Getting a refund on a faulty car

[stazbaby]

Hi I am trying to get some advice for my 62 year old mother. She has just bought a car on the 27th oct for £2000. On mon 31st oct, so 4 days later she took the car for a service and was told the head gasket has gone, air conditioning not working and air bag has been taken out. She has been told by another garage that the car will not pass an mot without the airbag in it. Now my mother has only driven the car from the garage to her home and thats it during those 4 days as they do have another car.

 

Knowing this my mother decided she wanted a refund of£2000 which she paid by debit card. However she went to the garage where she bought the car and spoke with the boss. He was abrupt and rude told her he would repair the car and thats it and then ordered her off the property. My mother was in tears with how the man spoke with her and feels she wouldn't trust him to repair the car properly. She just wants a refund she doesnt want the car back. The car is back with the garage now. We have spoken with trading standards/consumer direct. They said he was in breach of contract and she should put this in writing and give him 7 days to reply.

 

My mother is quite old and has been ill recently so she is not wanting to go to court. Is there anything else we can do? Is she entitiled to a refund after just 3/4 days as the man is claiming it was my mothers fault!!!

 

Any advice is appreciated!!!!!

[Consumer dude]

Hi I am trying to get some advice for my 62 year old mother. She has just bought a car on the 27th oct for £2000. On mon 31st oct, so 4 days later she took the car for a service and was told the head gasket has gone, air conditioning not working and air bag has been taken out. She has been told by another garage that the car will not pass an mot without the airbag in it. Now my mother has only driven the car from the garage to her home and thats it during those 4 days as they do have another car.

 

Knowing this my mother decided she wanted a refund of£2000 which she paid by debit card. However she went to the garage where she bought the car and spoke with the boss. He was abrupt and rude told her he would repair the car and thats it and then ordered her off the property. My mother was in tears with how the man spoke with her and feels she wouldn't trust him to repair the car properly. She just wants a refund she doesnt want the car back. The car is back with the garage now. We have spoken with trading standards/consumer direct. They said he was in breach of contract and she should put this in writing and give him 7 days to reply.

 

My mother is quite old and has been ill recently so she is not wanting to go to court. Is there anything else we can do? Is she entitiled to a refund after just 3/4 days as the man is claiming it was my mothers fault!!!

 

Any advice is appreciated!!!!!

 

 

 

 

 

Hiya, welcme to cag. I can't advise you myself on this issue but be assured some one will be along soon to put you on the right path..

[silverfox1961]

Hi and welcome to CAG

 

I have moved your post to a new place where people with experience will see it.

 

Hopefully someone will pop up soon

 

I would say that now he has the car back, you do write the letter demanding the refund and get it to him ASAP.

 

If he refuses, Trading Standards 'may' help but it may come to filing a claim at court

[Conniff]

Hello stazbaby.

 

What is the date on the present MoT certificate?

[oddjobbob]

Hang on a minute....

 

'head gasket has gone'... do you know this for sure? Or is the servicing garage trynig to get a few quid out of you? Has the car overheated / lost water/ lost power

 

'air conditioning not working'.... was it ADVERTISED as having airconditioning? A proper aircon man will diagnose the problem for you... it could be as simple as a regas £50 or as difficult as a condenser (£500)... but if the advert did not say 'airconditioning' as a feature then the dealer may well claim he was unaware that the car had this and that's why he never advertsed it.. in other words, he never said it had it, you thought you'd got something he didn't know about as a bonus so tough. I know and you know it's nonosense that he wouldn't know, but he may well claim this.

 

'She has been told by another garage that the car will not pass an mot without the airbag in it. ' .. then the other garage are talking out of their hat, an airbag / airbag warning light is not part of the mot test. Yes, yuo may well think its a safety matter (and it is) but some cars do not even have an airbag and yet they pass the mot! Would your car pass the MOT if both foglights were broken... YES... becasue foglights are not standard on a car... stupid but there you go.

 

So I wouldn't necessarily believe the garage that says the head gasket's gone, the air con maybe a simple fix, and the airbag is immterial to the MOT (again, did the ad say 'airbag'?

 

Sorry to **** on your bonfire, just telling it how it is!

[grahamengineering]

I agree with oddjob here. Quite how this garage managed to find an airbag missing is beyond me. This requires the steering wheel to be partly removed. Again this is not a test failure at present.

 

Air con not working, well in all fairness it is a £2k car and given the British weather its not something to worry about.

 

Head gasket, well if it is gone then the dealer whould come good and fix it. But as you have allowed another garage to work on the vehicle since it left him he will legally be able to wash his hands, stating he doesn't know what this other garage have done and may well have caused the hg failure.

[sailor sam]

I can't see in the OP's account where it states that another garage has worked on the vehicle apart from perhaps giving it a service. Strange though that it was considerded necessary to service it so soon after buying it. Surely that was the seller's should of done before delivery? Was there an obvious reason for your mother wanting it serviced? At this stage to formally reject the car for a refund, you would have to show that the car was miss-sold if you havn't given the seller reasonable opportunity to rectify the problem(s). as previoulsy mentioned, a lot would depend on how the car was described.

[oddjobbob]

It's not the seller's responsibility to service a car before he sells it.

 

Althuogh of course many main dealers and some other dealers do do it.

 

The problem is that if a seller spends £100 on servicing the car, will he get £100 more for it at sale time?... or will the buyer(s) look for one a little bit cheaper in auto trader?

 

We need to know if the head gasket IS actually gone... I was told this years ago by a garage on a merc I owned, it drove perfectly, didn't boil until short of water, but would lose a pint of water ever 200 miles.

 

It was a faulty radiator cap, £4.95 from halfords.

[sailor sam]

It's not the seller's responsibility to service a car before he sells it.

 

Althuogh of course many main dealers and some other dealers do do it.

 

The problem is that if a seller spends £100 on servicing the car, will he get £100 more for it at sale time?... or will the buyer(s) look for one a little bit cheaper in auto trader?

 

We need to know if the head gasket IS actually gone... I was told this years ago by a garage on a merc I owned, it drove perfectly, didn't boil until short of water, but would lose a pint of water ever 200 miles.

 

It was a faulty radiator cap, £4.95 from halfords.

 

Nobody said it was. But personally, I would never buy a car from a dealer that dosn't.

[grahamengineering]

Sailor sam, As the coolant would be checked or even changed to increase protection by the servicing garage, the original seller could quite rightly claim that they didn't fill it to the level, or bleed it to remove air.

[sailor sam]

Sailor sam, As the coolant would be checked or even changed to increase protection by the servicing garage, the original seller could quite rightly claim that they didn't fill it to the level, or bleed it to remove air.

 

Well if that was the case, then perhaps the OP's mother should of taken the car to a vet then if the servicing garage could get something like that wrong. In any event, as possible as that may be, it still dosn't answer my questions.