Advice required

[clarky5150]

I have just had my car collected from a very respected dealer (who shall remain nameless at this stage) after some body repair work. Although on first impressions (bad weather, hard rain) the job looked good, already a few thing had not been done to standard (the valet which had been promised to return the car to the condition it was in prior to the knock hadn't been done and the car broke down on route home due to a part being shoddily fitted) etc. After a few days home however problems have become apparent in both the paint finish and items not replaced correctly. In my opinion this has seriously affected the re-sale prospects of my once immaculate car. A release note had to be signed for the car at the time. The question is this. How do i now stand regarding my rights to demand rectification of the poor work? Any help much appreciated.

[douglasr]

You have every right to demand the faults are rectified.
Was it an insurance job - if so, you can do what I did and ask their engineer to have a look. The engineer took one look at my car and sent the bodyshop a strongly worded letter suggesting that they completely redo my car.

If it wasn't an insurance job, and yout car is still under an HP agreement, then get the finance company to deal with them - it is owned by them after all and in their interest to maintain the value of the car.

If its neither of the above, go and talk to the manager - if no joy, talk to citizens advice or your local trading standards.

[clarky5150]

Am i covered by consumer rights over this then as i am sure my Insurance company will have paid out last week.

[Jason F]

As far as I am aware the garage should be offered the chance to rectify any faults. This is subject to a reasonable period of time though, send the garage a letter giving them a date by which you want your car repaired, and if this is not adhered to then perhaps get the car repaired by another garage, and then sue the initial garage in the small claims court for the damages..

do feel free to A: Get some more/better legal advice on this, cause I could be wrong
B: Contact me offline to see if your garage is the same one as mine that I shall be taking to court very soon by the looks of things

[gadgit]

I think you will find that your legal rights on a fault when work has been carried out cannot be dicarded by the dealer. these rights are binding by law and protect the consumer even if you signed at the time that the work was ok. You have now found the work to be faulty and are still covered by the full consumer rights act. The only time you would not be covered in this event would be if you signed at the time that you agreed that the work was faulty but did not mind. Do you see the difference?

This is the same with goods from a shop, the only time you could not return goods due to a fault is if you bought them as damaged goods in the first place. Clearly you have not agreed that the work was faulty and therefore have now found it to be so.

The other question here is why is this dealer getting people to sign this useless piece of paper in the first place. Maybe he thinks he can con people into thinking that they can,t come back, Well he's WRONG!

good luck.

gadgit.

[clarky5150]

Spoke to the dealer at 5.30 today and ruined his whole day i would imagine. He has asked me to fax him a list of gripes regarding the repair (I hope their machine has a lot of toner!) and he'll "see what he can do" so fingers crossed al will be well again soon.

[Alistair H.]

Clarky,

Can you email me the dealers name offline? - I think we may have similar problems here.