The AA killed my engine!
Discussion
Hi Guys,
Quick tale of woe and request for some advice...
Car is a Subaru Forester STI
My car overheated about 2 miles from my house, it had never overheated before but I noticed that there were cracks in the plastic on top of the Radiator so I let the car cool down, got a lift home and came back about 4 hours later with some sealant and water and limped the car carefully home.
I am an AA gold home start member so requested recovery to my local Subaru specialist.
AA guy comes around whilst I am at work and after applying some glue to the cracks decides to drive the car to garage rather than requesting recovery, asking my wife to follow in her car to take him back. Wife reckons it has something to do with him liking the car.
After a couple of miles at a 60mph bit of road the car massively overheats as he accelerates and he pulls over and now asks for recovery.
When the car is finally recovered to garage it will not start and has no compression. When garage takes the engine apart, they find that the water pump has seized, timing belt shredded and valves hit pistons.
Just had AA's 'independent' report (ACE engineers) and it basically says this must have been progressive failure and the engineer could not have know about it, and because it happened quite quickly after he drove the car then could have happened anytime and they are not liable.
As I was expecting to just buy a new radiator and now have to buy/rebuild a new engine I obviously do not concur.
Question is: What should I do now? Engage my own independent report and solicitor?
If so who is recommended?
Is it possible that all the damage was via the AA engineer running the car on the drive and then driving 10 minutes? (I would have thought a seized or semi seized water pump would have squealed and smelt of burning rubber, neither of which I witnessed). Also the AA recovery driver might have damaged slightly moving the car from a dangerous position but I cannot prove that.
Any help or advice would be good as I am currently staring at a big bill!
Cheers
Al
Quick tale of woe and request for some advice...
Car is a Subaru Forester STI
My car overheated about 2 miles from my house, it had never overheated before but I noticed that there were cracks in the plastic on top of the Radiator so I let the car cool down, got a lift home and came back about 4 hours later with some sealant and water and limped the car carefully home.
I am an AA gold home start member so requested recovery to my local Subaru specialist.
AA guy comes around whilst I am at work and after applying some glue to the cracks decides to drive the car to garage rather than requesting recovery, asking my wife to follow in her car to take him back. Wife reckons it has something to do with him liking the car.
After a couple of miles at a 60mph bit of road the car massively overheats as he accelerates and he pulls over and now asks for recovery.
When the car is finally recovered to garage it will not start and has no compression. When garage takes the engine apart, they find that the water pump has seized, timing belt shredded and valves hit pistons.
Just had AA's 'independent' report (ACE engineers) and it basically says this must have been progressive failure and the engineer could not have know about it, and because it happened quite quickly after he drove the car then could have happened anytime and they are not liable.
As I was expecting to just buy a new radiator and now have to buy/rebuild a new engine I obviously do not concur.
Question is: What should I do now? Engage my own independent report and solicitor?
If so who is recommended?
Is it possible that all the damage was via the AA engineer running the car on the drive and then driving 10 minutes? (I would have thought a seized or semi seized water pump would have squealed and smelt of burning rubber, neither of which I witnessed). Also the AA recovery driver might have damaged slightly moving the car from a dangerous position but I cannot prove that.
Any help or advice would be good as I am currently staring at a big bill!
Cheers
Al
First thing to say is to keep a contemporaneous account of everything. You may think you'll remember it all but when it comes to legal process having a documented account of who you spoke to and when on every occasion will work in your favour.
There will be a degree of conjecture whether the engine failure would have occurred anyway but that isn't the point. The point is that when you rang them and asked for recovery to the local specialist the engine was working. Obviously so since the AA guy chose to drive it to the garage.
That was his decision - during which journey the engine failed.
So yes - independent report and legal representation.
There will be a degree of conjecture whether the engine failure would have occurred anyway but that isn't the point. The point is that when you rang them and asked for recovery to the local specialist the engine was working. Obviously so since the AA guy chose to drive it to the garage.
That was his decision - during which journey the engine failed.
So yes - independent report and legal representation.
Yes I specifically asked them to recover as I believed that the radiator was not fixable and needed replacing.
The AA responder now says we agreed for him to drive it, my wife was there as I was at work and she wasn't keen because he wanted her to follow in her car which was pretty inconvenient. There was no form signed saying that we agreed for him to drive.
The AA responder now says we agreed for him to drive it, my wife was there as I was at work and she wasn't keen because he wanted her to follow in her car which was pretty inconvenient. There was no form signed saying that we agreed for him to drive.
Hmm, not convinced you'll win but on first glance this situation is utter bulls
t. If you pay for a recovery service and request recovery for a known issue they should do that. Gluing a radiator and then driving the customer's car sounds utterly outside their normal SOP.
Which could be a good angle for the initial complaint...
t. If you pay for a recovery service and request recovery for a known issue they should do that. Gluing a radiator and then driving the customer's car sounds utterly outside their normal SOP.Which could be a good angle for the initial complaint...
It may have been progressive but it would appear that when he set off in the vehicle it had not progressed to the stage it ultimately ended up in. Ergo I would suggest that had it immediately be recovered the damage would have been significantly less.
I suspect you'll never get them to pay for the whole thing and have to settle in the middle (they may for example say pump had failed anyway or whatever and it was just belt and valves that later went).
It's going to come down to cost of rebuild v cost of an independent report and your appetite for a contentious correspondence plus desire to fight it. All the time your car will be off the road.
I suspect you'll never get them to pay for the whole thing and have to settle in the middle (they may for example say pump had failed anyway or whatever and it was just belt and valves that later went).
It's going to come down to cost of rebuild v cost of an independent report and your appetite for a contentious correspondence plus desire to fight it. All the time your car will be off the road.
Fleetwood said:
When garage takes the engine apart, they find that the water pump has seized
I think that's going to be the original cause of your overheating, not damage arising from being driven after the original failure.Fleetwood said:
Is it possible that all the damage was via the AA engineer running the car on the drive and then driving 10 minutes?
Incredibly unlikely.Fleetwood said:
(I would have thought a seized or semi seized water pump would have squealed and smelt of burning rubber, neither of which I witnessed).
Not necessarily. Definitely no "burning rubber", since that would imply the belt slipped - which a toothed belt won't do.Given that you've already said there were symptoms of the rad being cracked, which is a very plausible cause of the water loss, I don't think it was unreasonable for the AA guy to try and drive it a short distance, having topped up the coolant and temporarily fixed that apparent cause.
There's a big difference between the person responsible for the car (your wife) being "not keen" on him driving it, and not agreeing to him driving it. "Not keen" implies consent, albeit grudging.
The more usual short-distance transport solution would be a towing dolly or rigid bar tow from his van - but that's not possible with a permanent 4wd car - so the choice was driving or waiting for a flatbed. I suspect your wife was even less "keen" on waiting another few hours for the flatbed.
The pump could have seized just as easily during your limp home.
So just got the engineers report through and this is the conclusion:
C1 We can only conclude based upon the visible evidence the condition has become apparent due to failure of the water pump. The water pump has failed as a result of deterioration.
C2 It’s always argued that had the vehicle been recovered the damage could have been avoided and this may or may not be the case but this is far from clear and is a hindsight view. Clearly it’s unlikely, the patrol could have known the water pump was in such a distressed state and it is possible the defect would have developed in testing at a garage as the fault reportedly developed within 2 minutes of the patrols repair. The patrol found a leak and as such the actions do not appear unreasonable based on the evidence at hand, we consider as the fault developed within 2 minutes that the damage was most likely unavoidable and as such Force Majeure.
NB the car was not driven for just 2 minutes, more like 10 minutes plus and around 30 minutes idling on the drive.
Wife would not have cared about waiting for the flatbed and was expecting it as car was at home so no inconvenience for her.
C1 We can only conclude based upon the visible evidence the condition has become apparent due to failure of the water pump. The water pump has failed as a result of deterioration.
C2 It’s always argued that had the vehicle been recovered the damage could have been avoided and this may or may not be the case but this is far from clear and is a hindsight view. Clearly it’s unlikely, the patrol could have known the water pump was in such a distressed state and it is possible the defect would have developed in testing at a garage as the fault reportedly developed within 2 minutes of the patrols repair. The patrol found a leak and as such the actions do not appear unreasonable based on the evidence at hand, we consider as the fault developed within 2 minutes that the damage was most likely unavoidable and as such Force Majeure.
NB the car was not driven for just 2 minutes, more like 10 minutes plus and around 30 minutes idling on the drive.
Wife would not have cared about waiting for the flatbed and was expecting it as car was at home so no inconvenience for her.
98elise said:
Fleetwood said:
The subaru water pump is driven by the non toothed part of the timing belt so would indeed slip.
In that case the timing belt issue would be unrelated?TooMany2cvs said:
98elise said:
Fleetwood said:
The subaru water pump is driven by the non toothed part of the timing belt so would indeed slip.
In that case the timing belt issue would be unrelated?If it had been recovered as requested then I very much doubt it would have failed at the garage as they would have had the belt cover off and seen the problem immediately.
The strange thing is that last time I called the AA for a recovery many years ago they just sent round a flatbed there was never any question of them driving the thing.
Fleetwood said:
Is it possible that all the damage was via the AA engineer running the car on the drive and then driving 10 minutes?
YES !Clearly the car was not working correctly.
Whoever gambles to drive the car takes the risk of causing further damage - you decided NOT to take that risk and called for RECOVERY
The AA man decided to gamble that it would be OK
It was NOT
HE is 100% at fault - you asked for recovery, you didn't receive recovery, you received an idiot.
Wow... the AA damaged my car when recovering it but I didn't really have any bother getting them to pay for the two damaged panels to be re-sprayed. That was a bit more clear cut than your case though. I have an e-mail address if you need it.
I also recently had an issue with the RAC. Phoned in and told them car needed to be recovered as I knew the fault wasn't fixable at the roadside. Requested flatbed due to low front end & previous damage by the AA when they made recovery via the fold out wheel lift thing. They sent a man in a van, who told me that his computer said he couldn't recover my car (presumably because of the low front end). He then made a phone call and said he could recover it(!), but I managed to insist and got them to send a flat bed.
I would do the following:
1. Get the specialist who the car was recovered to assess the damage then report on the likely cause(s), consequences of driving a car with a known overheating fault and a quote for the repair. You'll have to to accept some of the bill yourself as you'd have had to rectify the original fault anyway (water pump + radiator + labour by the sounds of it). Get the garage to quote for how much that would've been so you can take it off what the AA's liability to you will be.
2. Write/e-mail stating all the facts as you see them and include your specialists report/quotes. Reject the outcome of the 'independent' report and give reasons (hopefully backed up by your specialist). Unless your wife is a mechanic she can't have been expected to prevent AA man from driving - AA man is supposed to be the one qualified to make the decision. Poor show that they're trying to push the blame back to you. You requested recovery - if the car was safe to drive there you'd have surely done so yourself?!
3. In future make sure you're with your car when it's being 'recovered'.
I also recently had an issue with the RAC. Phoned in and told them car needed to be recovered as I knew the fault wasn't fixable at the roadside. Requested flatbed due to low front end & previous damage by the AA when they made recovery via the fold out wheel lift thing. They sent a man in a van, who told me that his computer said he couldn't recover my car (presumably because of the low front end). He then made a phone call and said he could recover it(!), but I managed to insist and got them to send a flat bed.
I would do the following:
1. Get the specialist who the car was recovered to assess the damage then report on the likely cause(s), consequences of driving a car with a known overheating fault and a quote for the repair. You'll have to to accept some of the bill yourself as you'd have had to rectify the original fault anyway (water pump + radiator + labour by the sounds of it). Get the garage to quote for how much that would've been so you can take it off what the AA's liability to you will be.
2. Write/e-mail stating all the facts as you see them and include your specialists report/quotes. Reject the outcome of the 'independent' report and give reasons (hopefully backed up by your specialist). Unless your wife is a mechanic she can't have been expected to prevent AA man from driving - AA man is supposed to be the one qualified to make the decision. Poor show that they're trying to push the blame back to you. You requested recovery - if the car was safe to drive there you'd have surely done so yourself?!
3. In future make sure you're with your car when it's being 'recovered'.
Gassing Station | General Gassing | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff