Fowlers finance have sold me a bad car

[CUNGA]

In january 2015.I applied for car finance with Fowlers finance as i didnt have any spare money to purchase a decent car with cash.

 

I applied online and a person from the company called me went through an application and after about 6 hours contacted me to say that i had been approved and that i could go to manchester to get the car.

 

 

Originally i wanted a Vauxhall Insignia but when i got to Manchester i was told the car had been sold by another branch but they had a citroen C4 7 seater i could have a look at.

I have a large family and i liked the car so i accepted that one instead.

 

 

There was some scuff marks on front bumper and other little bit to bodywork and i commented on this and was told dont worry we will get someone to come to your home and repair them.

I was ok with that so didnt think much else of it.

 

They took me into the branch to fill in the paperwork for the car and i asked if i could test drive the car and was told this wasn't possible as the car was getting a device fitted to it and would take approx 30mins so after the paperwork i could do it then.

I thought ok sounds reasonable , went along with it.

 

 

After i did the paperwork the guy shook my hand and said thanks and we went to the car

it wasn't there it was over the road getting valeted by a garage

 

 

we went to there and the garage even tried to charge me for the valet in which i declined and laughed but fowlers told me dont worry we will sort it.

They gave me the keys and then left.

 

 

I live in Durham and car was in Manchester and it was around 1pm in day and needed to get back for kids school run i started to drive home.

 

 

After about 100 miles the car cut out on me and the display started showing."AIR POLLUTION FAILURE, HANDBRAKE FAILURE ,OIL PRESSURE FAILURE" amongst other faults

 

 

i pulled over on hard shoulder the engine management light was on but after about 10mins it went off and car was fine so i drove home.

 

when i got home i rang fowlers and told them what had happened they told me not to worry its more than likely a sensor and it got some dirt on it.

 

The next day i did a full inspection of the car and these are the faults i found.

 

A BIG ARCH IN DRIVER VIEW ON WINDSCREEN

AIRCON COMPRESSOR GRINDING AND MAKING LOUD NOISE.

2 BALD REAR TYRES

3 NUTS ON 1 WHEEL

BRAKE PADS NON EXISTANT

DRIVER SIDE WHEEL CALIPER SEIZED

THE REAR SEAT WAS DAMAGED OFF RAIL AND COULDNT BE MOVED NEVER MIND PUT DOWN

2 CENTRE SEATS DON'T MOVE NOR FOLD DUE TO CABLE PROBLEM.

 

I contacted fowlers with the problems listed

they told me that they would put me through to after sales and no-one answered

this went on for 2 weeks never getting through.

 

 

After a while i contacted my finance company telling them the problems and they told me they would look into it

 

 

after months of complaining and still making my payments

i contacted the ombudsman and they did what they do and also contacted a company to come and examine the car only 3 weeks ago remember i bought car in january and inspection in december .

 

 

The guy was really nice and told me that he had to be honest with me and ay there is no way of knowing if this happened last week or was there when i bought car and would be hard to prove.

 

This made me kind of upset as i have been complaining for months

.Now the ombudsman is saying that they got report and in the engineers opinion there faults were not there at point of sale but they were.

 

 

I contacted The car finance company at start of march and i they have them logged

 

 

recently i asked them if they record calls and i was told no only log them

and i asked for a copy of all logs they have with time and dates to back me up

they stated that i would be charged for this.

 

 

Also i forgot to mention that the car had no service history at all

i did not get an MOT was told they mislayed it and would be forwarded to me and the ombudsman told me that the milage was something like 90k on mot but when i got car it was 98.5k

 

 

i feel there is a major coverup going on

i just dont know i need your help to see if theres anything i can do

 

 

.I know about the watchdog program regarding them too this happened 6 months after i got car.

 

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

ah yeh report also said that the arch in driver side should of failed MOT this was on screen when i bought car.

[citizenB]

You should use the Subject Access request and this will only cost you £10.00 for the information you are requesting.

[Conniff]

What is the name of the selling dealer ?

[CUNGA]

The dealer is fowlers finance the finance company is called the car finance company

[Conniff]

Ok. I've been looking at their site and it doesn't say what type of finance it is, is it a car loan or HP. It will say at the top of the agreement.

[CUNGA]

The agreement i signed is a hire purchase agreement

[Conniff]

Ah good, so that means you didn't buy the car but the finance company did and it means they own the car and not you.

 

I'll go into more detail later cunga.

[CUNGA]

Many thanks i need all the help i can get as i feel i dont have many rights left due to time taken

[Conniff]

What, if any, complaints to them do you have on paper or were they all done on the telephone ?

[CUNGA]

all my complaints were done by telephone

[silverfox1961]

Hi

I did a few checks on this company yesterday and they are so bad that they even featured on Watchdog earlier this year.

 

They seem to get cars (or wrecks) from auctions for a pittance then just flog them on to people who cannot get credit elsewhere.

 

The name behind Fowlers had been in prison for running a debt removal company and has been banned to be a director of a company but from the Watchdog clip, he seems to still have a major finger in the pie, just not as a director.

[CUNGA]

Hi silver.yeh i know i got car in january he featured on tv about 5 - 6 months later wish i knew that then things would of been different.The thing that concerns me is that the finance company has a form they fill in when you contact them if you are having issues and the 1st question on the form is "IS IT A FOWLERS CAR"

[CUNGA]

I was wondering if this is under the sale of good act with the 6 month thing if things are there in 6 moth its taken as if they were there at point of sale or something like that.

[scaniaman]

Why were the bald tyres not noticed when you inspected the car????

[CUNGA]

tbh i dont know i dont know anything about cars but i looked at bodywork and inside seemed ok then car was in garage getting device fitted then valeter i saw it for like 5 mins or so

[silverfox1961]

Any updates on this thread? Someone else has suffered with Fowlers and may need some input.

[CUNGA]

well i lost my case with ombudsman

 

by all accounts i did all the faults and fowlers had nothing to do with it.

 

Its rubbish all faults were there.

 

Someone at the finance company said to me do you think you would win

as we have the ombudsman in our pockets and we never lose.

 

I dont really know what to say but i think you are stuck with the car if you buy from fowlers

 

they are very dodgey to say the least and even televison exposed them but still nothing done about it.

[king12345]

But you were on hp, the car doesn't belong to you...

[CUNGA]

I don't understand what you mean.

[silverfox1961]

Can you lay out which Ombudsman dealt with you, the reason why they disagreed with you and did you refuse to accept the ombudsmans ruling.

 

It may be that it was an adjudicator who made the original decision not the full Ombudsman.

 

You may still be in a position to take court action against Fowlers.

[king12345]

The car belongs to the finance company so they should sort this out.

Anyway, they could claim that you made some of the faults, in particular:

A BIG ARCH IN DRIVER VIEW ON WINDSCREEN

3 NUTS ON 1 WHEEL

THE REAR SEAT WAS DAMAGED OFF RAIL AND COULDNT BE MOVED NEVER MIND PUT DOWN

2 CENTRE SEATS DON'T MOVE NOR FOLD DUE TO CABLE PROBLEM

 

The other faults cannot be done by you, simply because it doesn't matter what you do, a brake caliper shouldn't seize in a year or so etc.

 

In any case, you complained about all of these faults soon after getting the car, correct?

Do you have records of this complaint?

If so, most of the faults cannot be disputed (except maybe the windscreen crack)

It all comes down to what evidence you have of your initial complaint.

[CUNGA]

I had my case with a person from the ombudsman they arranged an inspector to come ut check the car after a year btw his opinion was that the problems developed after point of sale and this was not the case at all.The finance company stated that i only got in touch with them 6 weeks after buying the car and that was correct but i was trying to get car sorted with Fowlers before the finance company someone told me to contact the finance company due to me having a hire purchase agrrement i didnt know this at time or i would of done it straight away.

 

The person i was originally dealing with from ombudsman was someone called syeda.She is a waste of time she doesnt listen to anything you say to her she comes across as if she is all caring etc but trust me she aint.I think this is the person the guy from the car finance company was saying was in his pocket.She then did her report and sent it to an ombudsman and he looked at the case and what she had wrote in the report he made his decision not to uphold the claim.

 

I have refused the decision as it is totally lies she didnt listen a lot of my case was missed off the report and tbh i knew i didnt stand much of a chance with her doing the case.

 

I have contacted a solicitor to see what i can do with taking the finance company to court and i have to pay £75 ph in which i am looking into as i will not allow people to get away with ripping customers off

[king12345]

As you contacted the finance company after 6 weeks, it is implied that faults were present at point of sale, unless they can prove it otherwise.

The burden of proof is with them, not you.

Even if fowlers claim that you never contacted them immediately.

I guess it's time for more experienced caggers to point out what to do now.

I am not too familiar with hire agreements.

[Conniff]

An hire purchase agreement means that you see a car and a company buys that car. They then hire that car to you for say two years, at the end of those two years they then will give you the car for a small payment.

Up until that final payment is made the car belongs to them and so do all the problems associated with it.

 

You should not alter or modify the car during the hire period as with any hire car.

 

After you have paid 50% of the agreed payments, you can hand the car back to them, (voluntary termination), with no further payments having to be made. That should be detailed in your agreement.

 

You should send a subject access request to the finance company who should have recorded the phone calls specifically saying you want a copy of the phone calls you made to them. It is a legal requirement for them to send this data for which they can charge up to £10, so send a £10 cheque along with your request.

 

This data will be your proof that you reported the problems at or before six weeks after purchase which is well within the six months where regulations say "faults are assumed to have been there at the time of purchase".

 

Can you let us know how you intend to go forward with this please Cunga ?

Edited February 19, 2016 by Conniff