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Yet ANOTHER New Motorhome Problem


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There should be no risk using clause 9, 10 and 11 of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 to initially reject the motor home. The OP needs to write a letter to the dealership stating that they want to reject the vehicle. I suggest that the OP keeps the letter brief, but bullet pointing the issues with the motorhome and stating that the motor home does not conform to the clauses mentioned which is why it is being rejected. This letter needs to be done as soon as possible giving the dealer 7 days in which to respond as the OP does nto wnat the vehicle repaired any more.

 

Once they have done this step then if the dealer refuses the rejection at that point clauses 19 & 20 of the CRA 2015 can be used and we can offer further advice. Until the OP has handed the dealership the rejection letter there is nothing any of us or any highly paid solicitor can done to enforce clauses 19 & 20 of the CRA 2015. TBH there should be no need to use a solicitor in this case.

 

The OP has indicated on more than one occasion that in the first 6 months multiple faults occurred and many were repeat faults resulting in the time period being extended due to the waiting time and possibly the 6 month time period may still be in force today.

 

As it is a motor vehicle unfortunately there probably will be a deduction however the OP can claim for compensation which can make up the difference.

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I understand fully what you are trying to say, but firstly you need to understand that simply relying upon rights which are conferred by the consumer rights act does not remove the risk of costs if for some reason or other the action is lost.

 

I have already said that regardless of the consumer rights act, the chances of succeeding in an action against the supplier is extremely high and I don't think that the odds change at all whether you want to rely on the cra or upon the common law.

 

A second issue arises with the use of the consumer rights act. It seems clear to me that the right which you are referring to needs to be asserted and the problem is that it has not been asserted.

You're quite right that there have been several defects which have manifested themselves and which have apparently been repaired but at no point did the OP make it clear to the retailer that he was requesting the repairs as a preamble to asserting rights under the cra.

This on its own suggests to me that the OP has surrendered any rights he might have usefully claimed under the cra and so must fall back to his rights under the common law of contract.

 

The truth is that the rights granted under the CRA not rights in the true sense of the word. They are not granted unconditionally. You have to do something to acquire them: you have to assert them.

this doesn't pose any difficulties as far as I am concerned and creates no disadvantage for the OP. The rights are the same as are the remedies as are the risks.

My own view is that the risks are minimal but they do need to be factored in.

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as I have started banging on about the rights which are apparently conferred by the consumer rights act comment I think that the present debate highlights one of the very serious flaws of the cra and the right which it purports to create.

 

in order to benefit from the short term right to reject, you must assert your right within the first 30 days of the contract. How many ordinary individuals, whether they are buying a cheap computer from Currys for a £60,000 motorhome are aware of their rights under the cra or their rights than any other piece of legislation?

I have no doubt but that the answer is almost no one.

 

What this means is that a consumer needs to be lucky enough to find a support forum such as the CAG within the 30-day period and to learn of his or her rights and then to take the proper steps to assert them. I fully expect that there are so few people who do this that it is fair enough to say that the rights conferred by the consumer rights act are in effect illusory. I have no idea why parliament decided to create the rights and make them conditional but by doing so parliament has undermined an extremely useful tool which consumers everywhere might have been able to exercise against unhelpful retailers with a resulting improvement in consumer service and product standards generally.

 

It would be interesting to see the Hansard debates and to understand the drafting history of the cra in order to discoverwhether the original suggestion might have been the creation of an unconditional right which was then watered down maybe as a result of pressure from the retail industries.

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I am sorry but as per section 22 of CRA 2015 that is incorrect as you have six months from time of delivery to reject however after the first 30 days you need to give the supplier one chance at repair before requesting a replacement or rejection for a full refund. The same section covers the waiting period in clause 6.

The OP has had several repeat faults in the first 6 months and at each fault the waiting time is extended plus I am sure there is six months from the date of the repair so that specific repair is covered for another six months. I covered the waiting period etc in an earlier post as it was used successfully by us to reject a £33k caravan at 11 months and get a full refund plus some serious compensation.

The short term right to reject should still be in place even though the unit is over a year old.

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s.22 only deals with the short term right - 30 days. Not the final right - 6 months.

 

s.20 makes it clear that both rights needs to asserted.

 

I'd love to be wrong but I don't expect that I am.

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s.22 only deals with the short term right - 30 days. Not the final right - 6 months.

 

s.20 makes it clear that both rights needs to asserted.

 

I'd love to be wrong but I don't expect that I am.

 

As said the unit may still be within the waiting period. However under CRA 2015 section 9, 10 & 11 the consumer can probably still reject the unit as per section 19(6) which is what we successfully did with our rejection and using advice from an expert consumer solicitor.

However even though we may disagree it is still essential that as soon as possible the OP write a letter rejecting the unit!

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As said the unit may still be within the waiting period. However under CRA 2015 section 9, 10 & 11 the consumer can probably still reject the unit as per section 19(6) which is what we successfully did with our rejection and using advice from an expert consumer solicitor.

However even though we may disagree it is still essential that as soon as possible the OP write a letter rejecting the unit!

I gather from what you say here that your complaint never actually went to litigation but was settled as a result of some negotiation or threatened litigation?

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I gather from what you say here that your complaint never actually went to litigation but was settled as a result of some negotiation or threatened litigation?

 

That is correct as I used CRA 2015 to our full advantage and the dealer/finance company could not argue against legislation. We were up against the dealer, the finance company and also the Financial Ombudsman who initially sided with the finance house until we pointed out the specific legislation. From time of rejection until getting a full refund plus compensation took about 4 months.

BTW here is a tip for the OP. Get an independent AWS or MCEA technician to do a report on the motorhome as soon as possible. Cost will be about £100 for the report, but this can be recouped and would stand up well in court. Also a request for copies for all documentation from the dealer regarding repairs may also help as the dealer would keep records as they have the claim for warranty repairs from the manufacturer.

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thank you.

 

In other words your version of the rights of the matter and the effect of the consumer rights act were not tested court.

 

Exactly what happened was that you faced them out and they backed down. Of course this is the very best way to deal with it because then you don't have the normal litigation risks. However, I am quite sure that if it had gone to court then a properly advised and represented retailer would have won the argument on the basis of the consumer rights act although I'm quite sure that they would have lost the case generally on the basis of youri common law rights under contract law.

 

It is unwise to use the result of a negotiated settlement to say that you have now established what the law actually is.

 

in terms of the ombudsman changing their mind once the legislation had been pointed out to them, I'm afraid that is meaningless. I think that it is extremely significant that apparently the ombudsman had no idea of the legislation which was already in place anyway.

 

This simply reinforces my general view that the ombudsman is limp-wristed, half-hearted and serves the industry.

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Your suggestion of getting an independent report is extremely sensible

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do you have a letter or some document showing that the ombudsman came to a particular decision and then retracted that decision when they were made aware of the prevailing law?

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... and incidentally, have you written up your story about your motorhome battle on this forum? Even if we did not help you here I'm sure that your adventures with it would be extremely helpful to other people.

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do you have a letter or some document showing that the ombudsman came to a particular decision and then retracted that decision when they were made aware of the prevailing law?

 

When you submit a complaint to the Ombudsman it does not go anywhere near an Ombudsman and is dealt with by a first tier representative who tries to make a decision. Their decision was incorrect as the person had a minimal knowledge of the CRA 2015.

We disputed their findings a requested it be escalated to the Ombudsman as we realised we were not dealing with an actual Ombudsman. A second person in the first tier understood CRA 2015 a lot better and agreed with us. Please remember that we were getting professional advice from a solicitor experienced in consumer law as we had a subscription.

Anyway at that point the finance house caved in and agreed to a partial refund at which point we suggested and booked a MCEA technician appointed by the Caravan Club to check the caravan. The dealer refused to allow the inspection and the refund went ahead.

I can only advise how we went about our rejection using CRA 2015 to our best advantage to get a full refund. The OP will get all sorts of obstacles placed in their way by the dealer and most of it will involve denying the OP their rights under Consumer law which by the way is a CRIMINAL offence. The OP should be able to able to do it on their own without involving a solicitor. We did use a solicitor initially, but we knew more about consumer legislation than they knew so you need to be very careful as most solicitors are not familiar with consumer law.

We never posted our saga as we got a lot of incorrect advice in particular from one individual however we proved them wrong in just about every instance. Also I cannot name the organisation that gave us the legal advice.

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