tradegirl

Thanks guys. It's a bugger, but...you win some, you lose some. Will get the car out asap and then see about court, etc. I have no idea. I know this sounds bad, but I have his name and address of the garage, but nothing mentioned about ltd etc. "Backstreet garage" in the truest sense of the word I think. Wow really? At this point it's not even spite. Does that mean I'm going to be on TV?

Gosh, Matt, I have no idea. CVT? Multitronic? And the mechanic said they hadn't sealed it properly. That's as far as my mechanical understanding goes!

CJ Underhill, I lie, it's in West Drayton (Geography's not my strong point) So it wouldn't be the same place. BHM, I hope yours gets sorted soon! You seem pretty relaxed about it! I would speak to him, but he rarely, if ever, answers the phone. I think we're going to get the car collected and then go over ourselves to see about the money. Not sure which way around to work this. But going off what the man from the other business said, we won't see a penny from him going down the normal route.

Hi Umesh, We paid by Paypal, funded by my current account. Paypal transaction is over 3 months old, so no luck there. And I don't think debit card/current account transactions are covered by indemnity claims. We will be getting it back asap. Stupidly left it there for so long while the guy was claiming would start it "this week"

Hi everyone! So we bought an Audi A6 auto in September 2016 with a known gearbox problem. We found a gearbox on eBay (rare gbox code), and had it sent to us and fitted by our mechanic. It wasn't right and was leaking, so the supplier took it back, repaired it, and sent it back out to us. It still wasn't right. Eventually the supplier said to send him the car (To Essex, we're in Birmingham) and he'd fix it free of charge. By this point we had paid him £1000 for the gearbox. He then said the ECU was a problem and to send him £350 to have the ECU repaired. He has now had the car since April 2017. I've called countless times, and when I eventually do get hold of him, he either says they're busy, or the latest one was that they've changed 3 gearboxes with no luck. I managed to get someone from a nearby garage to go and check that our car is still there. He said that it is, but that we should go get our car as it will just rot there. He said we're not the first to threaten the guy with legal or police action, and that no one has ever had any luck getting money out of this guy. Apart from our mechanics' labour, we're out £1350 to this guy. We obviously didn't know who we were dealing with initially. We have bought many gearboxes and engines from eBay and from breakers, and never had any issues. Do any of you have any experience with something like this? Is there any way of getting our money back? Thank you.

Glad you got it sorted. Hope you get another good profit in to balance it out!

That's very pricey for a repair on a 2006. Haven't you been elsewhere? The most we've paid for a 320d engine rebuild was £1300.

£3000 on a 2012 Focus that ended up with chassis damage we didn't know about (bought blind online) Had it for over a year, but we were so happy to get rid of it even with such a loss!

Well the car is still with me for starters. And secondly, neglecting to fuel up and not being able to afford fuel are two different things. If he'd put diesel in the car instead of petrol for example, I wouldn't be liable. This is a very similar thing.

Hi everyone. Sorry I've been AWOL. Just a quick update and I'll get back to yoi later. We paid for transportation to bring the car here to a BMW Specialist. Turns out the car had a misfire due to low fuel, 500 miles after we sold the car. So the car has either ran out of fuel or been driven on very low fuel. Fuelled up, engine primed, problem gone. The mechanic has been test driving the car for 2 days now with no issues whatsoever. Am I right in wanting to ask the customer to reimburse us for transportation and mechanic fees? Considering there is no fault at all with the car, and the symptoms were simply down to the car having been left without fuel.

I wish I knew this a couple of hours ago. This guy has been messaging and calling all day non-stop getting legal on me, and twisting my words to imply that there was a misfire at the point of sale and that I knew about it. Had I known this I would have told him to take a running leap. Not because a customer shouldn't have a reliable car, but because of his attitude. I'll remember this for the future. Thank you SC Derby. I knew none of this. Thankfully I found a good deal on transportation, but I'm still peeved because this customer didn't deserve a penny more out of our pockets than necessary. Because he was being a complete a-hole. Should have made him bring it himself. Thanks Tradex. Oh..phew. I thought I'd just agreed to something I didn't have to do! Thank you andy

Bugger, bugger, bugger, bugger. So I'm not even obliged to repair the car?? Just paid for a transportation company to bring the car to us for repair and to drop it back to him. Damn, I wish I held out until I saw these last few replies. All these new consumer laws are confusing.

Thank you Green Giant. There was nothing written into the contract. So we have to collect and deliver the vehicle back to him?

Hi everyone. He's now saying he'll accept the repair, but that we should collect it and drop it 80 miles there and 80 back. What would you do?

Thanks everyone, and thanks Tradex for the peace of mind. We've been in the trade for 4 years, but believe it or not, this has never happened before. Not someone rejecting repair and threatening legal action instead. We've got a solicitor friend and I'll speak to him later today for further advice as well. Fingers crossed!

It's just frustrating and suspicious that we have in good faith offered to have the misfire repaired at a BMW specialist, and the customer is just insisting over and over on a refund. I have sent the fault codes to the specialist who says it's more than likely an injector/coil pack and that the quote is way inflated. The quote doesn't even address the misfire. It has no quote for injectors or a coil pack. It goes straight to cat and nox sensor etc. I have relayed all the information. How am I expected to give him a refund no questions asked?? If it's a simple injector/coil pack fault and I have offered over and over to repair it, can he take court action? Just as simple as that?

He's insistent that he wants a refund. Rejecting any offer to get the car repaired by a BMW specialist here by us. My business partner who's a little braver than me says to tell him that's all we can offer and let him proceed to the courts if he wants to. Wish me luck!

Thanks for the replies. What could happen if I keep offering a repair and he wants a refund? Do I not have the right to offer a refund first?

Hi everyone. I need some advice please. We sold a 2007 320i coupe with 69950 miles on the clock with FSH until 2016 We MOT'd it and covered 200 miles in it prior to sale, no problems whatsoever. A customer came, test drove, all good, and he got a good price for it due to a minor dent on the door. We sold it on Saturday and he contacted me the following Thursday with a video showing the EML on and the engine shaking a bit. He took it to a BMW specialist today (Friday) who found Cylinder 2 misfire, as well as other codes (nox etc). First he said £1000 to fix and then the official quote to get the nox, thermostat, cat and o2 sensor repaired (funnily enough no injectors or coils quoted) is £2030. I have spoken to a BMW specialist that we use,who said that the first step any mechanic would take is to fix the cylinder misfire, and that the other codes would be resulting from that. And that a misfire repair would be £500 MAX even if using BMW parts and generous labour. The customer wants a refund on the car. He's had it 6 days. We have offered to have the car repaired by our mechanic. Legally, where do we stand? In your experience what should we do? He says it requires a new catalyst and that is £800 and insists he wants a refund on the car. This has never happened before, so any advice would be greatly appreciated. Many thanks in advance.