Warranty curiosity - normal or not?

[Simpo Two]

10 days ago I took delivery of a used car from a dealer. It came with a six month warranty. Three days after delivery it developed a fault which the dealer's sales manager admits is a warranty issue. As you'd expect the repairing garage must contact the dealer for approval, and their bill will be paid direct. But the sales manager keeps insisting that the repairing garage must call him personally, not the number in the warranty booklet. He says he will only approve repairs up to a certain amount. When I said that the amount was surely immaterial because it was covered by insurance, he said the warranty doesn't start until 30 days afer sale, and that any faults before 30 days are up to them. I told him that there was no mention of a 30 day period in the handbook, and that the official warranty phone number doesn't appear anywhere on Google. He said it was an internal number and that it comes back to his office, and the 30 day period is not advertised to the public.

Is he operating some kind of wheeze or is this normal practice?

[Simpo Two]

It's an a/c issue. When I test drove the car a few days before delivery the a/c was dysfunctional, and told them it would have to be repaired before I bought the car. They said they'd found the problem and repaired it (fitted a new condenser). An independent garage today says the condenser looks fine, but found no gas and thinks a spindle in the compressor has failed. One slight snag is that the dealer is a 2.25hr drive away... in which case the warranty says I can go to 'another reputable repairer'.

But it doesn't explain why I mustn't call the number in the warranty booklet...

Rejecting the car - not sure I could enforce this - would leave me with no car.

Edited by Simpo Two on Wednesday 24th August 19:27

[Simpo Two]

Thanks all, that helps to put my mind at rest. He is definitely a 'geezer' so I'm inherently suspicious. I was annoyed when he refused to authorise the claim until I'd signed the financial 'demands and needs' form that they forgot to ask me to sign at the sale. So I've saved his butt from FCA non-compliance, now it's his turn to return the favour. The MOT they 'overlooked' can be added to the bill.

Thanks again, we'll let the waggon roll. And when the a/c is eventually fixed, I can mentally adopt the car and start to enjoy it.