was couch surfing, but will go through what I have got and get back to you.

Hi and thanks in advance. I wondered if anyone could tell me if I am being, or have been, treated fairly with regards to a debt i have been paying off for some time now. I originally took a personal loan of £15k to buy into a business. It wasn't secured on the house I own, as at the time I was quite credit worthy and didn't expect there to be any problems. This was just before the recession. The business that we had worked hard to build up failed. Sadly my marriage did also. I started to fall behind on my payments and tried to negotiate with Tesco, but was given short shrift. The people I spoke to made no secret of the fact that they would proceed with a view of repossesing the property I own with my ex wife, if their demands were not met. The loan agreement was approx £170 per month, but they were demanding over £300 per month at a time when I simply couldn't afford it. They then placed a charging order on the property. Work for me at the time was sporadic, I am a builder and very little work was taking place at that time. I was staying on friends couches etc and paying them everything I could afford. I have religiously made these payment (on average £100 per month) for nearly a decade, and assumed that the debt would have been reduced significantly. I was informed that the debt had been frozen when I defaulted and it was passed to a debt handling company. Over the last couple of years I have worked 7 days a week to build a company up and things have gone well. I am now in the position to be able to face some of the demons of the past and so requested a breakdown of whatever debt was still outstanding from Tesco. You can probably guess the next bit. They have been charging interest ( I think at 5.9% PA) for the entire duration since I defaulted. I was staggered. I assumed that it would have been down to a nominal figure. I haven't spoken to anyone including Tesco, or the various companies that have pursued the debt on their behalf. I wanted to find out as much as I could before I did so. I am hoping I have some form of case here. The irony is now I can actually afford to pay the figure off in full immediately. It's just that they categorically informed me that the debt had been frozen when the account went into arrears. I am happy to supply as much information as I have if needed. Any help with this would be greatly appreciated. I have used CAG in the past to help a friend who was threatened with having her home repossessed. The outcome was.......She is still happily living there! Thanks for reading. Gary

Hi Oddjobbob, Just have a gut instinct that if we do allow him it's not likely to be satisfactory and really don't want a prolonged scenario. Hoping we might negotiate something more sensible for both parties as in he pay for the parts and we cover the labour at our local garage.

Hi Raydetinu I can understand the dealers attitude to minimizing his costs but he has a duty to ensure the vehicle was mechanically sound at point of sale, and as the gearbox failed within a few days (most likely was failing prior to sale but not evident) and the throttle mechanism was almost certainly defective prior to sale (emissions warning on dash but he insisted it just needed a service), he simply hasn't done so. As we have paid £250 for an inspection and the bill for transportation likely to be around £300 with no guarantee that works will be satisfactory we could be further out of pocket with no guarantee of a decent outcome. I think the major factor in our hesitancy to return the vehicle has been his behavior after the event. We had to phone him a number of times as he kept hanging up on us. He then kept changing tack with regards to at one point indicating that he would collect the vehicle. Then asking us to pay for half the cost of transportation and now insisting we return the vehicle entirely at our own cost. He was also insisting it was just a bearing issue, which is quite a staggering ability to diagnose the vehicle without even seeing it! I am considering asking if he would at least consider covering the cost of the parts and we have our own garage fit them, as this would equate to the cost of transportation and at least we would be certain that the works are carried out to our satisfaction. Not sure if that weakens our case though if he refused and we elected to sue?

We have a bill of sale so not sure if that constitutes a contract. There is no doubt that the goods are not of satisfactory quality and on that basis I do believe I have grounds to sue. Just whether its a worthwhile exercise considering our position. I really don't see us returning the vehicle. Just have a really bad feeling as to where that might lead.

Hi Heliosuk, Thanks for the response, as with all the responses its much appreciated. We have use our local garage for the last three years for all of our vehicles, and Steve the owner is a good friend and straight as they come. He isn't the sort of person to make capital out of a situation and, due to the business we give him, has already provided costs which are more than fair to try and help the situation. Costs of good 2nd hand gearbox between £500-£800 plus £180 fitting and throttle mechanism approx £200 new plus £60 fitting. Worst case scenario it would still cost the dealer about a grand if i was to return the vehicle but we could be £300 out of pocket for the transportation plus no guarantee that works have been carried out to our satisfaction and the time, effort and money that will be spent subsequently if repairs unsatisfactory. That being said I do have to look at this situation from the perspective of an unbiased third party and it could appear that we are frustrating the situation by insisting that we are not liable for the costs of transporting the vehicle back to the dealer for repairs to be undertaken. However this isn't just based upon the cost, it's also the fact that we simply do not trust him. Although we are not mechanics, the noise coming from the gearbox is enough for even a layman to not be comfortable in driving it any distance, yet he insisted we drive the vehicle back and if it broke down he would then recover us, but this contradicts his statement of refusing to recover the vehicle. It's the combination of all these factors that make us uncomfortable with putting ourselves at his mercy. We have purchased many vehicles over the years and when issues have arisen they have been dealt with by the various dealers in a professional manner than generally reflects the desire from them to protect both their reputation and ensuring the likelihood of doing business with us again. It's looking most likely we will just elect to repair the vehicle ourselves and chalk this up to experience. We haven't ruled out chasing some form of compensation, subject to us having some form of case, but it's likely this guy knows just how to present himself in situations of this kind to have the edge. I'm a firm believer in Karma, so perhaps things will even themselves out in time..... Thanks again to all of you for your objective feedback. Much appreciated!

That's my biggest concern. My gut instinct is if I take it back there will be more issues arising from this situation and I don't want a long protracted situation developing.

Hi Oddjobbob, Thanks for the response. I haven't ruled it out yet, but quite aggrieved that we should have to pay for the transportation for a vehicle that failed within 2 weeks of purchase. The vehicle is not safe to drive any distance at all so remains at my local garage for the time being. I was hoping the dealer would accept that it would be more sensible, practical and cost efficient to allow my local garage to do the work and cover the cost, rather than have the car shipped over a hundred miles, and also we maybe thought we had the right to do so, but looking more and more likely that is not the case. Just gutted about the whole affair TBH.

Hi Raydetinu, Thanks for the response. Surely the dealer has a responsibility to ensure the vehicle is fit for purpose before sale from any major faults regardless of who the sale is made to. But then again it does kind of make sense that he may have seen this as an opportunity to exploit us as a business based upon that knowledge. It's my intention to spend this weekend trying to ascertain as much information regarding the legalities and responsibilities of car dealers before I decide what to do.

Hi Connif, Would that really make a difference?

Hi Rebel, Thanks for the welcome! The car was bought through the company. Also thanks for the document. Will have a good read through tomorrow. Gary

Hi and thanks in advance for any assistance you might give me. I run a small building company and we recently purchased a VW Passat from a dealer in Sutton to use as a company vehicle. Although we noted what appeared to be a few minor issues we were initially happy with the purchase. Within a few days a loud whining began from the gearbox and so we took it to our local garage, who takes care of all of our vehicles and is tried and trusted. He diagnosed gearbox failure and also ran a diagnostic which found that the throttle flap mechanism wasn't working correctly, another serious fault. He advised that the vehicle should not be driven until repairs had been made. We contacted the dealer immediately to explain and he advised us to drive the vehicle back and he would carry out repairs. We advised that is wasn't safe to drive, but he kept insisting it would be fine. This was repeated a number of times until we decided to write to him explaining that we would not drive the vehicle. We also do not believe we should pay for the vehicle to be recovered to his garage for the repairs, something which he is also insisting on. The vehicle has now remained undriven since the inspection and we are running out of patience. We are prepared to arrange for the repairs to be done at our local garage but the dealer is refusing to cover the cost of this. It looks very much like we will have to go down the legal route but any input would be appreciated.