Fowlers Finance Pickle!

bodge392

I have seen some of the posts on here and as an ex employee of the company I need to put things straight!!


If you have bad credit and are desperate for a car these guys will rip you off!! For example if you give them £300 quid deposit with the inhouse finance they will give you a car that they have bought for around £1500 and charge you £50 ish a week for 2 and a half years, you can work out how much you are paying back!


If you have average credit then you would be better going direct to companies like first response or the car finance company as you can choose which car dealership you go to and that way you can also eliminate the heap of junk that you will get from Fowlers!!!


They have a so called prep centre where cars get an MOT but that's it.


As you can tell I left because the company is unreliable and I wouldn't recommend anyone to get finance through these guys and if you do then DO NOT pay any deposit or holding fee until you have seen the vehicle as you really are not sure what you are getting and if you decide not to go through with the finance then you will struggle to get any deposit as they do not want to give it back!!


I hope this helps!!!

chanz4

is it still the guy that had Lloyds and lee insolvency / iva owning it? By the way check make sure they paid your tax to inland revenue

lodgey69uk

I have recently purchased a zafira from fowlers with a few hick ups along the way.
The first hick up was the fact that the car was held back by 5 days from the original collection day so they could do some work on it and make sure it was ok for me to collect. I got half way home and realised that the work hadn't been done at all.
The second was the car was not ready for collection when specified and we had to wait ar I understand for ages while they valeted it (to a poor standard).
And the final and most annoying one is that fact that I contacted them well within the 14 day cooling off period to sort this out at their expense or come and collect the vehicle and issue a refund of my deposit. We seem to have gone round in circles with this. I did say I was willing to have the problem fixed but would require a courtesy vehicle which they were not willing to provide. Also I said I would take it to my local garage to be fixed but they were not willing as apparently the cost was too high even though taking it to there branch to be fixed or losing the sale completely would cost more.
I am still arguing the last point with them and it's been 20 days since collection and about 18 days since reporting the fault.
where do I stand with regards to the law with this matter, am I still ok to claim back the deposit and any expense in returning the vehicle.
Thanks in advance for any help

chanz4

REJECT THE CAR IN writting, you will lose the right if not quick

cunga

Last week 20th january i bought a car from fowlers finance.A citreon c4 grand picasso.I read the forums before i made the choice of maybe trying them for finance but i decided that i would contact them and see where it takes me.

I contacted them and spoke to a guy called damen at the manchester branch i live in durham so was a long drive to get there.When i got there they offered me a coffee and showed me the car and took me on a test drive.I fell in love with the car instantly its a really nice car.I went back into fowlers and completed the paperwork and while i was doing this they took car over road and fully valeted it out for me.

Once i completed the paperwork they let me use their phone to contact my insurance company to cover the car to get back home the car drove really great and i had no problems after 5 days the cars brake pads started to grind and also there was a mark on windscreen where the wiper must of came off and scraped the windscreen in driver view so i contacted fowlers regarding it and i found them very helpful they asked me to get quotes for both items and they would make arrangements for me to get them replaced in which i did they paid for the work to be done without question.I have found my experience with them to be a good one i know not all customers can be happy but i thought that i would try to give them a little positive feedback instead of all the bad.

P.s

There is one thing that i am kinda dubious about is the box thing they put on it but will see if its ok once my 1st payment goes out of the bank.

gazfocus

cunga wrote: »

There is one thing that i am kinda dubious about is the box thing they put on it but will see if its ok once my 1st payment goes out of the bank.

The 'box thing' will be an immobilizer that will disable the car should you miss any of your finance payments.

gazshep82

Where do I start. I bought a car off these guys back in September last year. 57 plate astra. Well I've missed payments on my account total arrears of £160. So on the 19th of this month they issued a default notice giving me until 05\03\2015 to bring my account up to date. However on the 19th I start to get txt messages off them and a third party recovery company saying that they was coming to take back the car and that is was now stolen and had been reported to the police. After getting these messages we decided not to use the car and parked it up. I had intentions on paying them what I owed this week. However Friday morning whilst I was out they attended my house with a flat bed truck to take car back and because it had be reported stolen my wife handed key over. I've paid over £1200 so far so I'm not happy at all they have taken it back. I have taken legal advice and have also spoken to financial ombudsman and the FCA regarding fowlers . fowlers should not of taken the car until after the 5th of march so the are in breach of there own agreement. So I've now started formal complaint against them. Ombudsman have sent a letter on my behalf requesting they investigate and refund me all sums paid under the agreement. They now have 8 weeks to reply and if they don't or fail to offer me my money back then ombudsman will take over my case and decide on the outcome which I was advised I have a very good chance of succsess . let the fun begin. I'm willing to go all the way to court on this one. Won't be first time I've taken legal action against I company and won .

hilly85

Hi guys,

Here's the truth about Fowlers Finance.
I have worked for this company for 3 weeks and because of what I have witnessed in this short space of time have decided to leave...

Firstly you should avoid this company like the plague...
The cars they purchase are directly from BSA Auctions they buy them in bulk twice a week.
They buy them without any prior notice of there condition , they are simply purchased if in demand or if the price is right.
If you believe your getting a brilliant bargain reliable car please think again the only checks on the car before the customer drives it away is to ensure it's clean hence why each of fowlers showroom has a valet station next door.

In regards to the financial side of there business .
Fowlers finance attempt to obtain you credit with multiple companies depending on your credit status but the emphasis and companies procedure is to get you with fowlers internal finance due to the higher cost and the hefty deposit required they'll attempt to hold you to ransom over if you want a car.

The after care.
To sum it up there is none!!!
There is no customer service department and the after care department is made up of 3 people who believe me don't care ...
If you are able to communicate with someone at the stoke head office 9/10 it will be sales team member
If you're incredibly lucky maybe even the person who sold it to you but this is unlikely as the sales team try to avoid people they have sold cars too and a lot of the time you'd have wished you hadn't as on multiple occasions I have witnessed customers treated unfairly , abused and lied too.
You should also understand that your financial details are not safe with this company as they do no prior employment checks or criminal or financial checks on there employees and unfortunately due to this I have witnessed card details copied and taken out of the business or left in plain view for anyone to see.

You should also know that if you register a interest in finance with fowlers they keep your details on there system for 5 years and will never remove them even if you request this as there is no way to remove this from there automatic dialler.
Most of the employees who act on your information to remove your number are heavily penalised by there management so won't as it affects there commission.

It's important for you all to know I am not writing this as a disgruntled employee just someone who cares .
I have worked for multiple million pound company's who invest heavily in customer service and treating there customers fairly
Something fowlers finance are in short supply of.
I hope this review helps you with your decision before applying for fowlers finance.

wiltsguy_2

gazfocus wrote: »

The 'box thing' will be an immobilizer that will disable the car should you miss any of your finance payments.

That's shocking! never knew this sort of thing was fitted to cars, this alone would make me run a mile, i remember my mates tv had a £1 coin meter on the back-similar thing i suppose!

Pixie5740

wiltsguy wrote: »

That's shocking! never knew this sort of thing was fitted to cars, this alone would make me run a mile, i remember my mates tv had a £1 coin meter on the back-similar thing i suppose!

It's actually quite clever given the sort of people who buy cars from Fowlers i.e. people who are crap at borrowing money and paying it back on time.