Recent service caused additional damage - Do we have any come back?

Sonicbob

Hi everyone,

Following a traumatic experience with my new car i was hoping for some advice from some people better in the know. If this question is better suited in another forum please let me know, however through it was most relevant here.

Ill try not to go into too much detail, however some may be relevant
Recently purchased a second hand car (Mini One '05) October time, it was due a oil change in December so was booked in at my local Halfords. (I've used these guys for the last 2 years and they seemed reasonably priced/efficient)
As part of the Oil change i booked the car for an Interim Service (which covered the Oil plus extra's) and a Winter Check, this was just precautionary to make sure i was ready for winter driving.
Collected the car on the Thursday, all seemed OK. Friday - Saturday didnt drive the car.
Sunday we were out seeing family and had a 2.5 hour drive up the motorway. Journey up was fine, however on our way back we noticed the heaters weren't working and no warm air was coming into the car. Suddenly the needle went into the red and the car overheated, we pulled in almost straight away.
Called out recovery and we ended up getting towed home as the car was not driveable.

Now both the RAC recovery Patrol and my local garage have diagnosed the same fault which caused the issue. The service that Halfords have done included a coolant top up and as part of that job had damaged the Radiator Cap in the process. The radiator cap clearly had a pair of grips around it as the plastic was shredded, it had also been bent into an egg shape by the grips causing it to not seal the pressure correctly.
This damaged radiator cap caused the engine coolant to leak out while driving, this caused the lack of heat in the cab in addition to the overheating.
Unfortunateley the overheating caused the head gasket to blow in the process!

Due to the christmas shutdown i should be picking my car back up shortly, however its more likely going to be a £500-700 job. Do i have a leg to stand on to go back to Halfords and ask them to front the bill for repairs? Their service caused damage to my vehicle which subsequently has hit me straight in the wallet.

I could really do with your advice here, i plan to contact Halfords in the next few days to explain what has happened. Any advice is welcomed, even if its "You havent got a hope in hells chance of getting money out of them"

Thanks in advance!

forgotmyname

Not a fan of them myself but can you prove the damage was done by them and not the previous owner?

Coolant levels rarely drop these days, And with the level easily checked by a quick visual look. No need to remove the cap.

Its possible your water has been slowly boiling away since you bought it.

£500 - £700 for a radiator cap? If the water was low the engine would have been running warmer than normal for sometime. Not a sudden rise in temperature.

Possibly there was no antifreeze and it froze?

Sonicbob

Hey - thanks for the responce.

My proof is simply the fact that i've been using the vehicle for over 2 months running ~80miles a day commuting. The car has been running smoothly until the first long journey after the Halfords Service (3 days later)
I know its not "proof" in terms of a photo of the work before and after, but its reasonable proof in my opinion?

I don't have the Halfords checklist to hand from their service, however im 90% sure there was a charge to top up coolant.

The £500-£700 charge is the blown head gasket caused by the overheating im afraid. Id hoped to simply get away with a replacement cap and coolant, but the damage had been done.

With the mileage that i do i would be very susprised of a slow boiling of the water away. Like you indicated this would be a gradual rising of engine temperature, im sure i would of seen this on the ~4 hour driving days. However in this instance the needle hit the red within seconds and were forced to pullover.

Thanks for the responce, do you think it will fall down to a "Proove that Halfords caused the damage, otherwise its nothing"? As i don't think you can seriously expect proof for something like this?

Aldridge_Andy

Are you saying you pulled over as soon as the engine temperature rose above normal, yet the head gasket was still damaged?

Normally the instruments give warning to pull over and rectify well before damage occurs.

Splott

forgotmyname wrote: »

Not a fan of them myself but can you prove the damage was done by them and not the previous owner?

Really easy. They have a receipt for an interim service and a winter check - both of which involve checking the coolant (winter check for antifreeze levels) - 3 days prior to the journey.

If the coolant cap was faulty prior to the service, the service desk would have told the OP especially since it is an opportunity to make a sale of a new one. I do not know of one single garage who would not do this.

forgotmyname

They probably didnt check the coolant. More profitable jobs were in the shop.

Even if they left the cap off it would take some time for it to lose enough water to fry the engine.

The heater getting hotter and the smell along with the gauge going higher should have alerted them to something being wrong.

You dont know a single garage, You dont know enough then. Even the TV shows that tested garages with the trading standards found it easy to find garages that claim they did work and didnt or charged for parts that didnt need changing or never actually changed.

Sonicbob

Aldridge_Andy wrote: »

Are you saying you pulled over as soon as the engine temperature rose above normal, yet the head gasket was still damaged?

Normally the instruments give warning to pull over and rectify well before damage occurs.

Yeah, we were travelling from cold for about 30mins in total, after about 20 mins in we tried to kick the heaters on and found no heat coming into the cab. Then i saw the temp gauge needle rise quickly to the red line, i literally pulled off the road at the next turning (literally 10-15 seconds) and stopped the car/engine off.

The engine was only started again once the RAC had topped it fully up with water (In attempt to diagnose a possible radiator leak)

Splott

forgotmyname wrote: »

The heater getting hotter and the smell along with the gauge going higher should have alerted them to something being wrong.

The temperature in my car is thermostatically controlled. It would not alter even if the gauge went into the red.

You dont know a single garage, You dont know enough then. Even the TV shows that tested garages with the trading standards found it easy to find garages that claim they did work and didnt or charged for parts that didnt need changing or never actually changed.

Completely different thing entirely.

forgotmyname

Splott wrote: »

The temperature in my car is thermostatically controlled. It would not alter even if the gauge went into the red.

What about the temperature gauge and the smell of a hot engine?


Completely different thing entirely.

How is that different? They may not have touched it.

Proof will be needed.

vaio

Splott wrote: »

The temperature in my car is thermostatically controlled. It would not alter even if the gauge went into the red.........

Yep, most modern cars also have thermostatic control of interior temperature but if there is no water in the system then there is nothing to transfer the heat from the engine to the interior

OP....I suspect either way you'll be OK, the winter check will include an antifreeze concentration test which needs the rad cap to be opened to get a sample of the coolant.

You claim they damaged it (which given the history sounds likely) but the only way I can see they could defend that claim is by arguing the cap was already damaged in which case I'd be arguing that they are still liable as they should have spotted the damage and brought it to your attention. Don't forget the worst you'll need to do is convince a judge that your version is slightly more likely then Halford's explanation

arcon5

Even if you had proof you will struggle to get much, if any money back as you haven't given them the opportunity to remedy the situation.

Does the interim service include checking the pressure cap or just the coolant level? I suspect the latter.

Are you certain the cap wasn't damaged before? Even if they did check the coolant that doesn't mean they caused the damage and if they did notice the cap was already damaged I would depend in what the inspection actually covers as to whether they should notify you of the damage (although good customer service would dictate they would)