Car Failed MOT - What Is A Fair Price For The Repairs Needed?

stressedoutmum

My car failed its MOT today. Its a Nissan Micra GX 1996. It failed on 2 points.

A. Offside rear position lamp(s) adversely affected by the operation of another lamp (1.14d) . (Basically when I put my foot on the brake the back lights come on I noticed this initially after a car went into the back of me - see further in my post about this

and

B. Offside rear outer sill seat belt anchorage prescribed area is excessively corroded (5.1.B.6)

I have been told that it could take the full day finding out what is causing problem A because it could be a number of things so therefore they cant quote me a price for that :eek: and about £70 to weld the seat belt anchorage.

Basically when I put my foot on the brake the back lights come on. Also the garage could not look at the earthing problem till tomorrow because they were so busy so now they are charging me £15 re-test - is this correct. It seems unfair to me because they didnt have the time to fix it today.

About 2 months ago someone crashed into the back of me and I noticed the earthing problem after that. I told the garage at the time and they said they would check it. After all the repairs were done i asked if the lights were fixed and they told me they were. So today I went back to the garage who done the accident repair and because they did not have it registered on their initial request then it has to be reassessed by the insurance company again to check if its accident related before they can fix it. Have had major rows with the garage today especially since they told me initially it could be because it had been 'nudged' and secondly they told me they had fixed it. Now they are denying all knowledge. Really rotten mood - been trying to sort this since 11am - poor kids and OH gave them a hard time when I shouldnt have.
thanks.

espresso

stressedoutmum wrote:

My car failed its MOT today. Its a Nissan Micra GX 1996. It failed on 2 points.

A. Offside rear position lamp(s) adversely affected by the operation of another lamp (1.14d) . (Basically when I put my foot on the brake the back lights come on I noticed this initially after a car went into the back of me - see further in my post about this

and

B. Offside rear outer sill seat belt anchorage prescribed area is excessively corroded (5.1.B.6)

I have been told that it could take the full day finding out what is causing problem A because it could be a number of things so therefore they cant quote me a price for that :eek: and about £70 to weld the seat belt anchorage.

Basically when I put my foot on the brake the back lights come on. Also the garage could not look at the earthing problem till tomorrow because they were so busy so now they are charging me £15 re-test - is this correct. It seems unfair to me because they didnt have the time to fix it today.

About 2 months ago someone crashed into the back of me and I noticed the earthing problem after that. I told the garage at the time and they said they would check it. After all the repairs were done i asked if the lights were fixed and they told me they were. So today I went back to the garage who done the accident repair and because they did not have it registered on their initial request then it has to be reassessed by the insurance company again to check if its accident related before they can fix it. Have had major rows with the garage today especially since they told me initially it could be because it had been 'nudged' and secondly they told me they had fixed it. Now they are denying all knowledge. Really rotten mood - been trying to sort this since 11am - poor kids and OH gave them a hard time when I shouldnt have.
thanks.

Fault A is almost certainly due to a bad earth connection. i.e. the current is finding a path to earth though another lamp filament. This should be easy for any competent car mechanic to fix.

Fault B obviously needs some rectification work to strengthen the area i.e. a plate fabricated and welded to solid metal. Difficult to put a price on it without seeing the extent of the corrosion.

Whether they charge a re-test fee is entirely up to the garage or test station! It doesn't sound too bad for a ten year old car - could have been worse!

HTH

northern_munky

Is the garage you took the car to a proper MOT station or did they take it somewhere for its MOT? If they did the MOT themselves and you left the car there for them to repair then they can't charge you a retest fee.

There are quite a few items that allow you to take the car away and fix yourself and as long as you take it back the next working day for retest they cant charge you another fee. Unfortunately, welding isnt one of them.

scatz

Try this site. It may not have everthing you mentioned but is worth a try!

http://shouldpay.co.uk/gettingestimates.php

I've just looked myself and it doesn't have what you need doing, but the site may help in the future......

murphwiz

Light fault should be a easy fix, as dsaid,m could be simple earth fault, or even wrong bulb fitted, or fitted incorrectly.