Urgent Advice Needed

johnpacker

Hi all,

Appreciate any advice that anyone can give here.

I bought a second hand car from a dealership in Essex around 3 months ago. When I purchased the car I asked the dealer if it came with any form of warranty and I was told that "all cars come with 3 months warranty". It has done around 75,000 miles and is an 06 plate.

Within 2 months I started to notice a problem where the "CHECK ENGINE" light would come on the dashboard. I phoned up and told him about the error and his comments about the warranty - he then said that he did not provide a warrant and the 3 months he was talking about was the "goods of sale act" and that because I'd had the car for 2 months the problem obviously didn't exist when it was sold to me. He did offer for me to bring it across and that he'd take a look at it with his diagnostic kit.

I took it across and he couldn't get the kid to work correctly but did manage to pull out the errors and gave these to me. He said he needed to get a Kia plug for the kit and he would do this and then I could bring it back to get it checked again. I asked if I should continue to drive it (as I hadn't noticed any problems with the driving at the time) and he said this was fine.

A few days later the car started to have problems starting. I went to get it checked somewhere else and paid for a diagnostic test and emailed him to say that he needed to sort it out. This is the chain or emails.

My Email

To whom it may concern,

I am the owner of the newly purchased Kia Sedona that has been having a few problems recently.

Following our call today I wanted to jot down the issues with the car and the error codes that I got after taking it to a local garage today to get some advice.

1) The first issue is that the "Check engine" light comes on during driving - generally this comes on after 5-10 minutes of driving when accelerating

2) Since the weekend the car has also had problems starting - when you try and turn on the ignition it just turns over and won't start - you have to try generally around 10 times before it starts

The error codes are as follows:

P1500
P1611
P1613
P1119
P1120

I do not believe that either of these issues are caused by wear and tear.

The local garage that I took it to today seemed to suggest that the starter problems may be due to the immobiliser - and P1613 is "Immobilizar data not plasible" so this could be correct.

That being said I have checked a few forums and it seems it could be a number of things:

[can't post link but this doesn't matter]

The link above suggests someone is having similar problems and gets the P1119 and P1120 errors.

I am able to bring the car across for repair on Saturday - do you have a courtasy car that can be provided whilst the car is fixed? I would prefer to leave the car to be fixed as I have fuel and toll costs whenever I come across from my residence.

Alternativly if you would prefer I can bring it in on another date or use a local garage to where I live.

I would appreciate it if you could reply to this email in writing with confirmation of how you would like to proceed to arrange for the fixes by the end of the week.

His Reply

You have had the car for three months with no problems and a 7 year old car with 80,000 miles I would argue that the fault is unfaultunely down to wear and tear.

That said I am willing to try and help you if you drop the car over on Saturday and I will give you an old Mondeo to drive but it will be on your insurance not ours. I will give the car to my auto electrician [name removed] who is very good with that type of fault, if he cannot do it we have a Kia dealer near by that charges £90 to diagnose the fault and they can look at it next Thursday but hopefully [name removed] will come up with something before then.

I phoned him a few times since he has had it this week and I have now been told that the fault has been fixed and the cost was £680 - and he is demanding that I pay a £300 contribution before he returns the car.

I am extremely angry with this but don't know what to do - as I do need the car back but do not feel I should pay as:

a) I don't think the car should have problems so soon after buying it and
b) I never gave permission to spend this money on the repairs

A friend has suggested that I should give them 48 hours to return the car or call the police as he is unlawfully holding it. Does this seem like the best advice or does anyone else have any opinions?

Thanks
John

GAZ237

The police will say its a civil matter and will not be interested.

johnpacker

GAZ237 wrote: »

The police will say its a civil matter and will not be interested.

So do you have another suggestion? I did not agree to any form of costs and he won't give the car back...

AndyPK

Did the paperwork say it had warranty?

johnpacker

AndyPK wrote: »

Did the paperwork say it had warranty?

No - I took his word for it - both myself and my father. I've never purchased a second hand car previously so just took his word as gospel really. In hindsight this was obviously a misktake.

However the CAB website does state the following:

You discover the fault within six months

You discover the fault within six months of you buying the car, it is presumed that the fault was present when you bought it.

If the dealer disputes this, it is up to them to prove the fault was not present. A pre-sale ‘tick box’ check of the car’s mechanical condition when it was sold is not sufficient. Neither is a paper you have signed which says something like "examined and found satisfactory in all respects." They need to provide reasonable evidence, such as an independent report into the car’s condition.

I believe that from this the cost of the repair should not be with me - but the main point here is that I did (EDIT: Should have said the word NOT here) say I would contribute towards the cost and the dealership is refusing to give me the car back - which is my property and in my name.

GAZ237

If you said you would contribute to the costs. What is the problem?

You don't have a leg to stand on with getting your car back.

If you drag it out and refuse to pay they can then charge you storage on top.

johnpacker

GAZ237 wrote: »

If you said you would contribute to the costs. What is the problem?

Sorry if I didn't make this clear - but I did NOT agree to contribute towards the costs! He asked me to - I said I would not.

EDIT - Sorry - edited post as I clearly make a mistake above. I should have written that I did not agree - not that I did agree!

forgotmyname

He is not unlawfully holding it, He did a repair and wants paying for it. Rightly or wrongly.

Pay under protest and work on getting your money back after.

Fault codes are for Speed sensor and throttle sensor and Temp sensor issues, All rather unrelated so it maybe just a dodgy battery or connection.
What did he actually do to fix it? Make sure the warning light works when you collect it.
Repaired by taking the bulb out?

Contradiction? You did or did not say you would contribute towards the cost?

johnpacker

forgotmyname wrote: »

He is not unlawfully holding it, He did a repair and wants paying for it. Rightly or wrongly.

Pay under protest and work on getting your money back after.

Fault codes are for Speed sensor and throttle sensor and Temp sensor issues, All rather unrelated so it maybe just a dodgy battery or connection.
What did he actually do to fix it? Make sure the warning light works when you collect it.
Repaired by taking the bulb out?

Contradiction? You did or did not say you would contribute towards the cost?

Apparently the Diesel injectors were leaking and had to be replaced/fixed.

Again - I made a mistake in one of the posts ahead and missed out the word NOT - so to confirm, I did not agree to contributing.

My worry is that my contributing (and I don't really have £300 to spare) and paying this fee to get my car back I am accepting the terms which I very much disagree with.

If I was to have to pay for it myself then I would have perhaps gone to a local garage to get it fixed and got some quotes - I was not given the option to do this, I was told (as you can see from his emails) that he would take a look - not that he would get it fixed at a charge.

johnpacker

As an update, I did as the solicitor friend of mine said and told him he has 48 hours to return the car or it will be taken to the police.

He has just got back in touch to say that he has kept the old injectors and will put them back in on Monday. A bit annoying and I'll be back to square one but at least I know what the problem with the car is now.

I am going to inform him and say that as he refuses to fix it at his cost he is going against the sale of goods act (but will speak to the CAB for confirmation first) and that if I have to get the car fixed at my cost then I shall be taking it to the small claims court/trading standards.

I imagine that he won't be able to get a refund on the work that has been done so it would seem very silly of him to do this really.

forgotmyname

If he fixed it himself then its the parts that are worth the money to him. An hours wasted labour is probably not so much of an issue.