New (Second Hand) Car Warranty - that covers nothing?

chocoholic123

My boyfriend bought a second hand car that came with 12 months warranty - which seems to cover nothing. Is this right? The car was purchased in November 2006.

He was getting a light on his dashboard which was something to do with emissions (according to the manual), and his CD player has stopped working.

The emissions thing they said is covered, and that he needs an 02 sensor (?) and that he won't be charged for parts or labour but that it would still cost £53 - the lady at reception was unable to explain this fully, but said that it was standard. (the light only came on when he used cheap petrol, it has since gone off and not been seen for a while)

Finally the CD player - they said it isn't covered at all, and that a new one will cost £300 plus labour :eek:

He's just been made redundant and really can't afford this - and frankly i don't think he should have to pay for any of it - is there anything we can do???

Butlers1982

You need to find out exactly what is covered in his warranty before you can fo anything.
Read all his documents that he signed when he bought the car and find out what is excluded.

Also id love to know

when he used cheap petrol,

where does he find it, i cant find any near me! paying 96p a litre!

chocoholic123

yeah - perhaps cheap isn't as accurate as dodgy - lol

Is there no law covering purchases of items and how long they last? He effectively bought a cd player worth £300 (albeit as part of the car) which died after 6 months?

hm71_2

we had a similar problem with carland (now carcraft) found the directgov website very useful for letter templates etc.. we bought a landrover freelander- had not been serviced on purchase air con was empty and wanted us to pay £60 to fill it. then gear box went £1900 to repair, list went on all within 6 months of purchase. Used the templates on the above website and they refunded 25% of the repair costs- what they didn't know is that had a friend repair it at cost so they actually paid 75% of the costs. would have pushed for full amount but as we had paid cost we got off lightly.
hope that helps

Dave_Brooker

chocoholic123 wrote: »

My boyfriend bought a second hand car that came with 12 months warranty - which seems to cover nothing. Is this right? The car was purchased in November 2006.

He was getting a light on his dashboard which was something to do with emissions (according to the manual), and his CD player has stopped working.

The emissions thing they said is covered, and that he needs an 02 sensor (?) and that he won't be charged for parts or labour but that it would still cost £53 - the lady at reception was unable to explain this fully, but said that it was standard. (the light only came on when he used cheap petrol, it has since gone off and not been seen for a while)

Finally the CD player - they said it isn't covered at all, and that a new one will cost £300 plus labour :eek:

He's just been made redundant and really can't afford this - and frankly i don't think he should have to pay for any of it - is there anything we can do???

I'm sure he can live without the £300 cd player for a while then...

C_Ronaldo

Or could he just buy a cd player and fit it himself

mpython

You do need to go back to the documentation supplied/ signed for when you picked up the car. Unfortunately companies will often use words that are open to interpretation. Warranty may or may not cover the parts in question - though I'd be very surprised if the CD wasn't covered as that kind of equipment doesn't really wear out, unlike say, windscreen wipers. Also, if the manual says to use one type of fuel but you've used another, that may invalidate parts of the warranty (but again, its difficult to see how it'd affect the CD player !)

Presumably the car was bought from a garage? In which case you'll have more rights than if you bought it from an individual but it could still be very problematic to resolve.

chocoholic123

Dave_Brooker wrote: »

I'm sure he can live without the £300 cd player for a while then...

He is... just doesn't seem right when he's had the car less than 12 months.

Do CD players for cars usually cost £300? I honestly have no idea - but I know for a fact we wouldn't have the skills to fit one ourself...

I will go back and double check the documents though. It was a big car sales place - a huge but independent one near where we live.

Thanks for your advice everyone.

Alias_Omega

What type of car is it, what is wrong with the cd player, does it power up, no sound etc.?

Im sure you can pick a cd player up from eBay with a code for less than £50 as most people swap standard ones out.

Just fit it yourselves

chocoholic123

Its a 2002 Vauxhall Vectra. The CD player thingy just cuts outs and hisses - makes loud irritating noises, doesn't matter if it is CD or radio - same thing happens - its got progressively worse and worse over the last couple of weeks - and now does it ever 5 mins or so. Once it happens it is off until you turn it off and on again...

I bet they are too difficult to fit for us to be able to do it ourselves... we really have zero skills when it comes this sort of thing.

///

Just to clarify from earlier we didn't put the wrong type of fuel in the car, it was labelled as the right stuff, it was just bought from a dodgy no name garage...

deanos

chocoholic123 wrote: »

Its a 2002 Vauxhall Vectra. .

.

They are around £300 from VX for a Cd player, however you can easily pick them up from Ebay for around £60-£100