RAC Vehicle Inspection - Waste of money and extremely misleading

jmajithia108

The RAC Vehicle Inspection service offered by the RAC is actually extremely misleading and all the RAC actually do is a visual inspection of the vehicle (simply what a competent buyer of the vehicle would do - review the car externally, stop/start the vehicle, ensure there are warning messages/lights and go for a test drive). Effectively they constitute that as a valid Vehicle Inspection and charge you £311 for a 4x4 to provide you a really terrible 10 page report where everything is ticked.

I bought a Comprehensive Vehicle Inspection from the RAC and 2 weeks later the battery had to be changed costing me hundreds of pounds as RAC had failed to check that if there was sufficient voltage and crank power coming from the battery. When i raised this as a complaint to the RAC, their customer care team did everything in their power to blame me for the issue stating they had advised that the stop/start may not be working (when this wasnt the issue). They additionally said in a comprehensive inspection, they only visually inspect the car even though the website clearly says: "[FONT=&quot]Our comprehensive inspection will give you a complete overview of any major faults found on the vehicle through full mechanical and structural checks on the car[/FONT]".

The cheek of the customer care team is the remote battery was flagged as being low in the inspection and one of the team members even tried to flag up that they had warned me about the battery until i flagged up and told them a remote fob battery is very different to the car battery. To keep me quiet they offered £50 as a good will gesture. I have requested a full refund on the inspection as they have not delivered this correctly but they refuse to speak to me any further and standard RAC have closed the case. I have now escalated this to the Finance Ombudsman and Trading Standards. RAC's customer care team are advised effectively to provide standard responses to customer's complaints and close the case down quickly to avoid reimbusing the customer or providing any financial compensation.

My advise is please DO NOT get an inspection from RAC. They are incompetenant and believe me the inspection they do is the same inspection you would do when test driving the car. Instead source a local mechanic to the inspection for you OR if your brave enough head with the AA.

Richard53

1. Without doing a full drop test, there is no reliable way of knowing how good a battery is internally.


2. At this time of year, a battery a few years old can fail quite quickly, from seemingly healthy to stone dead in a day or two.


3. Most people regard a battery as a consumable - when it goes, you replace it, without worrying too much.


4. You should have taken their decent goodwill offer - £50 would have gone a long way to offset the cost of the new battery, and you would have had a brand new battery to show for it. A new battery cost you 'hundreds of pounds ' - really?

Aylesbury_Duck

Fascinating, and advice I will ignore since it's obviously an unreasonable rant.

Car_54

The Ombudsman is unlikely to be interested, as inspections are not a financial product.

EdGasketTheSecond

Yes RAC like to close complaints without properly dealing with them in my experience too.

shaun_from_Africa

jmajithia108 wrote: »

I bought a Comprehensive Vehicle Inspection from the RAC and 2 weeks later the battery had to be changed costing me hundreds of pounds as RAC had failed to check that if there was sufficient voltage and crank power coming from the battery.

There obviously was sufficient power coming from the battery at the time of the test, when you bought the vehicle and for the 2 weeks following this otherwise how did you manage to start it?

When a battery fails, it can go from good to bad extremely quickly, especially if an internal short circuit develops in one of the cells and if this is what happened, there is no way that it would have been picked up on the pre-purchase test.

forgotmyname

Fully charge a battery and test it and it will show as all good. A couple of short journeys and that boost will have gone.

The battery may have been good on the inspection.

A battery replacement is not a major fault, just unlucky. I stuck a new battery on my car even though it was less than 5 years old. It sits unused for days and i dont want to risk a flat battery. Replaced for peace of mind.

mattyprice4004

With all due respect, you obviously purchased the check as you’re fairly unskilled when it comes to inspecting vehicles.

As someone who works in the trade, take it from me that it’s IMPOSSIBLE to properly ascertain the condition of a battery roadside and without having it removed from the vehicle and properly tested over a length of time.

I suggest you move on, their goodwill gesture is more than generous.
Also what vehicle is it? Hundreds of pounds is usually luxury car territory for a battery.

Your complaint is unfounded and you simply suffered what a lot of people do this time of year - a battery that just decides enough is enough.

jmajithia108

Thanks Matty and your kind response is respected. Strange that because my mechanic was able to test the battery within 5 minutes and told me that there wasnt enough voltage/crank power so i am not sure if these basic tests are done by my mechanic, what the RAC inspection did? Because if you are telling me they stood there, looked inside to see if there was a battery present and stop and started the vehicle. Well then an "unskilled" person like myself could have done that to be honest. And so yes the complaint to both trading standards and the financial ombudsman continue as the RAC cant exactly answer why they ticked this as working rather than just respond with not having the right equipment to perform the test at the time (i.e. leave it with a check to say they cant verify the battery). This is about the RAC mis-selling and additionally mis-reporting their findings incorrectly and in this instance they have been caught out. The battery fault was diagnosed a week after i bought the car - very unlikely the battery goes from being perfectly fine to not having the correct power in one week. RAC admitted all they did was stop/started the car and checked the battery was correct connected.

jmajithia108

Thanks Richard53:

1. Without doing a full drop test, there is no reliable way of knowing how good a battery is internally.
[JM: Well as mentioned earlier my mechanic was able to diagnose this very quickly]

2. At this time of year, a battery a few years old can fail quite quickly, from seemingly healthy to stone dead in a day or two.
[JM: Well the battery didnt drop dead but wasnt providing the sufficient power required. RAC performed no tests whatsoever in their vehicle inspection except stop/started the vehicle a few times and checked to see if there was a battery in the car. No offence any half decent competent person can do the same and you wouldnt have to pay £311 for it]

3. Most people regard a battery as a consumable - when it goes, you replace it, without worrying too much.


[JM: The battery isnt the issue here. Its RAC and what they detail they do in an vehicle inspection and what the actual output is afterwards. Their inspection is simply full of holes and a lot of the items they say are inspected ARE NOT]


4. You should have taken their decent goodwill offer - £50 would have gone a long way to offset the cost of the new battery, and you would have had a brand new battery to show for it. A new battery cost you 'hundreds of pounds ' - really?


[JM: Landrover Discovery 4 and yes it did cost around £300 for the battery. They offered it to me, i simply have asked for a refund of £311 for the false inspection that they performed thats all. The cost of the battery is slighlty more]

jmajithia108

Car_54 wrote: »

The Ombudsman is unlikely to be interested, as inspections are not a financial product.

Not an issue it has gone to both trading standards and BBC Watchdog as well. The point here is RAC will be doing this all of its consumers and then using their loose T&Cs to effectively close the case.