My Evans Halshaw Nightmare

waveydave79

Last year me and my partner decided it was time for a newer car. we purchased an Astra, which to this day is a nice car, however weve had a few minor niggles which needed ironing out.



2 months after the purchase the Engine light came on, and after investigation the transponder on the key stopped working. After speaking with the garage in January, we were told I had to try the other key, however the VX warrenty was near an end.

This fault was very intermitant and it only happened 2 times every month, so it took a while to see if it was the car or key. Under Evans Halshaw advise I took it in today, now under the extended warrenty to recieve a shock - :mad:

They now wanted me to pay them £50 for daigs + £73 pounds to get the CIM Module reprogrammed, It turns out the CIM is covered, but reprogramming it does not. There diagnostics require me to pay this as they do not know if the part is faulty.



I tried to riase the point that I had reported the fault as close to the end of VX warrenty as possible, the service manager there was not interested and explained the repogramming wasnt covered. 2nd point if its nessescary to reprogram the CIM before replacing it for diagnostic purposes- I think it is unfair I should cover the costs.



After reasoning with the Service manager, I managed to get alittle money off, but they still want £80, I agreed to that, Oh and it gets better - they couldnt do it today becuase there reprogramming machine (tech2) had just broke.


It amazes me of thier lack of customer service and understanding, surely if its nessescary to update software in order to diagnose the program, surely this should not be down to the customer. Another way of looking at it, was also that car was sold to me with the old firmware on it, the problem existed just wasnt happening often enough to show itself until too late.



let this be a warning to anyone buying from Evans Halshaw, I would have not taken out the warrenty if I knew I had to jump through these loops.


My father also has told me to seek legal advise, however they seem to have all the terms well laid out in the warrenty paperwork, the only possible way of doing it may be proving they dragged it out so the VX warrenty ended. I really do dread any futher dealing with this garage, and I am not looking forward to going back on thusday (when there machine is back up).

Sirbendy

The tech2 usually costs - I'm moving to a second-hand vauxhall that's tech2 compatible, that has 2 warnings lit up - 1 airbag system, 1 engine diags. I'm getting it sorted pre-payment, but then I'm going to (I think) purchase a £30ish "tech2" clone to read and reset the faults myself.

Lemonade_Pockets

A few things that you could try:

1) Speak to the dealer principle, explain the story etc etc see what he/she says.
2) Speak to EH head office, the dealership won't give you the number but if you google pendragon and loxely house Nottingham you should find it pdq.
3) Speak to vauxhall CS and see what they say - point out that you bought a vauxhall because you'd heard they were reliable and had a good dealer network, you feel you have been let down etc..
4) Speak to Auto protect - the people that provide the aftermarket warranty and just check out their story.
Just make a fuss and they will probably back down eventually.

Or save a load of hassle take it on the chin and pay up.

waveydave79

ok, thanks Ive had some time to think about it. I have the number for thier head office thanks to Lemonade. I will be speaking with them tommorow and explaining the situation. Failing this I will send them a letter.

What annoys me the most is.. VX have put up their hands and said there is issues if there are updates available. Why should I have to pay for them? I work in a customer service background myself and if we charged customers to update thier computers BIOS we would go out of businuess. In addition to this, I am so annoyed that I have to put in order for them to diagnose a potential hardware fault, of an item which is covered by the warrenty.

Will see if they budge tommorow I intend to cuase or much hassle as possible.

asbokid

i would do as sirbendy says and buy a code scanner and do the job yourself... if you actually like the vauxhall and you intend to keep it, you will probably make good use of the tool over your period of ownership of the vehicle. it's never a bad thing to know what diagnostic codes are being thrown by the ECU before you take the car in for a service..

you're in a good position to argue that "i don't believe it needed that £120 lambda sensor you just fitted. thanks all the same!"

Sirbendy

indeedy. My old Vauxhall had a pre-tech2 diagnostic system that you could interrogate with a paperclip (seriously, it would flash a code using the diag light that you could look up). However, it doesn't work on newer ones.

Tao81

Whats CIM module, transponder on key and tech 2. What models does this relate to, as I'm thinking of buying a s/h astra 1.6i club 2001?! Will this stuff potentially affect me if I do?

Sirbendy

How long is a peice of string? Basically...we can't predict that. Things go wrong sometimes.

I've just bought (for £1995) an X plate 2000 Astra 1.6i Club Automatic with 54,000 miles on it. Nice car. took it for it's first long run yesterday, found that it appears to have a jammed thermostat. Then coming home I had the engine warning light come on.

It has A 30 day warranty, so I'm going to get in touch with them and say "fix it, and give it a new timing belt at the same point, I'll pay for that as it has to come off anyway" - I'm not too bothered, as the timing belt on my old one I had done at 88,000...and having it done now won't hurt. It'll give me some peace of mind too. Whoever at Vauxhall thought that putting the thermostat behind the timing belt was clever deserves a slap. :rolleyes:

As to the engine lamp - here's a trick I tried that works. Turn the car off, press down on the accelerator and brake together, turn it back on to position 2 (NOT start it).

The engine management (spanner) lamp will flash out a code..10 flashes is a "0", any other number is the next digit..for example, mine is doing 10, pause, 4, pause, 10, pause, 10, or 0400.

There are lookup codes on sites such as topbuzz.co.uk that you cross reference these against to find the fault. P0400 on mine is the EGR valve, which is both known to Vauxhall, common on the 8 valves, and easy to fix.

A transponder is the remote key that does your central locking and immobiliser. Sometimes they come out of sync, it's all detailed as to how to sort it in the manual. The immobiliser chips are usually no hassle, I've had 2 now with no issue.

Tech2 is the Vauxhall computer system that can read the inbuilt computers in the car and tell the garage what is wrong, and how to sort it.

And the CIM...quoth another site:

"The CIM unit is a module which controls a lot of the electronics in the cabin (indicators & airbags to name but two) and is located in or near the steering column"

Welcome to the computer age, heh. God help us all. It's not just Vauxhall, ALL cars are now going more and more computer controlled. All are are complex as each other now, and as likely to go !!!!!! on occasions. All vauxhalls have a similar level of technology now. My old Astra (a 1997 mk3) was far more basic, and never went wrong. This one, we'll see.

I'm a computer tech by trade anyway, so I'm fairly comfortable with the electronics..:)

mrdee0

I bought my corsa from evans halshaw (vauxhall warranty ends June 2009) and i tried to get them to look at my car three times telling them my car was pulling a lot to one side. They kept telling me the alighment on the rear is not adjustable and i should take it to vauxhall to have a look!
Well after much stress and worry and not using the car for fear of crashing i sought help of a local garage who found the rear beam slightly bent from must have been before i got the car. Got it replaced for £380 and now runs fine.
Evans halshaw customer service was so terrible-no friendlyness at all-sometimes rude and ignorant-and most importantly not ready to listen to problems.
Well thats the last time i EVER buy from them and have advised every single friend and relative i can get hold of to warn them to not buy from them. I will be sending a letter of complaint to them as well.

moonkee

I hate Evans Halshaw too. Truly awful customer service and they over-charge massively on the maintenance. Will never use again.

fazer600

I would never use Evan Halshaw again they are a waist of space, i brought a 59 plate corsa with less than 10000 mile on the clock for £7113 which has had more problems in the first month than my 04 plate VW had in 6 yrs
>They never get back to you.
>They lied about it being booked in and that there wasn't a curtesy car which i now have after complaining.
>I told them the waterpump had gone, they had the car for 3 days used up all the petrol then told me there was nothing wrong and when i took it back after a mile all of a sudden the waterpump had gone so they didn't even check it
>The radio cuts out.
>The gears jump out.
>The petrol gauge stick
>When i take my foot off the throttle it still rev'ed high.
>It's taken nearly 2 weeks just for them to pick it up.