1 in 5 cars clocked?

L-M

Just saw it on the news there, according to Motorcheck.ie.

Highest percentage clocked are no surprise, Ford Focus, Avensis and Passat.

Not surprised.

Delancey

Is that because those 3 cars are the most numerous / most in demand ?

Atlantic Dawn

Interesting, from listening to some in the trade every 2nd UK imported car was clocked, clearly not the case...

The study included both cars that were registered new in the UK and cars that were registered new here, and it found only a marginal difference in the percentage of each which showed evidence of clocking.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2011/1006/cars.html

L-M

Delancey wrote: »

Is that because those 3 cars are the most numerous / most in demand ?

No, it's because the Passat and the Avensis and Focus would be hugely imported, I've seen 09 Focus's with over 60,000 miles on them and they're immaculate, I can understand why some of them are clocked and people wouldn't notice.

L-M

Atlantic Dawn wrote: »

Interesting, from listening to some in the trade every 2nd UK imported car was clocked, clearly not the case...



http://www.rte.ie/news/2011/1006/cars.html

May be the case, but the Focus and Passat stand out for me due to the sheer amount of diesel ones being imported.

mondeo

Sure why wouldn't they be since it's a relatively easy task to do on any car these days. I'm sure you could download somthing from a bittorent site tonight and hook your laptop up to your OBD connector and knock 20k off the clock.

It certainly is not a surprise at all.

wee truck big driver

would this not be a scare by dealers to put people off buying imported cars. i had a english car with fsh when a check was done in ireland it said there was doubts over mileage even though everything pointed to mileage being correct

L-M

wee truck big driver wrote: »

would this not be a scare by dealers to put people off buying imported cars. i had a english car with fsh when a check was done in ireland it said there was doubts over mileage even though everything pointed to mileage being correct

Well it said in the news to "Buy off a trusted Dealer to save you hassle".

I've seen numerous "trusted" Dealers with obviously clocked cars. It's like a shill to try scare people from buying privately.

wee truck big driver

people are too obsessed with the mileage. when realistically the condition is whats important

L-M

wee truck big driver wrote: »

people are too obsessed with the mileage. when realistically the condition is whats important

It's the way we Irish are trained

Nate--IRL--

Limerick man wrote: »

Just saw it on the news there, according to Motorcheck.ie.

I'm sure they have no vested interest in collecting these figures at all. Nice bit of free advertising for them on the news.

Nate

L-M

Nate--IRL-- wrote: »

I'm sure they have no vested interest in collecting these figures at all. Nice bit of free advertising for them on the news.

Nate

Motorcheck seem to be very helpful here on boards, often giving free checks to people etc. I can't see it purely being as a free advertising campaign, but having that knowledge for free is fairly valuable and might make some unsuspecting buyer a bit more cautious. (Although, it most cases will make them over cautious and get ripped off by "Trusted dealers")

Nate--IRL--

Limerick man wrote: »

Motorcheck seem to be very helpful here on boards, often giving free checks to people etc. I can't see it purely being as a free advertising campaign, but having that knowledge for free is fairly valuable and might make some unsuspecting buyer a bit more cautious. (Although, it most cases will make them over cautious and get ripped off by "Trusted dealers")

Fair enough - maybe I'm just getting too cynical in my old age

Nate

Anan1

Motorcheck have no way of knowing whether one in five cars here are clocked. They also have a strong vested interest in scaremongering.

The amount of muck on the news is unreal, when something is on that you know is bullsh1tty it makes you wonder is all the rest of it way off the mark too. Not specifically on about this clocking issue but in general.

BnB

ΛΛΛ Couldn't agree more James

CreepingDeath

Anan1 wrote: »

Motorcheck have no way of knowing whether one in five cars here are clocked.

It's yet another example of a flawed "survey".
It's not a random survey of all car buyers, it's a survey based on people who are suspicious enough about the car to go through motorcheck in the first place.

L-M

Irrelevant, if 20% of 6000 cars were searched that's still 1 in 5 of that search, if we say that about this survey we can say it about every single survey.

There are lots of clocked cars out there, and even more going unnoticed, I think it's about time people became more vigilant.

Anan1

Limerick man wrote: »

Irrelevant, if 20% of 6000 cars were searched that's still 1 in 5 of that search, if we say that about this survey we can say it about every single survey.

Motorcheck don't run surveys, they run background checks on cars people may be suspicious of.;)

Limerick man wrote: »

There are lots of clocked cars out there, and even more going unnoticed, I think it's about time people became more vigilant.

Absolutely.

Barry walsh

All they were saying was out of 6000 cars they checked 1 in 5 were clocked yes they have a vested interest but there are other companies that provide the same service

They were highlighting the issue which in turn will lead to more people checking the cars (good for them)but will mean more people will be out of pocket a small amount (whatever a car check costs) rather than the price of the car (which is always bigger)


I do have a problem with the buying off a trusted dealer rather than privately part that could be seen as anti competitive and a distort
the market plenty of trusted dealers clock vehicles through a third party to get around liability having requested a milage correction rather a "diganostic check" had been carried out and the milage was altered by the third party and the salesperson was not informed when it was sold on with the new lower milage

Anan1

Thing is, the (IMO) best way of checking whether a car has been clocked doesn't involve Motorcheck at all. You go through the car's service history thoroughly, and you ring every garage mentioned therein to confirm that they did the work as per the invoice/stamp. You'd want to be silly enough to assume that a car with no history hadn't been clocked just because Motorcheck wasn't showing any mileage discrepancies.

CreepingDeath

CreepingDeath wrote: »

...... You'd want to be silly enough to assume that a car with no history hadn't been clocked just because Motorcheck wasn't showing any mileage discrepancies.

Motorcheck should really highlight that to folk, "no discrepency as we have no data at all for this car"

L-M

Anan1 wrote: »

Thing is, the (IMO) best way of checking whether a car has been clocked doesn't involve Motorcheck at all. You go through the car's service history thoroughly, and you ring every garage mentioned therein to confirm that they did the work as per the invoice/stamp. You'd want to be silly enough to assume that a car with no history hadn't been clocked just because Motorcheck wasn't showing any mileage discrepancies.

You have to remember what country we're in when you say that phrase.

I looked at a 03 1.6 Petrol 3door Highling Mk4 Golf yesterday, I know Golfs inside from out, and I looked through all the usual area's I would and guessed the mileage between 80-90,000 miles. It was actually 167,000, I couldn't believe it.

MrDerp

1 in 5 used cars clocked is a bit of a misleading headline.

"The analysis, carried out by car history check provided Motorcheck.ie, was based on a sample of 6,000 used cars which the company has produced reports on for private consumers this year."

Now, does Mrs Murphy buying a nearly new Micra get a Motorcheck.ie report done? I've no doubt there's widespread clocking, but I think there's a bias in the figures given that you're more likely to stump up the money for a report if the car appears to be a little too good to be true.

Anan1

Limerick man wrote: »

You have to remember what country we're in when you say that phrase.

I know, I know.. Still and all, if you buy without a verifiable SH then you buy on the basis that it probably has been clocked.

cadaliac

MrDerp wrote: »

1 in 5 used cars clocked is a bit of a misleading headline.

"The analysis, carried out by car history check provided Motorcheck.ie, was based on a sample of 6,000 used cars which the company has produced reports on for private consumers this year."

Now, does Mrs Murphy buying a nearly new Micra get a Motorcheck.ie report done? I've no doubt there's widespread clocking, but I think there's a bias in the figures given that you're more likely to stump up the money for a report if the car appears to be a little too good to be true.

Exactly !!
The source pool of cars tested are already suspicious of being clocked and the 3 mentioned cars - Focus, Avensis and the Passat are the most popular cars to import (epically diesels).
So for me this "survey" is a load of crap. Again, more scare-mongering, although, there are a lot of cars out there that are clocked, and unnoticed, as mentioned above.
I would doubt if the figure is as high as they say but maybe it is for imported cars only.

cadaliac

Anan1 wrote: »

I know, I know.. Still and all, if you buy without a verifiable SH then you buy on the basis that it probably has been clocked.

Not necessarily though. Well not for Irish cars. I would agree for imports from the UK alright.
I've bought cars with history up to about 50 to 60k and then nothing. That car had 124k when I bought it and it wasn't clocked.
I bought a Peugeot 405 with 113k on the clock with no history but the owner had all the receipts of the work that was carried out on the car in its life - which was better than a FSH in my book.
Regardless, thees were cheap cars and anything more expensive should have a history, in Ireland or anywhere else for that matter.

There should be no excuses. None.

Why would you NOT record a service costing you a few hindered quid on your 10k (or more) car?
Disregard for recording a service history points to a disregard to servicing a car.

Sandwlch

wee truck big driver wrote: »

people are too obsessed with the mileage. when realistically the condition is whats important

People are too obsessed with year on the number plate.

Realistically the mileage IS whats important. Its the best indicator of the condition of the important stuff - the stuff you cant see.