What are my rights when buying a car from a dealer posing as a private seller?

[Deleted User]

I purchased a fiat Multipla off eBay at beginning of October, big mistake. The seller appeared to be a private seller using a private seller account, he had good feed back and the car looked good. When we went to pick up car the seller seemed a nice enough guy. But he was in a rush so we looked over car quickly and it seemed ok. So we paid cash, my husband did paper work and we took car. When we were driving home we started to notice a strange whining noise, car door kept flying open as we were driving( very dangerous) we discovered one of fog lights did not work. On closer inspection the next day we discovered the fog light was smashed, also boot could not be opened with key and many other problems. Clearly car was not as described he did not mention these thing on listing. More worryingly I looked over paper work and it seems that car was not in the sellers name and the new keepers supplement that seller gave my husband was not In my husbands name. It was filled out with sellers details. I thought perhaps the seller bought car and sold it without sending papers off or registering it in his name.

I contacted seller the next day to inform him we were not happy, I explained all the problems. And asked him about the paper work. He said that he is a dealer and that's why paper work was not in his name. He also said the only reason new keepers supplement was in his name was so he could tax car. I did a hpi check to make sure car was not stolen and it came back fine.

I told him I was not happy with car as it was not as described and had many problems, I told him I wanted to return the car for a refund and he refused to accept car back. I have tried to request a partial refund to cover cost of getting things fixed. He refused this to. I have sent many letters and he has now stopped responding and won't answer phone.

Yesterday we tried to drive to get some food shopping and the car started to behave funny, the gears kept popping out then then there was this vey loud noise and the gear box went completely, you can not get it in any gear, car also started smoking. Car was not drivable. We had the car towed home and it is now stuck on our drive. Completely useless.

I don't want car its useless. It was never as described and certainly not fit for purpose. What are my right as this seller was a dealer posing as a private seller. I was going to contact trading standards is this a good place to start.

I have copies of all communication with seller and a copy of eBay listing. If he won't communicate or sort this out would I have a good case for the small claims court or not. I paid £650 by cash + £121 by PayPal by debit card for tax for car. So £771 in total.

What should I do. Any advice much appreciated

Thanks in advance

Linus2864

Trading Standards will be your first step as it is illegal for a trader to pose as a private seller:

http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/england/consumer_e/consumer_cars_and_other_vehicles_e/cars_buying_a_car_e/cars_buying_a_secondhand_car_e/cars_what_to_watch_out_for_when_buying_a_second_hand_car_e/buying_a_car_from_a_private_seller_what_you_need_to_know.htm

"Sometimes dealers pose as a private seller to avoid their legal obligations and to dispose of faulty or over-priced cars. It is illegal for a car dealer to pretend to be a private seller"

Hope this helps

forgotmyname

He could argue you inspected the car and could see obvious things like broken fog lights. Sub £1000 its not going to be perfect.

If you can prove he is a dealer and think he will pay you if you take him to court then thats an option. But he may just say tough and never pay you.
Does he have the means to pay?

No matter how cheap the car is and how much of a rush he is in. You must take the time to check everything. If your not happy then walk away.

techspec

Not a good idea to continue driving it if you didn't want it though.

used_car_manager

forgotmyname wrote: »

He could argue you inspected the car and could see obvious things like broken fog lights. Sub £1000 its not going to be perfect.

If you can prove he is a dealer and think he will pay you if you take him to court then thats an option. But he may just say tough and never pay you.
Does he have the means to pay?

No matter how cheap the car is and how much of a rush he is in. You must take the time to check everything. If your not happy then walk away.

2 words... VAT MAN!!

he will brick himself ..

motorguy

used_car_manager wrote: »

2 words... VAT MAN!!

he will brick himself ..

i would doubt a small time ebay trader selling dross at £600 is anywhere near the vat threshold.

motorguy

[Deleted User] wrote:

I purchased a fiat Multipla off eBay at beginning of October, big mistake. The seller appeared to be a private seller using a private seller account, he had good feed back and the car looked good. When we went to pick up car the seller seemed a nice enough guy. But he was in a rush so we looked over car quickly and it seemed ok. So we paid cash, my husband did paper work and we took car. When we were driving home we started to notice a strange whining noise, car door kept flying open as we were driving( very dangerous) we discovered one of fog lights did not work. On closer inspection the next day we discovered the fog light was smashed, also boot could not be opened with key and many other problems. Clearly car was not as described he did not mention these thing on listing. More worryingly I looked over paper work and it seems that car was not in the sellers name and the new keepers supplement that seller gave my husband was not In my husbands name. It was filled out with sellers details. I thought perhaps the seller bought car and sold it without sending papers off or registering it in his name.

I contacted seller the next day to inform him we were not happy, I explained all the problems. And asked him about the paper work. He said that he is a dealer and that's why paper work was not in his name. He also said the only reason new keepers supplement was in his name was so he could tax car. I did a hpi check to make sure car was not stolen and it came back fine.

I told him I was not happy with car as it was not as described and had many problems, I told him I wanted to return the car for a refund and he refused to accept car back. I have tried to request a partial refund to cover cost of getting things fixed. He refused this to. I have sent many letters and he has now stopped responding and won't answer phone.

Yesterday we tried to drive to get some food shopping and the car started to behave funny, the gears kept popping out then then there was this vey loud noise and the gear box went completely, you can not get it in any gear, car also started smoking. Car was not drivable. We had the car towed home and it is now stuck on our drive. Completely useless.

I don't want car its useless. It was never as described and certainly not fit for purpose. What are my right as this seller was a dealer posing as a private seller. I was going to contact trading standards is this a good place to start.

I have copies of all communication with seller and a copy of eBay listing. If he won't communicate or sort this out would I have a good case for the small claims court or not. I paid £650 by cash + £121 by PayPal by debit card for tax for car. So £771 in total.

What should I do. Any advice much appreciated

Thanks in advance

Firstly, you wont be able to claim the price of the car tax back. Every car needs taxed and you could claim back any remaining months from the DVLNI if he takes the car back.

So thats you back to £650.

Its a tough one.

If you stick it on ebay and list the faults it will probably make £300-400.

Whilst £250 is a bitter pill, it could be far less painful than trying to chase a no hoper like this through the court system, bearing in mind that to 'reject' the car you would need to stop using it for the duration.

motorguy

techspec wrote: »

Not a good idea to continue driving it if you didn't want it though.

^^^^^^^^^

This

Its going to be hard to reject the car after two months as the O/P will be deemed to have 'accepted' it.

Plus no £650 car is going to be perfect.

Joe_Horner

As UCM says, VAT man, then Tax man and Trading Standards unless he refunds in full.

Once you have the money, report him to all three anyway - traders have to make a living and, as others will say (reaonably), at that price you can't expect perfection. But things like doors flying open make the car unroadworthy, and selling an unroadworthy car is an offence in itself - having a current MOT isn't a defence on that one btw.

A trader is required by law to actively point faults out to you, not hope you don't notice them (no matter how obvious they might or "should" be). If they can't handle that (and lots manage to) then they should find a new profession.

Joe_Horner

pgilc1 wrote: »

i would doubt a small time ebay trader selling dross at £600 is anywhere near the vat threshold.

But he's also probably not declaring anything for tax, or keeping proper records, either.

And it's not the bill that's scary, it's the investigation when they think you might be hiding stuff. Not to mention the sort of assumptions they're allowed to make about your earnings if they don't like your records

motorguy

Joe_Horner wrote: »

But he's also probably not declaring anything for tax, or keeping proper records, either.

And it's not the bill that's scary, it's the investigation when they think you might be hiding stuff. Not to mention the sort of assumptions they're allowed to make about your earnings if they don't like your records

Sadly, HMRC are unlikely to launch a full VAT inspection on someone like this. A VAT inspection costs them something like £2,500, so they have to be assured they're going to recoup more than that before they'll bother.

So lets say £5,000 is their threshold. £5,000 means £30,000 of profit made, which on a motor trade margin of maybe 10% means a turnover of £300,000.

Very unlikely that a small timer flogging the odd £600 car here and there has that sort of turnover.

They have much bigger fish to fry.