Garage hid the major damage to the car

Sir_luksik

Hi everyone, I just found out that the used car I bought 8 months ago had a major painting done on one side. I needed to change a bumper after small incident and the painter found out that the whole side of car was already painted. Car was purchased as used from an official dealer and the assured me (verbally) that it had not been in the accident. Obviously nothing in the car service history. Mechanically the car seems to be fine as it was checked by my mechanic but now I'm wondering what happened to the car so the whole side needed to be painted. Can I request that information from the dealer? Do I have any chance of finding out what happened?

PsychoPete

The dealer might not have known it was painted, the previous owner could have had the damage repaired and said nothing when trading it in. If work was done to a good standard then I wouldn't be worried. Could easily have been a mark on a door but they painted the whole side to get a better paint match

brokenangel

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058243004/garage-hid-the-major-damage-to-the-car

Just because a car got sprayed doesn’t mean it was in accident, my wife let a trolley go and it ran up along side making a huge scrape on it, I have no idea what the repair guy done but I expect it was sprayed over a large area

I also left a car parked in Dublin over night once, came back to find one of the panels which looked like someone had kicked it 3-4 times. Again no idea what repair place done

I would ask dealer, they might know

They might have also sprayed it themselves because it was full of marks and to bring it back up if it was main dealer

Sir_luksik

that's what my painter said... that it could have been done outside of the garage privately. He said it was a good job. I was just surprised that the garage didn't check that before taking in the car for trade.

colm_mcm

This could have been the result of a scrape rather than a full-on accident. Even a scrape to a door could require a much larger area to be painted.

brokenangel

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118968746#Comment_118968746

If the car is not crashed a sprayed panel is not a reason not to take in the car and resell it

Sir_luksik

Thanks to all for you comments. I may give them a ring and ask if they knew about it but I probably know the answer already. I just want to make sure it was a minor damage requiring painting only and nothing mechanical.

Dirty Nails

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058243004/garage-hid-the-major-damage-to-the-car

Just to put it in perspective, will you declare replacing a bumper to the next owner?

User1998

I agree with Colm above. If you want the job done correctly, a minor scratch can require up to two full panels to be painted. A car being keyed can require four panels to be completely resprayed.

I think you are completely over reacting OP. The painter didn’t even find any previous accident damage. I’d just forget about it if I were you

Atlantic Dawn

Could simply have been someone keyed the side of the car. If there's no signs of body panel mismatch or filler used it's a minimal repair.

bs2014

How did you fair with this? This sounds exact same as me. Bought a 2yr old BMW a month ago and discovered whole passenger side of car was resprayed (quite badly) with a paint run on the passenger door and slightly different shade of colour to original colour.. Will never know how I didn't spot it. Dealer agreed to refund the car last week but now they are ghosting me, ignoring my emails and texts.

Bit frustrating as they now happy to take the car back cuz they know it will have went up in value and will easily flock it to another punter, cheaper to do that than respray the car right. Even if I get the refund, it leaves me goosed cuz my car I traded in is long sold and to buy the same make and model of car I traded in would cost like 5k more than I sold it for, equally to buy the same car as I currently own (with the bad paint job) will cost an extra 5k.

What way did you fair? Did you have to take a legal case or go to SIMI?

Seth Brundle

What way did you fair? Did you have to take a legal case or go to SIMI?

SIMI are a lobby group for the motor trade and aren't really there to give a toss about the customer.

goochy

Bs 2014 assume you didn't buy from a Bmw dealer ?

colm_mcm

Any used BMWs haven’t just gone up €5k in the space of a month, so it’s safe to say this BMW was below normal market value, which will make finding a genuine one from a proper dealer for the same money very difficult.