Any recourse?

mp80

Hi,

This is quite a long story, so be patient

I work in Europe and was in the UK recently getting a car service done amongst some other chores), and the garage (Arnold Clark Honda, Manchester) advised me I needed a new suspension part for my car, so I rebooked it in for last Friday when I knew I'd be back again for the bank holiday weekend.

Friday comes, drop the car off at 9am

Get a phone call at 3 from them telling me the part hadn't been ordered (despite me giving them 2 weeks notice) - I was pretty annoyed and gave them some stick, etc...

Anyway, they gave me a courtesy car and promised the car would be ready Saturday.

Saturday comes, heard nothing, so phoned mid-afternoon to be greeted by a lady telling me the service part was closed. By this time I was getting pretty annoyed but as there wasn't anything I could do about it, I left it...

Now I was supposed to be driving back to mainland EU today, booked on Eurotunnel with a non-refundable ticket.... 10am comes, noone had phoned, so I phoned them, they gave me the usual spiel about having had phoned me and miraculously I'd not answered and they didn't get voicemail (lies)

"we got the wrong parts so it's not been done, it'll be done tomorrow though"

:mad::mad:

I won't write here what I told them...

So the upshot of it all is:

1. I couldn't return to the EU today as planned
2. I've lost nearly £100 on my non-refundable Euro tunnel ticket (I phoned them and they said they could only switch up to 24 hours after the booked time)
3. I'm going to lose 2 days work (I'm a contractor so I genuinely won't get paid) sorting this out which will cost me over £1,000 in lost income.
4. The total waste of time the whole event has been

The work is supposed to cost £609, I said the fair thing to do was to offer it free of charge (I'm still going to be well out of pocket, but life is life sometimes) and they said no.

Legally I really doubt I have any recourse, but would like some advice on what you guys would do if faced with the same situation. I know how bad Honda are at customer service, so writing to them will get me nowhere (have done it twice in the past, both times ignored!)

NEVER BUY A CAR FROM ARNOLD CLARK HONDA, MANCHESTER

Kilty_2

Write a letter of complaint to the branch manager - aparrently they have strict guidelines about responding in a certain amount of time etc etc.

mp80

Ok, I should have said the Euro-zone

colino

As it is AC, you are wasting your time. A poorer chain I have yet to come across. Try and find arnoldsucks dot com and see the depth of customer failures.

Kilty_2

colino wrote: »

A poorer chain I have yet to come across.

Oh they're out there - Arnold is just much bigger.

vaio

I’d have said that as they were aware of your circumstances they are liable for your losses.

Document them all and write a letter of complaint asking for recompense, if they don’t pay up (which they probably won’t) then small claims is the way to go.

mp80

Update:

It's STILL not done. Spoke to manager, who tried to deflect the blame onto Honda UK.

Asked about zero bill, said no, as expected but offered 50% discount. Now I've already had the work discounted when they quoted the initial (ridiculous) price, so they'll probably use the trick of discounting thatby 50%, and not my quoted price.

What do you reckon?

Funnily enough, I work as a contractor for a major car company, and I found out that Arnold Clark runs two franchises of our brand Might be some weight in my favour?

mp80

Update!

Was promised car by 9:30, not done

Finally got it mid afternoon - caused me to miss ferry back over to France, and hence incur MORE losses

Had meeting with service manager, was honest and admitted it was their fault which I appreciated.

Have a meeting with the General Manager tomorrow, so far I have not paid anything - as I have incurred over £2,000 in lost income I expect not to pay, and for them to recompense me somewhat as goodwill, so things are looking up a bit.