Used car turbo failure

jamiewakeham

Well, if I have misunderstood the OFT advice, then I retract much of what I've said.

But how should I read "You must also bear any costs associated with doing so such as transporting the vehicle to a garage for repairs." (OFT1241 9.25)? That's a genuine question - are fuel costs (which I quite clearly did on the back of a fag packet) and loss of income not 'costs' in that sense?

Richard53

I think there is an assumption of reasonableness in the reading of that. If you live within 3-4 miles of the supplying dealer (as most will), then the dealer can expect to arrange and/or fund the recovery to his premises. But if you bought a car in Inverness while living in Plymouth, would you - or anyone - think it reasonable to expect the dealer to bear the costs of getting the car back?


I don't think I would. The guy has to make a living, after all.

motorguy

jamiewakeham wrote: »

Well, if I have misunderstood the OFT advice, then I retract much of what I've said.

But how should I read "You must also bear any costs associated with doing so such as transporting the vehicle to a garage for repairs." (OFT1241 9.25)? That's a genuine question - are fuel costs (which I quite clearly did on the back of a fag packet) and loss of income not 'costs' in that sense?

II think there is an assumption there that the car has suffered some sort of catastrophic failure. Yours hadnt.

Drawing what you are saying to a logical conclusion then, for example with my Golf yesterday it stalled and threw on the engine management light. I started it up and it hasnt done it since. Technically that could have been "dangerous" and it could happen again, perhaps on the motorway. However i could, according to you, expect the dealer to come and pick it up, trailer it back to their workshop, and leave me a courtesy car in the meantime. Ultimately they may find that there is a dangerous fault, it could have been a one off, it could have been my bad driving or it could just need a software upgrade.

Do you really, really believe that ALL traders have to legally provide that level of service on ALL cars they've sold? No? Me neither.

The reality is - and bear in mind this is a VW main dealer not some shady backstreet trader they'll say drop it over and we'll have a look - which is a personally reasonable stance.

The bottom line is here, you're interpreting the SOGA to suit yourself. The dealer took the correct stance and now your nose is out of joint as it turned out it didnt need a turbo.

Personally, i think you need to man up and phone the dealer and explain.

Apart from anything, if your view of the world is correct - that the dealer knew the car had a "major" fault, was grossly incompetent and wasnt adhering to the SOGA by paying for all your expenses to get the car back to them - then you've just reinforced with them that if they decline to come and get the car they can save themselves £,£££'s in warranty claims. So in effect, if you believe he is a dodgy dealer you've encouraged him to be dodgier!! :eek:

motorguy

jamiewakeham wrote: »

Well, if I have misunderstood the OFT advice, then I retract much of what I've said.

Summarising, yes you have misunderstood it, and you should retract much of what you said.

Herzlos

jamiewakeham wrote: »

I'm clearly not going to win this argument... but for the sake of it:

1) Does no-one think the dealer is in the wrong for selling a car with a mandatory recall update not done? I can't believe that, when selling a car for £10k, you wouldn't either check the model year for recalls and make sure they've been done, or at least just plug the computer in to check that it's not full of error codes (it was). If they'd done either of these the whole thing would have been avoided. And that seems, to me, to be a completely reasonable thing to expect a dealer asking £10k for a car to check. So, at best, incompetant.

Was it a Skoda dealer or does it have a Skoda service history? If so, I'd expect the recalls to be checked and done, but as you've said it was already recorded as having it done anyway.

If it was a different franchise, I wouldn't expect them to have done or checked the recall work.

I'm curious though; 1.2 TSI Yeti's don't seem particularly rare (I see 170 on autotrader right now, 8 within 50 miles of me), so why did you source one from 200+ miles away?

I didn't even travel that far to look at a Mg ZT V8 and they are like hens teeth (1 or 2 for sale nationally).

vaio

jamiewakeham wrote: »

......But how should I read "You must also bear any costs associated with doing so such as transporting the vehicle to a garage for repairs." (OFT1241 9.25)? That's a genuine question - are fuel costs (which I quite clearly did on the back of a fag packet) and loss of income not 'costs' in that sense?

I think you are right and SOG makes the dealer responsible for consequential costs like recovery.

SOG is essentially a distillation of the bulk of contract law and under that too, if there is a breach (which selling a faulty car is) then all reasonably foreseeable consequential costs of the breach are recoverable.

If the dealer doesn't want to accept his responsibilities and pay for recovery from distant customers then he should limit his advertising/selling to local punters who only use their car for local trips.

Putting faulty items right is a part of the overheads of running a business that sells to consumers and gets built into the price, dealers will obviously try and wriggle out of things that have the look of being expensive but if they really want to avoid these costs then they always have the option of selling to trade only when they can do it on pretty much any terms they agree with their trade customers.

Herzlos

It's not local trips, it's a buyer from the other end of the country expecting to be reimbursed for buying from the other end of the country.

colino

vaio,so your interpretation of the law (which is completely wrong) is that on the word of an unknowledgeable, complaining buyer, who took third party advice which proved, " It turns out there's a mechanical failure in the turbo. It's going to need a complete replacement turbo at £700 plus about £250 labour;" but turned out to be, "cured" to the satisfaction of the buyer by a simple, cheap, remedy; the trader should have paid to transport the car to his premises to find out the buyer was wrong?
I think you have been watching too much Judge Judy.

motorguy

vaio wrote: »

If the dealer doesn't want to accept his responsibilities and pay for recovery from distant customers then he should limit his advertising/selling to local punters who only use their car for local trips.

Frankly thats a ridiculous interpretation. What happens if the customer moves house? What happens if the customer lies about where they live? What happens if the customer drives the car to Shetland some weekend and they discover a fault?

That in itself shows your interpretation is wrong.

vaio wrote: »

I think you are right and SOG makes the dealer responsible for consequential costs like recovery.

We're not in the realms of recovery of a broken down car - we're in the realms of the buyer cant be bothered to drive back with it.

vaio wrote: »

SOG is essentially a distillation of the bulk of contract law and under that too, if there is a breach (which selling a faulty car is) then all reasonably foreseeable consequential costs of the breach are recoverable.

Again, a plainly ridiculous interpretation. If i buy a PC from PC World and it breaks down, will PC world come and pick it up and will i be able to claim consequential loss? No? Thought not.

Almost the very first line of the SOGA relating to faults says that the seller has the right to inspect the car. It does NOT say they have to go to the item to inspect it.

motorguy

vaio wrote: »

I think you are right and SOG makes the dealer responsible for consequential costs like recovery.

SOG is essentially a distillation of the bulk of contract law and under that too, if there is a breach (which selling a faulty car is) then all reasonably foreseeable consequential costs of the breach are recoverable.

If the dealer doesn't want to accept his responsibilities and pay for recovery from distant customers then he should limit his advertising/selling to local punters who only use their car for local trips.

Putting faulty items right is a part of the overheads of running a business that sells to consumers and gets built into the price, dealers will obviously try and wriggle out of things that have the look of being expensive but if they really want to avoid these costs then they always have the option of selling to trade only when they can do it on pretty much any terms they agree with their trade customers.

So according to you, every car sold in the UK comes with a 6 month recovery service whereby ANY fault means you can just ring up the seller and say come and pick it up??

:rotfl:

Yeah right.