Neighbour broke car, won't pay

Gene_Hunt_2

slyracoon wrote: »

If he was insured to drive it then claim on the insurance he was using.

If he was uninsured then you were comitting a criminal offence by allowing him to drive your car whilst uninsured. You could try small claims but it could then come out that you allowed him to drive whilst uninsured and you could be in trouble.

They won't pay for wear and tear.

Katie-Kat-Kins

Quentin wrote: »

Suing for the money via the scc is just a waste of your time and money.

There is no breach of contract here, so you have no case to pursue.

You are being totally unfair - the key snapping was an accident waiting to happen.

The villain in all this is as advised, the mechanic who mislead you.

Whilst I agree that this isn't a case for the small claims court I feel the need to clarify that you do not need to have a contract to bring a claim in the small claims court. The small claims court can hear claims which arise due to negligence or statutory breach of duty etc as well as under contract.

optimus_primera

Hammyman wrote: »

Oh dear. A trip to a scrapyard would have got you a replacement for under £20. Any garage would charge you no more than an hours labour to replace it.

In short, the "mechanic" who told you it would be too expensive was probably hoping to con you out of the car.

If I was your neighbour, I'd reimburse you £50 or so but any more than that is you taking the mickey and expecting to be reimbursed the full value of the car for a £50 or so repair is ridiculous and should you decide to take it to county court, you'd lose if you tried to claim more than the cost of the repair.

Not if it had the Nissan anti theft system (NATS) .... you'd need to get the key coded to the car.

Quentin

optimus_primera wrote: »

Not if it had the Nissan anti theft system (NATS) .... you'd need to get the key coded to the car.

No, the chip is in the key fob, not the key blade!

Steaming33

It's in the fob, but the fob can't be taken off the blade. Interesting crook of a mechanic who worked on the ignition for three hours but didn't charge me, I asked him if he knew where I could get any good second hand cars to replace, he said no, he's always MOTed my cars and done a great job. He was also the second mechanic to say the same thing, he was away over Christmas so I got another one in. The thing with breaking the key in the ignition is that sometimes it jambed when the wheel lock came on, so you had to gently turn the wheel and the key at the same time, which my neighbour knew, he'd had it explained and had used the car many times. Or you can lose your temper and break the key.

The plan was to sell the car after Christmas for £590ish (whatcar guide price) before we had to MOT/tax it as we wanted to upgrade, we waited three weeks while neighbour said he was going to sort it then realised we were going to have to get rid or tax/MOT it, so we had to scrap it for £200.

NeverAgain_2

Steaming 33,

I doubt very much if you have been 'ripped off' by the mechanic.

Repairing, replacing, recoding and all the rest of it could easily run into a few hundred.

And you've had a hassle-free sale to the scrapyard.

I don't see you can do much about the neighbour, who has clearly taken advantage of your good nature and will continue to do so.

Steaming33

I think you're right on both counts NeverAgain, I didn't really expect any other response to be honest, just wanted to let off some steam. Now to get another car and get driving again.

optimus_primera

Quentin wrote: »

No, the chip is in the key fob, not the key blade!

Not quite correct, the fob is for the alarm system, the engine immobiliser is paired with the key.
Well it is with the NATS system on my Primera.

petrolhead111

The key could easily have been replaced for between 25 and 35 quid

Mechanics don't know anything about car keys always go to a good locksmith who deals in car keys you would only have needed to give them the two halves of the broken key and they could have moved the transponder/immobiliser chip over to the new key to avoid programming costs and cut you a new key job done no fuss.

NeverAgain_2

...Now to get another car and get driving again...

That's the spirit - try not to let this have any greater impact than it need to.

I would continue to bug the neighbour whenever I could be bothered or happen to come across him - with no realistic hope of getting anything.

Equally, if you think forgetting about the whole sorry episode will make you feel better, than you should do that.

Be selfish for a change.