[UPDATE] - Comeback from Dealer over Dodgy Car

slumped

Hi All

In Late November I posted a thread here about my car which when washed revealed several panels that were painted badly enough that the paint came off revealing a crash damaged car.

The HPI check (UK import before I bought it) showed that it had been recorded as an Insurance Total Loss. (Cat 2).

I posted here and a few people asked me to post the conclusion of the case as I was considering legal action.

Here's what happened - DONT ASK THE NAME OF THE GARAGE - I am not telling!

1. Bought Blue Car (BMW 318i - 1998 model) in March 2006 for €9,000

2. Drove around as normal for 8 months.

3. Decided to get new tyres put on and then get the car power washed (up to now I always used a brush wash)

4. Power hose removed some of the blue paint to reveal red bodywork. Alarm bells now ringing.

5. Did HPI check and discovered truth.

6. Contacted garage (not a BMW Dealer) who were reluctant to settle. They are SIMI registered.

7. After a week of me sending faxes and letters and getting nothing in writing from the garage I decided to hand it over to my solicitor.

8. Legal argument centred on one key fact. When I asked the garage if it had been crashed they said as far as they knew it had not. My solicitor reckoned that because I had been sold a crash damaged car without being told I was entitled to in his words the value of the car and a lot more.

9. Got an AA vehicle inspection done on it (Cost me €357) and the report said that the vehicle was in an unsatisfactory condition.

10. Garage asked me to call in to talk about a deal.

11. They started by offering me 7000 trade in value and ended up giving me 9250 trade in value. That's 250 more than I paid for it. Gave them cash and traded up a couple of years. Got a six month Freeway warranty and the car is taxed until June.

To summerise, if you are sold a ringer or a crash damaged car and you were not informed, you are entitled to comeback. Be stubborn (I was!!) and you will get there.

What p1sses me off about it is that they sold my tradein to a guy who didnt care less about its history, just wondering exactly what they told him.

It took 7 weeks from discovering the problem to having a solution and had to drive the wifes car for that time.

So if anyone out there is thinking of buying a Blue BMW 318i 1998 with a Dublin reg from a garage in Kildare - beware and avoid!!!

Slumped

gyppo

Glad you got sorted out.

Did you do a HPI check on this one;)

slumped

gyppo wrote:

Glad you got sorted out.

Did you do a HPI check on this one;)

It's got a full BMW service history from Neil Conlons and my own mechanic has given it the once over. The garage I bought it from actually fixed up anything that my mechanic found wrong with it before they sold it to me.

S

prospect

is it one of these?

http://tinyurl.com/ybc8qq

slumped

prospect wrote:

is it one of these?

http://tinyurl.com/ybc8qq

No - the garage in question does not have it listed on their site.

gyppo

Im delighted to see the consumer come out the better in cases like this.

Traders that knowingly sell on damaged cars or clocked cars as bona fide articles should be made public examples of.
Dont get me wrong, Im not hinting that you should name and shame - but there should be legislation/public register there to inform joe public that garage 'X' has previously been caught doing dodgy deals.

PauloMN

slumped wrote:

Here's what happened - DONT ASK THE NAME OF THE GARAGE - I am not telling!

Why not (as a matter of interest)? Garages selling ringers should be exposed, and if they claim that they didn't know, they should have known. If the job was so bad that paint came off when you washed it, they should have been able to spot it a mile away.

slumped

PauloMN wrote:

Why not (as a matter of interest)? Garages selling ringers should be exposed, and if they claim that they didn't know, they should have known. If the job was so bad that paint came off when you washed it, they should have been able to spot it a mile away.

I have been looked after quite nicely by the garage and although I got the feeling they were glad to see the back of me I don't believe that they sold me the dodgy car and knew about it.

Benefit of the doubt. I make mistakes in work but I don't get crucified if it's once off. Let's be fair.

If someone else had the same experience with a garage in Co. Kildare then I would consider naming and shaming.

S

PauloMN

slumped wrote:

I have been looked after quite nicely by the garage and although I got the feeling they were glad to see the back of me I don't believe that they sold me the dodgy car and knew about it.

Benefit of the doubt. I make mistakes in work but I don't get crucified if it's once off. Let's be fair.

If someone else had the same experience with a garage in Co. Kildare then I would consider naming and shaming.

S

Fair enough, we all make mistakes, but are the mistakes you make in work life-threatening? Some of these guys get away with way too much.

I don't buy that they didn't know. Either they did know and didn't say, or they didn't know in which case they are abolutely hopeless with cars. If a car is so badly repaired that the paint comes off with a wash, they should have easily seen that.

Anyway, glad you got sorted in the end and fair play for being persistent. It's the only way when dealing with car dealers.

Did you get the SIMI involved at all?

mikedragon32

One of the questions a dealer asks when taking a trade-in is if the car has been crashed. It's included in the SIMI form they fill in when you buy your new car. They also ask if it's been used as a taxi.

I can't see how/why a SIMI dealer wouldn't therefore know if a car they are selling was crashed or not. And surely if you asked, he should have had the professional courtesy to find out for you.

Careless at best.

slumped

mikedragon32 wrote:

One of the questions a dealer asks when taking a trade-in is if the car has been crashed. It's included in the SIMI form they fill in when you buy your new car. They also ask if it's been used as a taxi.

I can't see how/why a SIMI dealer wouldn't therefore know if a car they are selling was crashed or not. And surely if you asked, he should have had the professional courtesy to find out for you.

Careless at best.

The guy that sold it to them allegedly said (when quizzed about it afterwards) that it had only minor damage, you would not have known it was in an accident.

Despite that, 4 panels were replaced and 4 others hammered back to normal and resprayed.

S

OldmanMondeo

Fair play to you for sticking to your guns. I nearly got caught with a UK import before christmas. Will never buy an import because of this.

JHMEG

So it cost you 9000 + 357 AA inspection + 60 HPI check + how much for your solicitor?

You're still out of pocket as far as I can see. Never mind the stress and time spent dealing with it.

As a matter of interest, is it a garage in Kildare town or county? If county, give us a hint and let us know which town it's in!

Moanin

OldmanMondeo wrote:

Fair play to you for sticking to your guns. I nearly got caught with a UK import before christmas. Will never buy an import because of this.

Why noy buy a uk import?The same could happen when buying an Irish car>there are plenty of dodgy Irish cars out there also!

slumped

JHMEG wrote:

So it cost you 9000 + 357 AA inspection + 60 HPI check + how much for your solicitor?

You're still out of pocket as far as I can see. Never mind the stress and time spent dealing with it.

As a matter of interest, is it a garage in Kildare town or county? If county, give us a hint and let us know which town it's in!

Garage actually paid for HPI and Solicitor was free so worked out well.

It's a garage in the County of Kildare, north of M7.

That's all I am saying.

Elessar

Glad you got it sorted.

Are you still driving a bmw? How did you find the older 318 model?

Mc-BigE

Glad you got sorted, personally i would have got the money and went elsewhere. But if you got the new car checked out, then maybe, as you say it was a case of the dealer didn't know or it wasn't forwarded by the previous owner. But very poor that they didn't check it before selling it to you.

It all depends on what they do next,

Will they sell it on to someone else and tell them it was crashed or not?

What if someone on here buys it? You need to name and shame or at least give more details of the car (photo) so people can avoid buying it.

samo

A friend of mine got a letter the other day from the Gards asking for them to contact them regarding business practices of garages in the South and West of Dublin.

They had purchased a car from a company in the past that I know has some links with a garage in Kildare with a less than great reputation (they did a bit of homework as to who the owners were as they were having difficulty, so I believe getting something fixed under warranty)

I dont know the upshot of the conversation with the Gard but interesting that enough people must have made complaints to get the business practices of certain garages investigated.

Just to say though to the OP - well done for persevering with it and that you got a result.

slumped

Elessar wrote:

Glad you got it sorted.

Are you still driving a bmw? How did you find the older 318 model?

Driving a 00 BMW 318i now.

The older one, when compared to the newer model, is very loud. My old one actually sounded more like a diesel than a petrol.

Wasn't a bad car but when you sit in the newer model you see huge differences.

S

OldmanMondeo

Moanin wrote:

Why noy buy a uk import?The same could happen when buying an Irish car>there are plenty of dodgy Irish cars out there also!

It put me off because the car was clocked and had a new clutch at 40k, not good for a 2.0 dsl. Any car I buy now is from a Main dealer only. It does give you some peice of mind and some come back.

Moanin

OldmanMondeo wrote:

It put me off because the car was clocked and had a new clutch at 40k, not good for a 2.0 dsl. Any car I buy now is from a Main dealer only. It does give you some peice of mind and some come back.

But you can buy from a main dealer in the UK also and if you buy a relatively new car with full main dealer service history,HPI check and that is still covered under maufacturers warranty there's nothing to worry about

slumped

Just wondering if anyone else has ever bought a dodgy vehicle and got it sorted with the garage??