Car dealership failed service: will I have to pay?

ECV

07 Mini One: chugging and sounding sick, so I took it back to the dealers for repairs. I trusted them to fix it, facts below...short version.

Btw: I feel stupid enough, just looking for some practical - maybe legal? - advice...

Service department assessed, suggested expensive repairs (new coil packs, sparks & then new starter) - we thought about a new car;
Couldn't afford one from them, asked Service Dept if it was a good idea to go ahead and fix - they said yes, but obviously couldn't guarantee how long it would stay motoring for;
Trusted their judgement: car is now off road - not building compression in cylinder 2; not worth them fitting new engine;
They want us to pay for parts & labour - despite the fact that now we've had to buy a new car.

Do I have any comeback? If you want to know privately who this rapacious Mini Dealership is, no problem, but don't want to name and shame. Actually I do: but it might not be fair.

Toyotafanboi

Don't name and shame publically, we also cannot provide any legal advice.

IMO it does sound like they warned you that plugs and coils were just a first step in the process and may solve the problem but also may not and had to be eliminated as part of the diagnostic process, with that in mind, I think you owe them.

Sometimes if a car comes in with a problem that has had very poor/ no maintenance history some basics may need to be replaced before an accurate diagnosis can take place, unfortunately.

obviously couldn't guarantee how long it would stay motoring for;

mullingar

ECV wrote: »

07 Mini One: chugging and sounding sick, so I took it back to the dealers for repairs. I trusted them to fix it, facts below...short version.

Btw: I feel stupid enough, just looking for some practical - maybe legal? - advice...

Service department assessed, suggested expensive repairs (new coil packs, sparks & then new starter) - we thought about a new car;
Couldn't afford one from them, asked Service Dept if it was a good idea to go ahead and fix - they said yes, but obviously couldn't guarantee how long it would stay motoring for;
Trusted their judgement: car is now off road - not building compression in cylinder 2; not worth them fitting new engine;
They want us to pay for parts & labour - despite the fact that now we've had to buy a new car.

Do I have any comeback? If you want to know privately who this rapacious Mini Dealership is, no problem, but don't want to name and shame. Actually I do: but it might not be fair.

It was badly misdiagnosed and parts were just throw into it to hopefully fix the fault. Complain and see what they say as it was completely mis-diagnosed first time


Did it runout of coolant and overheat???

I fixed up a 1.4 07 Mini one recently that overheated due to no coolant thanks to a leaking thermostat (common fault).

Stripped it, Found the block was perfect (i was lucky), the head had warped a tiny bit and the crown of the piston #2 was damaged so the ring could not seal (French engine so numbered from gearbox)

Insert one second hand piston, a head skim, new timing chain kit, new thermostat, new head gasket and a full service = excellent compression and for a 1.4 was surprisingly very quick

GerryDerpy

Ah the good auld parts swap technique of fault finding. If it was me I wouldn't pay and see them in court. But I would have the qualifications and technical knowledge to defend my case.

Isambard

Pay up. They did what you asked and told you it may not last long.

ECV

Toyotafanboi wrote: »

Don't name and shame publically, we also cannot provide any legal advice.

IMO it does sound like they warned you that plugs and coils were just a first step in the process and may solve the problem but also may not and had to be eliminated as part of the diagnostic process, with that in mind, I think you owe them.

Sometimes if a car comes in with a problem that has had very poor/ no maintenance history some basics may need to be replaced before an accurate diagnosis can take place, unfortunately.

Thanks for that: I think this is a case of perspective. They couldn't guarantee how long the car would last - in the long term, not the short term. that's what I had asked. I asked if it was actually worth going ahead with the repairs and if they thought that they would fix it. They said yes, I trusted them. Stupid, right? I wish that Mullingar below had been the mechanic...

ECV

Isambard wrote: »

Pay up. They did what you asked and told you it may not last long.

Looks like I have no choice. I don't have to like it - or recommend them to anyone...

ECV

GerryDerpy wrote: »

Ah the good auld parts swap technique of fault finding. If it was me I wouldn't pay and see them in court. But I would have the qualifications and technical knowledge to defend my case.

End of the line for me. I want to give them the money in 5c coins.

wendydoll

Did you bring it a BMW Mini dealer?

ECV

Yes I did. Why do you ask.

wendydoll

Give their head office customer service a call and get them to look into the issue for you. You might get nowhere, but I had an issue, basically the same problem with the car within a few weeks of getting it repaired at the dealership and they wanted me to fork out another small fortune for the job to fixed again. Got nowhere with the dealership, rang BMW, who investigated it and wrote of the charges for repair.

Del2005

ECV wrote: »

End of the line for me. I want to give them the money in 5c coins.

50 coins is all that is considered legal tender.

CeilingFly

wendydoll wrote: »

Did you bring it a BMW Mini dealer?

ECV wrote: »

Yes I did. Why do you ask.

I would guess a similar experience I had.

"the computer says xyz" and their answer is to expensively replace items until they happen upon the real problem. At which stage the costs are astronomical.

A good independent mechanic will use their knowledge, their ears and the info you give them, add that to the computer diagnosis and quickly come up with the correct solution and a hell of a lot cheaper too.

CeilingFly

Isambard wrote: »

Pay up. They did what you asked and told you it may not last long.

But did they?

Far too few mechanics in these places. Under experienced "sales" people go by what a computerised readout says rather than use experience real mechanics would have.

I'd ask for an opinion from BMW/Mini especially if the replacement you bought is a Mini.

Also Google independent garages specialising in mini in your area and maybe ask their opinion.

spiggotpaddy

Suppose with the advent of the electric car, and more dealerships relying on the "computer says no " technique highly skilled mechanics are becoming antiquated relics of the last century. Soon to be lost like the black art of two stroke race tuning.
Now I'm off to have a conversation with my fridge to see who's the smartest.

ECV

amen, brother

ECV

wendydoll wrote: »

Give their head office customer service a call and get them to look into the issue for you. You might get nowhere, but I had an issue, basically the same problem with the car within a few weeks of getting it repaired at the dealership and they wanted me to fork out another small fortune for the job to fixed again. Got nowhere with the dealership, rang BMW, who investigated it and wrote of the charges for repair.

Worth a try...

minikin

Del2005 wrote: »

50 coins is all that is considered legal tender.

Pay in installments, 50 x 5c coins per week

LeChienMefiant

I would not bring a car older than manufacturer warranty to main dealer.

Toyotafanboi

LeChienMefiant wrote: »

I would not bring a car older than manufacturer warranty to main dealer.

I wouldn't say that as an outright statement but I certainly wouldn't make myself a first time customer with a ten year old car.

As well and good as it is contacting the manufacturer to get a refund or contacting the dealer via solicitor or paying them in 5c coins, maybe the OP should consider taking a cold hard look at their car and their actions too.

People are great at hearing what they want to hear too. Did the dealer tell you that the coil packs "would" solve the problem or that they "could" solve the problem because their is a big difference there, for example.

That and the amount of hindsight mechanics on this thread is laughable. Does every mechanic do a compression test on every car presenting with a misfire? I'd highly doubt it. Most mechanics will recommend a coilpack and a set of plugs to see where you stand with a misfire as a compression test in itself is often not enough to condemn a cylinder/ engine outright. Plenty of well maintained, evenly worn engines can continue to run satisfactorily when outside of the manufacturers compression specs.

Can you really make it the dealers fault that your ten year old car has packed in? You may not have wanted to pay the price for an accurate diagnosis because it isn't a good news story but now you know. An independent probably would have followed the same diagnostic path and gotten the same result at a slightly lower cost but the car would still be goosed.

That's probably the real lesson here. Let's not name and shame a garage because your car is clapped out and they now want payment for the service they provided.

mullingar

Toyotafanboi wrote: »

I wouldn't say that as an outright statement but I certainly wouldn't make myself a first time customer with a ten year old car.

As well and good as it is contacting the manufacturer to get a refund or contacting the dealer via solicitor or paying them in 5c coins, maybe the OP should consider taking a cold hard look at their car and their actions too.

People are great at hearing what they want to hear too. Did the dealer tell you that the coil packs "would" solve the problem or that they "could" solve the problem because their is a big difference there, for example.

That and the amount of hindsight mechanics on this thread is laughable. Does every mechanic do a compression test on every car presenting with a misfire? I'd highly doubt it. Most mechanics will recommend a coilpack and a set of plugs to see where you stand with a misfire as a compression test in itself is often not enough to condemn a cylinder outright.

Can you really make it the dealers fault that your ten year old car has packed in? You may not have wanted to pay the price for an accurate diagnosis but now you know. An independent probably would have followed the same diagnostic path and gotten the same result at a slightly lower cost but the car would still be goosed.

That's probably the real lesson here. Let's not name and shame a garage because your car is clapped out and they now want payment for the service they provided.

On the mini the knock sensors/ecu would have detected a cylinder misfire. Swapping coil packs around would have shown the fault was not coil pack related if the fault code remained on that cylinder.

Armed with that information the next step would be to check fuel injectors and compression. Checking compression on a petrol engine only takes 5 mins per cylinder.

Alas, real mechanics are a dying breed and modern technicians rely entirely on the codes. Pity

Toyotafanboi

mullingar wrote: »

On the mini the knock sensors/ecu would have detected a cylinder misfire. Swapping coil packs around would have shown the fault was not coil pack related if the fault code remained on that cylinder.

Armed with that information the next step would be to check fuel injectors and compression. Checking compression on a petrol engine only takes 5 mins per cylinder

Have we confirm with the OP and the tech on the job that the car didn't have one or more failing coil packs?

Have we confirmed that they didn't tell the OP that it was likely that the car was outside compression specs but it was still running on it's day one plugs and coils and that a new set may compensate for time enough for to tide them over for a period of time until they decide to repair or replace the engine?

We're making full assumptions based on half the facts. We are conditioned beat the big bad dealer because it's the easy thing to do but we don't know if it's the right thing to do.

CeilingFly

Toyotafanboi wrote: »

We are conditioned beat the big bad dealer because it's the easy thing to do but we don't know if it's the right thing to do.

Unfortunately there are far too many issues with bmw service "professionals" that all seem to follow a similar pattern - "computer says" and then they replace and charge for items until the fault goes away.

And that's from direct personal experience - they wanted to replace the dpf filter on my car almost 100,000km ago - indo says its still fine.
Also told turbo would need replacing as a "sound" was coming from it. Indo said sound was normal. Again 100,000 km later and no issue.

Toyotafanboi

Or to put it another way,

OP brings car to (common knowledge) the most expensive repairer
OP asks for diagnosis on poor running
Dealer accepts job
Dealer carries out initial checks and ask for approval to replace x and y to confirm diagnosis
OP approves
Dealer replaces x and y and confirms engine is ****ed

OP doesn't want to pay and wants to name and shame dealer, because the dealer gave them news they didn't want to hear. Not because the dealer was wrong in their diagnosis but because the dealer is charging more than the find palatable (a figure also previously approved by the OP) for giving a correct, if bad news diagnosis.

OP owes the money. Don't bring a 10 year old car for first time diagnostic to main dealer.

/thread.

Farmer

ECV wrote: »

07 Mini One: chugging and sounding sick,

My €0.02

Surely fitting a new starter for a car running badly is incompetence

Also, how was it that the low compression wasn't diagnosed earlier

You're paying high main dealer labour rates for a full professional diagnosis, not for piece by piece diagnosis.

You have nothing to lose by at least threatening the small claims court during your negotiation with them

Edit: Oops, some of this covered already while I was writing this post

khaldrogo

Toyotafanboi wrote:

That and the amount of hindsight mechanics on this thread is laughable................

There is another thread about main dealer vs chain store atm with people slating the chain saying that all they do is through parts at cars to fix faults and the main won't do that!!!!!
The amount of YouTube mechanics on that thread spouting unqualified biased rubbish is just was laughable......if you don't work on cars for your wages then I don't want to hear your opinion.

Toyotafanboi

khaldrogo wrote: »

There is another thread about main dealer vs chain store atm with people slating the chain saying that all they do is through parts at cars to fix faults and the main won't do that!!!!!

I was going to say something along those lines.

Every thread where someone has an issue with an independent garage you get the whole "most independents are crap, they will just throw parts at the car or replace the whole engine if they don't know what's wrong".

Every thread where someone has an issue with a main dealer you get the whole "most main dealers are crap, they will just blindly follow fault codes and they aren't real mechanics, they are just fitters".

Yet people will they consistently recommend looking for a brand specialist independent, like for example in this instance an independent BMW/ Mini specialist. The thing is, those independents aren't self educated. Where did they gain their in depth brand knowledge? By training at a main dealer of course. So they were just a useless trouble code diagnosing fitter in the main dealer but now he's out on his own he's God's gift.

Good diagnostic techs are plentiful, the biggest issue is with the advent of Google, YouTube and even the likes of this forum every unqualified punter wants to second guess their judgement call and belittle the fees they request for same. Nobody on this thread has seen what the technician on that Mini seen, all we've heard is a second hand, incomplete account of the faults from an unqualified individual but from that alone, we all know the technician was wrong. Indeed.

ba_barabus

Toyotafanboi wrote: »

I was going to say something along those lines.

Every thread where someone has an issue with an independent garage you get the whole "most independents are crap, they will just throw parts at the car or replace the whole engine if they don't know what's wrong".

Every thread where someone has an issue with a main dealer you get the whole "most main dealers are crap, they will just blindly follow fault codes and they aren't real mechanics, they are just fitters".

Yet people will they consistently recommend looking for a brand specialist independent, like for example in this instance an independent BMW/ Mini specialist. The thing is, those independents aren't self educated. Where did they gain their in depth brand knowledge? By training at a main dealer of course. So they were just a useless trouble code diagnosing fitter in the main dealer but now he's out on his own he's God's gift.

Good diagnostic techs are plentiful, the biggest issue is with the advent of Google, YouTube and even the likes of this forum every unqualified punter wants to second guess their judgement call and belittle the fees they request for same. Nobody on this thread has seen what the technician on that Mini seen, all we've heard is a second hand, incomplete account of the faults from an unqualified individual but from that alone, we all know the technician was wrong. Indeed.

You seem to have much disdain for the members of the forum which you moderate.

As for the OP, you did sanction the work, you did agree to it, you were told it may not work. I'd pay.

ba_barabus

khaldrogo wrote: »

There is another thread about main dealer vs chain store atm with people slating the chain saying that all they do is through parts at cars to fix faults and the main won't do that!!!!!
The amount of YouTube mechanics on that thread spouting unqualified biased rubbish is just was laughable......if you don't work on cars for your wages then I don't want to hear your opinion.

To be fair there are countless threads on here where these chain stores try to massage the work required for cars.

khaldrogo

ba_barabus wrote:

To be fair there are countless threads on here where these chain stores try to massage the work required for cars.

Do you understand how a main dealer works?
Do you understand that the after sales dept is what keeps the doors open?
Do you really believe that main dealers don't attempt upsells the same as the indys?
There are unscrupulous people in every section of the motor trade. Not everyone in a main dealer is trying to screw you, not every indy or chain is trying to screw you.
1 or 2 personal bad experiences with 1 place should not be enough to slate every other place out there. I guarantee​ you that the place that has 10 bad reviews has many, many more loyal, happy, repeat customers.

Toyotafanboi

ba_barabus wrote: »

You seem to have much disdain for the members of the forum which you moderate.

As for the OP, you did sanction the work, you did agree to it, you were told it may not work. I'd pay.

Ah no, I enjoy the car guy chats and banter. I just don't enjoy the constant retailer bashing. That said, that's just my opinion, "other opinions are also available"

ba_barabus

Toyotafanboi wrote: »

I just don't enjoy the constant retailer bashing

Nor do I if it's not justified as 'that thread' during the week showed

ba_barabus

khaldrogo wrote: »

Do you understand how a main dealer works?
Do you understand that the after sales dept is what keeps the doors open?
Do you really believe that main dealers don't attempt upsells the same as the indys?
There are unscrupulous people in every section of the motor trade. Not everyone in a main dealer is trying to screw you, not every indy or chain is trying to screw you.
1 or 2 personal bad experiences with 1 place should not be enough to slate every other place out there. I guarantee​ you that the place that has 10 bad reviews has many, many more loyal, happy, repeat customers.

I never said any or all of them were. There was 1 chain mentioned at the start of the thread you're referring to and they regularly show up here in very questionable situations. You can argue that the few have tainted the majority but that's life and that's why they should be quicker to clamp down on that type of behaviour but they rarely do.

I've had excellent main dealer, chain and independent service in the past but if they try sh!t on for a second they're told.