Worst mistake a garage did where YOU came out better off
Discussion
My starter:
Bought a Range Rover brand new in 2000 from a main dealer in Surrey. Ran it for almost a year/18K miles and then - and this is unbelievable but true - the Princess Royal was visiting the area where I was staying and the Police on a sweep of the area picked up on the fact that the car was not registered. This culminated in discovering that despite it having a tax disc it was indeed unregistered and what's more was an import and not a UK car. Something I was unaware of.
Dealers first offer was a brand new car, but in the end settled for them taking it away and settling the finance, which was so far in negative equity it was not funny - Like 10K+.
It did not end there though. Got a call from the Police about 8 months later asking for confirmation of the story above, as whilst the car was in the dealer's pound (they had a lot of trouble with DVLA on how to deal with the matter) the unluckiest car cloner in the World had copied it and been stopped as the car was not registered.
So there you go. Depreciation free Range Rover motoring for 18K miles.
Bought a Range Rover brand new in 2000 from a main dealer in Surrey. Ran it for almost a year/18K miles and then - and this is unbelievable but true - the Princess Royal was visiting the area where I was staying and the Police on a sweep of the area picked up on the fact that the car was not registered. This culminated in discovering that despite it having a tax disc it was indeed unregistered and what's more was an import and not a UK car. Something I was unaware of.
Dealers first offer was a brand new car, but in the end settled for them taking it away and settling the finance, which was so far in negative equity it was not funny - Like 10K+.
It did not end there though. Got a call from the Police about 8 months later asking for confirmation of the story above, as whilst the car was in the dealer's pound (they had a lot of trouble with DVLA on how to deal with the matter) the unluckiest car cloner in the World had copied it and been stopped as the car was not registered.
So there you go. Depreciation free Range Rover motoring for 18K miles.
Edited by Stu - B on Tuesday 21st September 08:52
I helped a good friend of mine buy a used Puma a few years ago. She took it back to the garage to service it. Whilst waiting in a cafe opposite it drove out of the dealership with 2 mechanics in.
"we were just going to get some parts for your car".
She didn't pay for her (overpriced, "brakes need doing" etc) £700 service.
"we were just going to get some parts for your car".
She didn't pay for her (overpriced, "brakes need doing" etc) £700 service.
The local VW garage managed to bend the exhaust on the ex g/f's Polo when we took it there for a service. We had to do a 4 hour drive the day after we collected, when she drove the car back. I jump in with her and one child to head off to Oulton and was thinking it was a little down on power, but it was cold and so I dismissed as I hadn't driven it for many months and was used to quicker fare.
We got out the lanes and straight into nose to tale 40-50mph traffic so again no real opportunity to note more than that it felt sluggish. Then we got to the A14 and i looked a the petrol gauge - we'd used about 4x the amount of fuel we should have.
Stopped and called the AA as all was far from right. It wasn't until the patrol guy got on his hands and knees that he spotted the kink. so we went slowly to an ETB type place 4-5 miles down the road who happened to have the right part and fitted there and then.
Spoke to and wrote to the VW garage who admitted the tec thought he might have caught it coming off the ramp (so why didn't he bloody well check?)
Ended up with free new rear back box (would have needed one in the next 12 months anyway) free service and labour on the few odds and sods i had had done whilst the car was with them and a full tank of petrol.
Not as impressive as a free RR for 18 months but not a bad little result I thought!
We got out the lanes and straight into nose to tale 40-50mph traffic so again no real opportunity to note more than that it felt sluggish. Then we got to the A14 and i looked a the petrol gauge - we'd used about 4x the amount of fuel we should have.
Stopped and called the AA as all was far from right. It wasn't until the patrol guy got on his hands and knees that he spotted the kink. so we went slowly to an ETB type place 4-5 miles down the road who happened to have the right part and fitted there and then.
Spoke to and wrote to the VW garage who admitted the tec thought he might have caught it coming off the ramp (so why didn't he bloody well check?)
Ended up with free new rear back box (would have needed one in the next 12 months anyway) free service and labour on the few odds and sods i had had done whilst the car was with them and a full tank of petrol.
Not as impressive as a free RR for 18 months but not a bad little result I thought!
My Dad bought a used car from a main dealer, took it home and decided to tidy it up. (He loved tinkering with his cars, it's where I get it from...!) He went to buy some touch-up paint for it, but discovered the code didn't match the paint colour. So he took the car to the dealer to ask why the car had been resprayed.
On further examination, they found the car was a ringer. So they took it back and offered him the pick of any car on their forecourt.
On further examination, they found the car was a ringer. So they took it back and offered him the pick of any car on their forecourt.
SGirl said:
My Dad bought a used car from a main dealer, took it home and decided to tidy it up. (He loved tinkering with his cars, it's where I get it from...!) He went to buy some touch-up paint for it, but discovered the code didn't match the paint colour. So he took the car to the dealer to ask why the car had been resprayed.
On further examination, they found the car was a ringer. So they took it back and offered him the pick of any car on their forecourt.
Possibly a slightly embellished story unless every car on their forecourt had a price tag within 500 quid of his own On further examination, they found the car was a ringer. So they took it back and offered him the pick of any car on their forecourt.
Dr G said:
Possibly a slightly embellished story unless every car on their forecourt had a price tag within 500 quid of his own
Not at all embellished, no. He bought all his cars from there, they knew they'd be getting it back within 18 months at the latest in any case. They knew him well and relied on him not being greedy and demanding a new, top-of-the-range whatever. The car he went for was about £3000 more than he'd paid for the ringer, IIRC.Edited by SGirl on Tuesday 21st September 09:43
Early 90's, chap comes in to buy a BMW 850. His part ex is a very nice 944 Turbo Cab he had bought at Porsche Main Agent when it was 6 months old. Car was worth circa £25K at the time.
Deal done, new car arrives, admin girl tells me problem with part ex, its a Cat D on Hpi, Ie its been written off.
Ring man, tell him the news, he goes nuts, I have carried my child blah blah blah, end result is he gets back ALL his money, he had run car for 2 years and put 30K miles on it.
Porsche agent will have swallowed a huge pill on that one!
POORCARDEALER said:
Early 90's, chap comes in to buy a BMW 850. His part ex is a very nice 944 Turbo Cab he had bought at Porsche Main Agent when it was 6 months old. Car was worth circa £25K at the time.
Deal done, new car arrives, admin girl tells me problem with part ex, its a Cat D on Hpi, Ie its been written off.
Ring man, tell him the news, he goes nuts, I have carried my child blah blah blah, end result is he gets back ALL his money, he had run car for 2 years and put 30K miles on it.
Porsche agent will have swallowed a huge pill on that one!
The price of reputation! Good result. Having said that, he'd probably lose all of that in the first year's BMW depreciation!Deal done, new car arrives, admin girl tells me problem with part ex, its a Cat D on Hpi, Ie its been written off.
Ring man, tell him the news, he goes nuts, I have carried my child blah blah blah, end result is he gets back ALL his money, he had run car for 2 years and put 30K miles on it.
Porsche agent will have swallowed a huge pill on that one!
Not a garage, but I bought a £200 snotter of an Escort some years ago from an overty religious family.
Got the car home to find that the glovebox was stuffed with books and pamphlets 'spreading the good word of the Lord'. Rang the vendor to ask if they wanted them back but he assured me it was fine and that I might enjoy reading them.
Bit crafty that.
Got the car home to find that the glovebox was stuffed with books and pamphlets 'spreading the good word of the Lord'. Rang the vendor to ask if they wanted them back but he assured me it was fine and that I might enjoy reading them.
Bit crafty that.
Not so much a garage mistake but i had a car broken into whilst in for a MOT and the garage couldnt claim off their own insurance as they had been broken into a few weeks before so instead said they would do the MOT for FREE and pay cash for my stereo equipment. I was asked to provide the model numbers for the stereo, amp, sub, speakers i had - no problem as i had the receipts when i bought the car.
The thing is i paid £200 for a car with £600 worth of stereo so after having a free MOT, a bit of welding, a brand new door fitted and painted, a second hand dash fitted, and a valet the garage still paid me money, so i had a car with 12mths MOT that owed me £50.
dave
The thing is i paid £200 for a car with £600 worth of stereo so after having a free MOT, a bit of welding, a brand new door fitted and painted, a second hand dash fitted, and a valet the garage still paid me money, so i had a car with 12mths MOT that owed me £50.
dave
Cambelt snapped on my first 306 GTi-6, got it trailered to my Peugeot garage. A few days later I went in to look at the damage (estimate for repair was about £1200-£1400). Whilst there I spotted an immaculate, 12 month old China blue example, talked to a salesman and arranged a fantastic price to px the broken 306 for the shiny new one - I went for it.
Turns out the salesman had calculated the cost to swap assuming the old 306 was already repaired - had the deal in writing and he stood by it - Result
Turns out the salesman had calculated the cost to swap assuming the old 306 was already repaired - had the deal in writing and he stood by it - Result
. I bought a used Audi A4 from the stealers and i was taking a trip to the alps to go skiing about 2 months later, i noticed there was some catching from the front left wheel so took it back to the dealers. Was told it was a common fault and covered on warranty, i could pick it up later on that day. Recieved a phone call around 3 saying during the work they had broken part of the suspension housing and apologised for the problem and they would not be able to get a new part till the monday after the weekend. I was leaving on the saturday, ferriers, hotel etc all booked. Bearing in mind i was only 22 at the time, last year! i went in there with my Dad and kicked off big time. The site manager had to give me his A6 59 plate sline and insure it for me to drive to the alps and back, 1600 miles covered with someone else's car, brakes, tyres etc. Bet he wasnt happy about that!!
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