Advice needed - Cars covered in cement by neighbours!

Jonesya

So has the car actually had a good wash, with a sponge, or through a car wash, to shift any deposits?

As I read the original post, it had a spray down with a hose then got took to a body shop and then a 'detailers'.

Just thinking that most people, if their car was dirty, might give it a good wash first before escalating it and taking it to a body shop and 'detailers'.

Mr.Generous

I'd try a clay bar myself, a detailer will use a machine polisher which requires skill not to remove too much paint, a clay bar removes surface contaminants and is relatively easy to use. It would take a day to do 2 cars though, wash, clay, wash, polish / wax is the way to do it. If it comes off with clay £80 per car sounds ok to me.

arcon5

Betterment won't be considered here.
I remember reading of a case where a rear bumper was repaired and a deduction made because other unrelated damage. Court ruled the betterment was merely consequential and in any case the insurer was liable to make good damage their client caused and if they opted to replace the whole number rather than a localised repair that was their decision

interstellaflyer

onedaymyfriend wrote: »

Thanks Adrian. Unfortunately, as our neighbours are housing association tenants they don't have building insurance and they're not covered under the house associations policy.

Surely if they are housing association tenants they shouldn't be doing building work as it's not their house, is it them doing the building or the landlord?

DUTR

onedaymyfriend wrote: »

Good morning guys, I could really do with some advise as what to do next..

On Sunday 28 August, we woke up to find our car (a 2016 Mazda Mx5) covered in cement dust. The neighbours had been doing some building work and had been mixing cement approx. 8ft away from the car (which was in our drive). Rather than brush it off and risk scratching the paintwork I rinsed it of with the hose and it dried click and clean all was well. We didn't mention this to the neighbours as it was removed easily with no damage.

Unfortunately, the next morning we found that not only had the car been covered in cement dust again, but it had been rained on and then baked on by the sun. I went round straight away to bring it to his attention and asked that he be more careful and that this sort of thing wasn't on. He offered to wash it there and then, but as we were in a hurry and had to be somewhere we declined and told him we'd rinse it off upon our return. (Little did we know that it wasn't going to come off as before).

It had now become apparent that both cars had been affected, so I rinsed both cars off with the hose thinking that would do the job. The following morning, to our surprise the cars looked no different and we're still covered.

After work that afternoon we took the car to a local bodyshop, who advised that we don't do anything with it ourselves and that we should hire a professional detailer to correct the paintwork. We saw three different detailers, we were surprised at the quotes to fix the issue £500, £600 or £1200 per car.

On Thursday 1st September I delivered by hand the cheapest quote to our neighbours. The husband came round about an hour later asking it we were having a laugh and that there is no chance he'll be paying that, he even had the cheek to ask why we park our car there to which we replied (with expletives) it's our drive!

We then explained that we have two more quotes of £600 and £1200 a car, to which he replied 'No way! I'll get my own quotes tomorrow (Friday 2 Sept). We didn't hear anything for 4 days and then received a letter yesterday (Tues 6 Sept), stating that they will not be paying for the paintwork to be fixed, but as a good will gesture will pay £80 for the local car wash to do both cars inside and out. Needless to say we're not happy..

What would you guys do?

Thanks as always!

D&T

Ridiculous quotes for applying fallout remover to wash the cement off, followed by a general valet.

1886

We use a supplier at work called AutoSmart. They have a product which is designed to remove concrete etc from plant machinery. I've never used it myself but you could try and get hold of some

http://www.autosmart.co.uk/Plant%20Cleaning.html

DUTR

1886 wrote: »

We use a supplier at work called AutoSmart. They have a product which is designed to remove concrete etc from plant machinery. I've never used it myself but you could try and get hold of some

http://www.autosmart.co.uk/Plant%20Cleaning.html

Yep, thats the fallout remover, Autoglym do one too, so I'm not sure where the OP is coming from with £100s of pounds quotes.

neilmcl

DUTR wrote: »

Yep, thats the fallout remover, Autoglym do one too, so I'm not sure where the OP is coming from with £100s of pounds quotes.

No, the fallout remover is called fallout remover - http://www.autosmart.co.uk/Exterior%20Cleaners.html

Different thing entirely.

neilmcl

1886 wrote: »

We use a supplier at work called AutoSmart. They have a product which is designed to remove concrete etc from plant machinery. I've never used it myself but you could try and get hold of some

http://www.autosmart.co.uk/Plant%20Cleaning.html

Agreed.

To remove dried concrete, cement from body work you'll need something to chemically change the concrete back to a liquid state so it can be washed off. Autosmart Congo or XXX apparently is the stuff to use.

Fallout remover tends to be used to remove iron deposits/fallout from a car's body work.