Avon Car Sales - Dubious tactics not to refund for fault in car - court claim issued

[BankFodder]

What you mean by – tweeting the letter of claim?

[Sc0ut]

ha... auto correct  ... sorry tweaking 

[BankFodder]

I don't understand. I thought we had prepared a version of the letter of claim which addresses this eventuality.

 

[Sc0ut]

Well one can always benefit from seeing the actual response just in case. 

Ok if you think its all good  .... Will send today.

Cheers

[BankFodder]

For the avoidance of doubt, please can you post op what you are about to send. Thanks

[Sc0ut]

Dear Avon Car Sales Ltd.

Letter of Claim
 

We acknowledge receipt of your email 18^th March 2021 in which you fail to honour your previous offers and you have refused to refund me in full as previously offered as stated in my emailed letter of 12^th March 2021.

 

The details of my complaint and the reimbursement I seek are all contained in that letter.

Furthermore, your insistence that I be responsible for the cost of transporting the vehicle to you in order to carry out any sort of repair and for which you were legally responsible is, in my view, an example of unfair trading in addition to a breach of contract.

 

I also notice that under the Road Traffic Act 1988 Section 75 it is an offence to sell a vehicle that displays some of the defects which were present in the vehicle which you sold me and suddenly refused to repair and then refused to refund me and charge me for the full repair all within your 3 month warranty period.  Now you demand that I collect the damaged vehicle which can not be driven safetly and charge me storage fees.

If you do not reimburse me in full within 14 days then I shall see you in the County Court and without any further notice for my losses plus interest and furthermore, I shall refer the judgement which I am confident of obtaining against you to Trading Standards who are then required by law to be an investigation.

Yours faithfully

Edited March 18, 2021 by BankFodder
A few edits

[BankFodder]

I removed the references to the previous offers because it suggests that you are leaving the door open to them renewing an offer and effectively to paying you a reduced amount and shortchanging you

[Sc0ut]

OK good point  .....

 

Its standard to put my name & address on letters.  Should I do this on this letter?

 

[BankFodder]

I'm not sure why you're asking this. If you don't put your name and address on the letter then they won't know who it's from

[theberengersniper]

As a quick aside, on the subject of the MOT and any suspicions you might have about it, you can use https://www.gov.uk/check-mot-history to check the past MOT history of the vehicle.

 

That will tell you when the vehicle was last tested and what faults existed at the time of the test. If no faults were recorded in relation to the brakes or driveshaft boots, yet the car has done very few miles since the MOT, you might choose to report the garage responsible for the test via the telephone number at this link.

 

I would normally expect such a complaint to go nowhere, but having had cause to do this in the past, I can confirm my complaint was taken very seriously indeed, to the extent that a car with known faults was submitted to the garage in question for test.

 

I gather you don't think the sales garage and the MOT station are connected, but I think there's a suspicion they may be 'friendly' shall we say. You might choose to make their life as awkward for a day.

[Sc0ut]

Sorry I just don't trust them and the lengths they would go to.   Just checking.  Thanks for your patience.

 

I'll consider the MOT at least for hassle value as 2 mechanics thought otherwise about the CV boots.

[Sc0ut]

Hi

Got reply from Dealer, expecting from their lawyer later .....

 

As noted previously, Legal Solutions 4 U have been instructed to handle this matter and all correspondence if required, should be sent to them. As you have previously replied to their correspondence you are obviously well aware of this.

 

Please note that any emails or letters sent directly to Avon Car Sales will not receive a response from us.

 

Legal Solutions 4 U have more than reiterate our position on matters and we are currently awaiting confirmation on when you will be arranging collection of your vehicle.  

 

[BankFodder]

Ignore. Keep all your correspondence to the dealer.

[Sc0ut]

He has rejected the letter of claim via the lawyers previous statement, do we still have to wait the 14 days to submit a claim?

 

[BankFodder]

I suggest you do.

Has the draft claim been prepared?

[Sc0ut]

How is this ? .......

 

Particuars of Claim

 

The claimant bought a Skoda car registration xxx from the defendant car dealer. Within a week the car displayed a serious fault and investigation revealed further serious defects. The defendant is aware of the defects and the timeline. The car is not of a satisfactory quality and unroadworthy within the meaning of the road traffic accident 1988. The vehicle could not be driven. The defendant refused to consider any repairs unless the claimant return the car at his own expense – which the claimant eventually did. The defendant refused to repair all the faults and so the claimant rejected the vehicle on the basis of the defendant's fundamental breach. The defendant has refused to reimburse the claimant for the cost of the car and associated costs and losses. The claimant seeks £3,495 [cost of the car], £190 car transporter cost, £106.80 [89 + Vat] cost of independent engineers report, £174.08 lost insurance- total £3,965.88 plus interest plus costs.

 

[BankFodder]

how many weeks?

You may have said it earlier but you will have to remind me

[Sc0ut]

8 days!!      picked up car on 25 Sep and reported 2 Oct

[BankFodder]

All the faults were diagnosed within 8 days???

[Sc0ut]

No sorry.   thought you meant when it was first reported to them.  

2/Oct I reported issue

8/Oct Skoda Health Check - 14 days

26/Oct Mechanic report done confirming cause after dealer changed his mind & refused to repair - 4 weeks

[BankFodder]

You're right. I don't know what happened. Please check now

[Sc0ut]

Got it .... Thanks

[Sc0ut]

Hi

Just about ready to submit the claim but trying to line up the dots and understand what happens when because of the deadlines required.   The claim particulars were bigger so I shortened it to attach the full version which needs to be sent with in 14 days of claim.  The guidance now tells me that I needs to submit a N215 certificate of service and references documents.   Is this just for the Extra Particulars?  When do I have to submit evidence ??  The guidance is not at all clear on this.

Regards 

[AndyOrch]

You submit your evidence when / if the defendant submits a defence...and your advised to do so when the court informs you at allocation stage. If they dont contest the claim you get a default judgment without any evidence....which you can request if they fail to acknowledge service/submit a defence after 19 days.

 

Serving Additional Particulars of Claim

If during step 5 of issuing the claim you state that you will serve additional Particulars of Claim,
you must send the additional particulars to the defendant(s) within 14 days of your
claim being issued. You should also send a covering letter to the defendant clearly advising
that these are the extra particulars referred to in your claim form and quote the claim number.

You must file an ‘N215 Certificate of Service’ with the court within 14 days of the claim being
issued. The certificate of service confirms to the court that you have sent the documents to the
defendant. The certificate can be filed by post or preferably by email to
[email protected]. Please include the claim number in the subject line of the email. A
blank N215 can be downloaded from www.justice.gov.uk/forms.

The second page of the N215 explains how to calculate the ‘date of service’. Please note if
the date of service is different to that of the claim form, then you should consider the
later date to be the date of service for the claim. For further information please see Civil
Procedure Rule 7E.6 at: http://www.justice.gov.uk/courts/procedurerules/
civil/rules/pd_part07e

 

Andy

[BankFodder]

Please do not send a fuller version.

We want to send the minimum version – if it needs to be cut down then post it here and we will cut it down.

We are doing our best to help you – but if you start going off at a tangent and doing it alone, then you are just making more work for everyone.

Also, if you don't understand the steps involved in taking a small claim in the County Court then you are ready. I'm sorry if this sounds a bit short – but there has been ample time for you to do the reading to get an idea of what the steps are.

Please don't start issuing any claim yet until you are fully comfortable with what you are doing.