Service woes from Arnold clack

Mickyf

Hi all I could do with some advice please, apart from, you shouldn’t have gone there in the first place !

14/11/18. I brought a 3 year old, £20000 car from Arnold, full manufacturers service done before collection.
On collection they had not stamped the service book, so they scurried away and did that.

Two weeks later on a health check at Volvo, the discs were excessively grooved.I had done 300 miles in the car by then. After quite a few dodged phone calls and a/c calling the other garage money grabbing opportunists they agreed to look at and eventually change discs and pads. Even that simple task took 3 visits. Completed on 14/12/18

In the meantime I smelled a rat with the servicing so I asked for proof the car had been serviced.
On the 8th of December I received an internal invoice, it proves one department charged the other, nothing more. It doesn’t even add up to the amount of components needed for the service.
Next I was sent a preparation form, it has the date, it has the mileage (different to the one in the service book by over 100 miles) and every box has been ticked, including the none applicable items and bits that need specific information have been ignored.
The space for the technician to sign is not filled in either.
After complaining yet again, mostly by email, I was sent sheet 1 of 3 autodata service schedule, again all boxes ticked, ie clutch operation ( it’s an automatic) etc.
This document is dated 12/12/18
All of the above forms tick the brakes in good order
At the date the last form was filled in car was with me, no wonder I questioned if the car had been serviced.

I told them I wanted to reject the car, sadly as I let them repair it they have said no.
I also had a service done at my expense at the time the groved discs were highlighted as I wanted to be sure of the condition of the car.

Also highlighted at service was cracking in the rear tyre treads, this had been noted on the mot as advisory’s back in July 5 months ago
I looked at the treads, 5mm approx but didn’t even think to look for cracks as I relied on good faith that the car would be in good order, schoolboy error on my part.

Customer service who are meant to be impartial have told me that their last correspondence is their final one, saying if the branch say they serviced it, it must be true! They are also telling me they have no service history or manufacturers warranty, I’ve never asked for either of those. All I have asked for specifically is the technicians properly filled out paperwork.

At least that gives me the go ahead to get external bodies involved, my question is who?

If I parked the car up would I have grounds to hand it back?

Should I start the ball rolling with their ombudsman, office of Fair trading, maybe there is a servicing body that deals with this or maybe even the police, it is fraud after all, last choice is probably a bit daft but I’m proper pee’d off with them.
Many thanks for reading my tale of woe, if I had the answer I wouldn’t be asking you lovely people out there.

agrinnall

I don't see any evidence in your post that the servicing hasn't been done yet, just a suspicion on you part. That suspicion may be right but you'd be wasting your time and money taking it to other bodies unless you can offer something more. Is it possible to get an electronic service record from the car itself by taking it to another dealer and asking them to plug into the diagnostic port?

jimbo6977

All I have asked for specifically is the technicians properly filled out paperwork.

You might as well ask for the moon on a stick.

All bar one Arnold Shark branch I've been in has managed to annoy me one way or another. One clown stamped my service book in 2015 with a stamp that reads "do note use after 2012"

On the other hand my largest spend with them was when I bought a pre-reg from AC Ashton-in-Makerfield in Jan 2013. Got good service, a straightforward buying process, and a decent price.

I wouldn't go to any other of their branches again though.

fred246

The garage service industry is completely unregulated. That's why it's a complete farce. Anyone can make any lies up. It doesn't matter. Falsifying service records is normal for garages. It's done everyday. If you go to Trading Standards and say "I took my car to the garage and they haven't changed the oil", they will say "take it back and ask them to change it then." That's all that happens. It's been the same for years.