£5k Bill on Car Trader - grounds for rejection?
Discussion
FIL: Bought a 2006 Mercedes from a long-standing trader. Recent fault code shows that the balance shaft is faulty - £5k bill to repair. There was a recall on this model but the car is too old Merc to be interested. He's had the car 2 months and covered just under 1K miles.
Can my FIL reject the car and get a refund?
Can my FIL reject the car and get a refund?
I don't think there was a recall and even in the US after class action litigation (if this is the same issue) they only extended the warranty to 10yrs.
Rejection isn't relevant here but the trader may want to buy the car back rather than pay the repair cost - they're assumed liable for any fault that occurs within 6 mths. Is there a fault in the way the car is running, or is something just showing as being out of spec on the code reader?
Rejection isn't relevant here but the trader may want to buy the car back rather than pay the repair cost - they're assumed liable for any fault that occurs within 6 mths. Is there a fault in the way the car is running, or is something just showing as being out of spec on the code reader?
Sheepshanks said:
I don't think there was a recall and even in the US after class action litigation (if this is the same issue) they only extended the warranty to 10yrs.
Rejection isn't relevant here but the trader may want to buy the car back rather than pay the repair cost - they're assumed liable for any fault that occurs within 6 mths. Is there a fault in the way the car is running, or is something just showing as being out of spec on the code reader?
You’re right, recall was US-centric, not UK. Code shows problem and idling is a little lumpy - only a little though but enough to not sound ‘right’.Rejection isn't relevant here but the trader may want to buy the car back rather than pay the repair cost - they're assumed liable for any fault that occurs within 6 mths. Is there a fault in the way the car is running, or is something just showing as being out of spec on the code reader?
Edited by DrSteveBrule on Wednesday 7th March 15:34
papa3 said:
DrSteveBrule said:
Indie. Parts aren’t expensive but it’s a labour-intensive job.
Must be seriously intensive if the parts aren't expensive.A quick search of the UK forums suggests it's a £2K job, although that was posts from a few years ago, One says if there's a suggestion of swarf damage to the bottom end it's generally more certain to fit a replacement engine for about the same cost.
Which indie has quoted?
DrSteveBrule said:
You’re right, recall was US-centric, not UK. Code shows problem and idling is a little lumpy - only a little though but enough to not sound ‘right’.
12 year old car with a "little lumpy" idle? Doesn't seem like a cause for rejections to me.Edited by DrSteveBrule on Wednesday 7th March 15:34
OverSteery said:
DrSteveBrule said:
You’re right, recall was US-centric, not UK. Code shows problem and idling is a little lumpy - only a little though but enough to not sound ‘right’.
12 year old car with a "little lumpy" idle? Doesn't seem like a cause for rejections to me.Edited by DrSteveBrule on Wednesday 7th March 15:34
FIL loves the car, it's a highly specced model, no others like it for sale right now and would ideally love to keep it. He's now spoken to the trader and a cheque for a couple of grand to cover the labour is hopefully heading towards my FIL this week.
When he bought the car the trader stated many times that they know the car well and have serviced it for the previous owner over the last 6-7 years. The fact he was agreeable to resolving the matter so quickly leads us to suspect he knew of the fault slowly manifesting itself if he knew the car as intimately as he claimed.
Thanks for all the advice and opinion, it's appreciated.
ETA: Merc labour costs are £105 p/h ex VAT and the job has been quoted at 23 hours.
My folks had this issue and had a battle with MB to get it fixed - this was a couple of years back and MB only relented as it had full MB history. It was in the dealer for at least a week and they said it was a labour intensive job. Think the dealer originally quoted something like £7k.
DrSteveBrule said:
Lumpy idle wouldn't be grounds for rejection – correct – but it's what triggered the further investigations and the subsequent fault codes thrown up confirmed the balance shaft issue.
FIL loves the car, it's a highly specced model, no others like it for sale right now and would ideally love to keep it. He's now spoken to the trader and a cheque for a couple of grand to cover the labour is hopefully heading towards my FIL this week.
When he bought the car the trader stated many times that they know the car well and have serviced it for the previous owner over the last 6-7 years. The fact he was agreeable to resolving the matter so quickly leads us to suspect he knew of the fault slowly manifesting itself if he knew the car as intimately as he claimed.
Thanks for all the advice and opinion, it's appreciated.
ETA: Merc labour costs are £105 p/h ex VAT and the job has been quoted at 23 hours.
So your indie wants to charge nearly double Merc's hourly rate? Either that or they really don't want the jobFIL loves the car, it's a highly specced model, no others like it for sale right now and would ideally love to keep it. He's now spoken to the trader and a cheque for a couple of grand to cover the labour is hopefully heading towards my FIL this week.
When he bought the car the trader stated many times that they know the car well and have serviced it for the previous owner over the last 6-7 years. The fact he was agreeable to resolving the matter so quickly leads us to suspect he knew of the fault slowly manifesting itself if he knew the car as intimately as he claimed.
Thanks for all the advice and opinion, it's appreciated.
ETA: Merc labour costs are £105 p/h ex VAT and the job has been quoted at 23 hours.
DrSteveBrule said:
ETA: Merc labour costs are £105 p/h ex VAT and the job has been quoted at 23 hours.
Where is that rate from? You said indie, but I'm not aware of any indie that's up at that level. It sounds like a slightly discounted dealer rate - many of them will significantly discount their rate on older cars.Based on the costs I saw from a few years ago that total labour cost doesn't seem too bad though.
If you're still open to looking at other indies to carry out the work, let us know where FIL is based and I'll see if there are recommended indies near him. Many are in the wiki: https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...
His indie garage (all marques, not just Mercedes) - who are good and have used for decades - don't really want to do it. They pretty much said as much. They don't want to have one car taking up that amount of time as they are busy, it's a small workshop and there's only 3 of them.
Mercedes Main Dealer quoted £105 p/h and 23 hours (plus VAT). FIL is paranoid (I'm only half joking when I say that) and would pay that rate rather than get an equally good Merc specialist to do the job for less as he would think that anyone else doing it wouldn't do it 'as well'. I know, it's painful.
Mercedes Main Dealer quoted £105 p/h and 23 hours (plus VAT). FIL is paranoid (I'm only half joking when I say that) and would pay that rate rather than get an equally good Merc specialist to do the job for less as he would think that anyone else doing it wouldn't do it 'as well'. I know, it's painful.
DrSteveBrule said:
That would be nice. It's a C-Class 280 Estate with the petrol V6.
Ah ok, I had a brief 4 day ownership of a 2006/56 CLS with the V8 and believe I had a similar issue. Managed to return the car (and get my PX back) plus a £250 restocking fee I offered to the dealer to smooth things along. Could be worth exploring?Edit - Didn't see that the trader is sending a cheque for the labour, a good result.
Edited by JBUK on Thursday 8th March 09:58
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