Private sale small claims

jellybaby21

A friend of mine sold a car via private sale last year.

Car was running fine and had NCT, buyer was told that there was a part that they had to replace (done in garage) and had receipt to prove.

Turned out few months later there was more problems with it and buyer proceeded to small claims court and won. Didn't have any documents and was not even able to give reg of car.

Now I have never heard of this before, car was sold in good faith.

How was the ruling made against the seller?

Seller is appealing, and now has to see solicitor (that she can't afford!)

Any info or insight appreciated

Kenny Logins

Smells funny...

Kenny Logins

To be eligible to use the procedure, you, the 'consumer' must have bought the goods or services (or the service) for private use from someone selling them in the course of business. As a 'business' you must have bought the goods or services (or the service) for use in business from someone selling them in the course of business.

Type of claims dealt with
(a) a claim for goods or services bought for private use from someone selling them in the course of a business (consumer claims)

(b) a claim for goods or services bought for business use from someone selling them in the course of a business (business claims)

(c) a claim for minor damage to property (but excluding personal injuries)

(d) a claim for the non-return of a rent deposit for certain kinds of rented properties. For example, a holiday home or a room / flat in a premises where the owner also lives provided that a claim does not exceed €2,000.

http://www.courts.ie/Courts.ie/library3.nsf/pagecurrent/781D7D5227918A618025715C004CAEF3?opendocument

Nody

Kenny Logins wrote: »

Smells funny...

Not only smells funny but as posted above me private sells are not covered by the small claims court in the first place which means your friend is pulling your leg or it was not a private sell...

jellybaby21

Thanks guys, no definitely not pulling my leg. They have a young family and are stressed to bits over it. I've advised them to see a solicitor as they are not dealers! Seems that they are taking it that they are, and how they came to that conclusion I don't know. Solicitor will hopefully shed some light on it, was literally a 2 min job judge just flicked through it and awarded to the plaintiff

Kenny Logins

I can't see how this can possibly stand up??

bazz26

Is it possible the buyer is bluffing about the small claims court ruling? I'd be verifying that first off with the court clerk.

Nody

jellybaby21 wrote: »

Thanks guys, no definitely not pulling my leg. They have a young family and are stressed to bits over it. I've advised them to see a solicitor as they are not dealers! Seems that they are taking it that they are, and how they came to that conclusion I don't know. Solicitor will hopefully shed some light on it, was literally a 2 min job judge just flicked through it and awarded to the plaintiff

Assuming your friend is not lying it sounds like someone is trying to pull a quick one here.

For starters your friend would have received a notification to appear in court at date X, time Y for the case. Secondly the buyer would need to show how this was bought with some type of proof from said person (no, they don't accept his word for it and the buyer needs to show a receipt, invoice or something to back it up). This by definition would show that it's not a commercial transaction and end up with the case being thrown out. Third, once the buyer somehow won the case against a commercial entity he "bought" it from the sheriff (and ONLY the sheriff!) who's asked to enforce it has to seek out said legal entity to recoup the money which has to belong to said legal entity.

Hence; based on the above it sounds like your friend has received some faked documents claiming a judgement has gone against him. The reality is that it's not the case and even if the Sheriff would show up as there's no legal entity to claim goods from he'd leave empty handed.

ice.cube

Sounds like someone is watching too much Judge Judy.

bugsntinas

surely if the buyer went to the small claims court the court contacts the seller well that's how it worked when we claimed our rent deposit back.

corktina

I'd imagine if the action wasn't defended then the claimant would win, but it's getting them to take on the case that would be the real problem, maybe it was a trade sale described as Private Sale in the ads, as they do

ajmboyce

caveat emptor private sale might sound harsh but their problem car sold as seen.
More to this than meets the eye somebody is trying it on somewhere along the line.

ironclaw

Only thing I can think of is if the seller is a business and the invoice is from the business etc, even if it wasn't strictly an automotive business or sold through the business. Then on a quick glance it would appear it was bought from a business (Knowing the smalls claims court is literally a 10 min investigation) I'm clutching at straws mind you and that's pure speculation.

I'm guessing a scam personally unless they actually attended court. Then there is more to this story than is being let on.

corktina

ajmboyce wrote: »

caveat emptor private sale might sound harsh but their problem car sold as seen.
More to this than meets the eye somebody is trying it on somewhere along the line.

sold as seen means nothing. If it can be proved there was a known undisclosed fault, there would be a case (but not in the Small Claims Court)

Drummerboy08

corktina wrote: »

sold as seen means nothing. If it can be proved there was a known undisclosed fault, there would be a case (but not in the Small Claims Court)

How do you prove definitely that a private individual sold a car with a known fault tho?

kdevitt

Drummerboy08 wrote: »

How do you prove definitely that a private individual sold a car with a known fault tho?

Its happened in the past in at least one case I know of. Seller had been told that the gearbox was on its last legs by a garage who'd serviced it, buyer followed back through the service history when the inevitible happened. The garage had the gearbox issue listed on their system as having been advised to the original customer. Was listed for hearing, but was settled out of court.

ajmboyce

Drummerboy08 wrote: »

How do you prove definitely that a private individual sold a car with a known fault tho?[/QU

Be hard prove unless the car had a service history and there might have been an advisory from a garage that something needs to be done with the car if there was a problem on the the flip side the if the person buying the car see s this on the service record if the car in question had one and is seen by the the buyer than the buyer is knowingly buying the car with the knowledge that x y or z needs attention so no real case there either.

Yawns

bugsntinas wrote: »

surely if the buyer went to the small claims court the court contacts the seller well that's how it worked when we claimed our rent deposit back.

You went to the small claims court to get a rent deposit back? Is that not what PRTB is for?

ajmboyce

corktina wrote: »

sold as seen means nothing. If it can be proved there was a known undisclosed fault, there would be a case (but not in the Small Claims Court)

private sale car sold as seen has to mean something what happens if the buyer gets the car home and has a change of heart and starts picking out faults with the car or maybe in an extreme case add one or two themselves or if they are driving the car home and something goes on the car they are after buying and something just goes somethings go with out warning might not happen too often but it has happened cant just run back with the car especially if car was purchased in a car park somewhere as many are.

ajmboyce

corktina wrote: »

sold as seen means nothing. If it can be proved there was a known undisclosed fault, there would be a case (but not in the Small Claims Court)

private sale car sold as seen has to mean something what happens if the buyer gets the car home and has a change of heart and starts picking out faults with the car or maybe in an extreme case add one or two themselves or if they are driving the car home and something goes on the car they are after buying and somethings go with out warning might not happen too often but it has happened cant just run back with the car especially if car was purchased in a car park somewhere as many are.

corktina

Not what I said. The instance I was referring too is if there was a known fault that wasn't disclosed.

ajmboyce

corktina wrote: »

sold as seen means nothing. If it can be proved there was a known undisclosed fault, there would be a case (but not in the Small Claims Court)

corktina wrote: »

Not what I said. The instance I was referring too is if there was a known fault that wasn't disclosed.

Fair enough but try proving that one.

Voodoomelon

Something as silly as mentioning a fault online on a forum before selling could be your undoing. My understanding though was only if the fault causes the car to be dangerously defective, or if the buyer asks about a specific fault and you deny it.

HandsomeDan

ajmboyce wrote: »

Fair enough but try proving that one.

If a garage issued an advisory it would be on record, and so, fairly easy to prove.

CramCycle

Yawns wrote: »

You went to the small claims court to get a rent deposit back? Is that not what PRTB is for?

The PRTB are a useless quango who do absolutely nothing for renters (they have never found in favour of a renter in any case brought before them the last time the stats were revealed earlier this year).

Small claims court is quicker and more efficient.

corktina

CramCycle wrote: »

The PRTB are a useless quango who do absolutely nothing for renters (they have never found in favour of a renter in any case brought before them the last time the stats were revealed earlier this year).

Small claims court is quicker and more efficient.

Rubbish, I took my daughters former landlord to the PRTB and got a full refund of the deposit she witheld

corktina

ajmboyce wrote: »

Fair enough but try proving that one.

Several people have given examples of how it could be proven.

CramCycle

corktina wrote: »

Rubbish, I took my daughters former landlord to the PRTB and got a full refund of the deposit she witheld

Apologies, I got that from another thread awhile back, where several posters had claimed they had been waiting for over 2 years to be heard, and someone published data stating that all had been found in favour of landlords. I had lodged a complaint with the PRTB myself many moons ago and never even got a response. Despite repeated attempts at contact.

Just done a quick google, looks like I was wrong about what I said before though, sorry.

Pov06

Had a similar case a few years ago (wasn't car related) in the SCC.

The other party happened to be a Garda and you can imagine who won...

Yawns

I just didn't think the SMC would deal with it seeing as that's what PRTB is there for is what I meant.

ajmboyce

corktina wrote: »

Several people have given examples of how it could be proven.

In this particular case as it states in original post car was sold with nct and buyer was told car had an issue issue with car was fixed and had a receipt to prove issue was fixed buyer still bought car what exactly is there to prove? After a few months as it states in original post car had other issues they are not the sellers fault and unless a person can see into the future anything can happen.

1. If you buy a car privately with service history and there is an advisory from a garage and buyer sees this on service history that something needs attention and one still buys the car then what is there to prove? one is knowingly buying a car with an issue and are obviously happy to do so or they would look for a car elsewhere.

2. If you buy a car privately from some lad or lady in a car park with no history you are taking them at there word which probably counts for sod all what come back have you realistically none at all your happy with the car at the time its a chance your taking and if the car has issues how are you going to prove that the seller knew about it at the time of sale and if an individual does manage to get in touch all you ll get is car was running fine when you bought it and you were happy with it at the time is probably the most pleasant response one could expect.

corktina

I don't know how else to say it. If you buy a car privately that has, say, a faulty gearbox, and you can find the garage that told the seller it was faulty and he didn't disclose it, then that's fraud. I'm not talking about this specific case.

ajmboyce

corktina wrote: »

I don't know how else to say it. If you buy a car privately that has, say, a faulty gearbox, and you can find the garage that told the seller it was faulty and he didn't disclose it, then that's fraud. I'm not talking about this specific case.

Thats fair enough but what if there is no garage involved at all car never seen garage but seller knew the box was getting ropey and sold the car fair enough it might be fraud but it would be extremely hard to prove this unless as a user said earlier he had a thread up somewhere relating to the car in question with the fault in question or what about a timing belt and a lad says it s changed i went to look at a car before that seller said belt was changed the tipp ex was still wet nearly it was that fresh car hadnt an oil change let alone a timing belt done for years and no i didnt buy the car.

Autonomous

Did your friend get advance notice of the claim? did they respond or just bin it...if they didn't respond, judge would rule in favour of the person making the complaint as no defence was given.

corktina

ajmboyce wrote: »

Thats fair enough but what if there is no garage involved at all car never seen garage but seller knew the box was getting ropey and sold the car fair enough it might be fraud but it would be extremely hard to prove this unless as a user said earlier he had a thread up somewhere relating to the car in question with the fault in question or what about a timing belt and a lad says it s changed i went to look at a car before that seller said belt was changed the tipp ex was still wet nearly it was that fresh car hadnt an oil change let alone a timing belt done for years and no i didnt buy the car.

I can only refer you back to my original post where i said if it could be proven. It's hypothetical....

unfit2006

If a car failed it's NCT and the owner sells the car without mentoning that fact to the buyer, could the buyer take a case against the seller for selling the car with a "known undisclosed fault" ?

I presume the NCT failure sheet would need to be produced as evidence.

flutered

a court clerk will not show a claim to a judge unless the claiment can provide a recipt, as this is the only way the claiment can prove it is purchaced.