Need URGENT advice

MLisking

Hi All,


Right, I have a Rover 25, 44k, 2003, bought 12 months ago (well, my stupid partner did) and has 3 yrs left on HP.


The car was playing up around 3 months ago. Last week took it in to Ford garage (this is who we had a warranty with so had no choice - when in fact the warranty was invalid as i didnt get it serviced at 10k, it was serviced at 12k, sooooo annoying but a different story) and they did a "full" service - changed spark plugs and oil filter, and charged me £200 :mad: !!!!!!!!!! We strongly suspected it was the head gasket, they ran all these tests but said no, its fine.

So anyway, STILL the coolant is constantly needing to be topped up, and so I take it into a different mechanic (one that has a good repuation with close friends). He goes through it with me and says yep, as you suspected, it IS in fact the head gasket. So thats ANOTHER £600.

I'm stuck. I don't want to cough up that amount, but have no choice as cant afford more HP. So thats £800. I'm devastated but I NEED my car, its vital.

Can I claim back the £200 from the ford garage? They charged that much because they were "investigating" the head gasket so surely I should get that charge back??

Any other thoughts / ideas on what I could do would be really appreciated. Please help.

Silk

Did you take the car in under warranty when it started playing up 3 months ago ?
Was the service done at the same time as you reported the fault ?
If so did you ask them to check the car as to why it was losing water before they carried out the service ?

anewman

I wouldn't be spending £600 on it before the legal ownership is sorted out. The HP company still owns the car legally and it would be even worse if you put £800 into it and they took it off you. I am sure they would give you due warning of this though.

If you did not ask for a service at the Ford garage I would demand a refund. Unfortunately the only thing going against you in court is that they could easily say you asked for a service and it's their word against yours. But I wouldn't let them get away with it easily. Go in there and raise your voice (to drive away potential customers) until someone actually tries to deal with your query.

Silk

Whats this legal ownership about ?
Is it an ex partner ???

anewman

Silk wrote: »

Whats this legal ownership about ?
Is it an ex partner ???

If a car has finance on it, the finance company legally owns the car and can take it away. This is why you should do a HPI check before purchasing a car.

Silk

anewman wrote: »

If a car has finance on it, the finance company legally owns the car and can take it away. This is why you should do a HPI check before purchasing a car.

Sorry I don't understand
There must be millions of cars that break down that have finance outstanding on them why is that relavent ?

MLisking

anewman wrote: »

I wouldn't be spending £600 on it before the legal ownership is sorted out. The HP company still owns the car legally and it would be even worse if you put £800 into it and they took it off you. I am sure they would give you due warning of this though.
QUOTE]

Sorry if I'm being stupid here, but why do you think the car would be taken from me? We are making the payments fine no problem, am I missing something? Could the HP comp take the car because its damaged? HP is with Black Horse. Thinking of saving like a mad woman, paying off the money owed on the car and then getting rid of it.

MLisking

Silk wrote: »

Did you take the car in under warranty when it started playing up 3 months ago ?
Was the service done at the same time as you reported the fault ?
If so did you ask them to check the car as to why it was losing water before they carried out the service ?

1) My husband topped up the coolant and oil, we just thought it was running low. 3 months later when it needed more we realised there was a problem so took it in straight away.

2) We asked them to do a service to find out what was going on. We made them aware it was using too much oil and too much coolant. They were vague about the loss of coolant but said it wasn't the HG as they had ran some tests.

What should I do?? Could they argue that the HG went after the service was done last week?

anewman

MLisking wrote: »

Sorry if I'm being stupid here, but why do you think the car would be taken from me?

Sorry, thought you meant the HP was kindly left to you by the previous owner and you had a double whammy bad situation (couldn't see why a 2003 Rover bought a year ago would be purchased by HP).

MLisking wrote: »

What should I do?? Could they argue that the HG went after the service was done last week?

It's of little relevance when it failed. It has failed and needs sorting.

Silk

MLisking wrote: »

2) We asked them to do a service to find out what was going on. We made them aware it was using too much oil and too much coolant. They were vague about the loss of coolant but said it wasn't the HG as they had ran some tests.

What should I do?? Could they argue that the HG went after the service was done last week?

The bad news is that you asked them to do a service in which case they have done that.
The "possible" good news is that they said they carried out some tests.
What you need to find out is what tests they carried out and whether they would have shown up the gasket problem.
Any normal garage knowing the problems of Rovers and head gaskets should have known what tests to carry out.
The problem is that the end result is still a HG gone which needs sorting as it will only get worse. You asked them to do a service so no come back with that.
The only come back I can see at the moment is that you have paid for oil and coolant which you will have to pay for when the HG is done.
What you should have done and any decent garage would have done without asking is to look for the cause of the coolant loss then rectify it and cost permitting carry out the service.
A lot of it hinges on the exact instructions given to the garage. What does it say on the invoice/service sheet ? Does it say "check for leaks" first or does it say "carry out service" first ?

MLisking

Grrrrr. Maybe I should just look at that £200 as lost money and be done with it.

At the end of the day my main concern is getting it fixed. Think thats enought to be dealing with.

Oh I'm soooo stressed. Money - I hate you! lol

Thanks everyone.