VWFS Mis Selling Claim

normanna

MrsM2016
You purchased a car where you understood what the balloon payment would be and now as the balloon payment is near and does not match the car value you wish to renegotiate the payment.  The current value of the car could never be guaranteed.  

You've had the car some years yet you have made no complaint prior to this.  I also don't see this as an obvious COVID finance issue.  If you really can't afford/not wish to pay the balloon payment now then you could just hand the car back and take out a new agreement where you really understand what you are signing and can comfortably afford the payments.  

If you really do not agree with the company's final response then they should state in the letter where you could escalate to.  However, I'm sorry but I don't see you having a case and you could expend a huge amount of time and effort and get nowhere with this. 
Good Luck

lordmountararat

Nobody could have foreseen Covid19 and the dramatic difference it has made to used car values. I bought my car outright two years ago and it is worth a lot less now that I would have expected then, so were I to trade it in I would suffer a substantial hit. Who should I sue? The Chinese?

Edi81

The guaranteed future value is the risk that the lender takes on. The higher the GFV allows you to have smaller monthly payments and you can either pay this or hand the car back with no future liability. If the car is less worth than the GFV that is not your issue, its the lenders.
Who sold you the finance? Normally you are introduced to the lender by a car dealer acting as their agent. Your complaint with VWFS won't go anywhere.

Shakin_Steve

normanna said:

MrsM2016
You purchased a car where you understood what the balloon payment would be and now as the balloon payment is near and does not match the car value you wish to renegotiate the payment.  The current value of the car could never be guaranteed.  

You've had the car some years yet you have made no complaint prior to this.  I also don't see this as an obvious COVID finance issue.  If you really can't afford/not wish to pay the balloon payment now then you could just hand the car back and take out a new agreement where you really understand what you are signing and can comfortably afford the payments.  

If you really do not agree with the company's final response then they should state in the letter where you could escalate to.  However, I'm sorry but I don't see you having a case and you could expend a huge amount of time and effort and get nowhere with this. 
Good Luck

I thought the current value of the car was, indeed, guaranteed:

https://www.carfinancemadesimple.info/gfv-explained/

Shakin_Steve

MrsM2016 said:

Thank you Normanna for being constructive in your reply. 

In short: I am in the process of building my case for mis selling against VWFS. I have lots of examples of how we were misled in the sales process, but when consulting my paperwork I noticed lots of discrepancies, which I thought would potentially be an easier route to complain over as it removes the "he said, she said" element. I have done my research into misselling so know about things like Plevin and commission, but what I would like help on is around whether their administrative errors on my paperwork have any bearing on it being missold? If they havent given me the legally required documents prior to setting up a finance agreement, what happens?

So the example I listed above, in proper English, would be that the pre-contract credit information (or SECCI) we were given was for Hire Purchase not PCP. As this is a legal requirement, if they have given it with the wrong method of finance on it, does that mean that therefore havent provided us with the correct pre contract information? From what I can gleam online, as PCP is a type of HP, they use the terms interchangeably but that is very confusing. The fact they managed to give me all of another customers purchase details demonstrates they weren't completing the paperwork with the correct amount of care and attention.

A lot of what I have read online suggests that PCP misselling is the next scandal like PPI as so many lies were told, heavy handed tactics used and incorrect and misleading information given. Has anyone successfully managed to claim for this already? A host of solicitors seem to be jumping on the bandwagon as there are a plethora of "no win, no fee" offers, but does anyone have any actual experience of it?
 
My online research says that the main bone of contention is that car dealers pushed PCP onto customers, and sometimes even gave them higher interest rates, to gain a larger commission. All the paperwork I have clearly demonstrates that they were heavily pushing us towards PCP. Has anyone else done any online research and would be happy to share helpful forum posts etc?

Please rest assured that when I write to VWFS I also ensure my child is asleep so I can concentrate. The fact they are being illusive in their replies has nothing to do with my emails being unclear. Has anyone else found them evasive? Did you succeed in your case despite this? 

Many thanks.

You were given a gfv, so it must have been PCP. You don't get that with hp.

MinuteNoodles

For someone supposedly intelligent enough to do a PhD they're doing a very poor job of demonstrating that intelligence.

If you get to the end of the PCP deal and the car is worth less than the balloon payment and you hand the car back YOU WIN. You don't pay the shortfall or roll it into another PPC, the finance company get to shoulder that loss.

If you get to the end of the PCP deal and you decide to buy the car you've still not lost anything because 3 or 4 years ago or whenever it was you signed the deal you agreed to buy a car for £X funding it with a deposit, Y monthly payments and a final balloon payment of Z with the option of handing back the car at no risk to yourself at the end of the finance deal if you didn't want to pay the balloon payment.

THE ONLY TIME YOU LOSE is when you get to the end of the monthly payments, you don't have the money to afford the balloon payment and the car is worth MORE than the balloon payment.

superbigal

Agree with above. This has been a brilliant PCP deal for the OP.  

DrEskimo

superbigal said:

Agree with above. This has been a brilliant PCP deal for the OP.  

We don't know enough about the terms to determine whether it was financially 'good'.

1) The bit that people always seem to forget when talking about GFV 'protection' is the cost. PCP isnt always free (0% APR) and so if the car is worth £1k less than the GFV, but you've paid £3k in interest then you are have won nothing. You are still £2k net loss relative to buying. Do we know how much interest the OP was charged and the difference between the GFV and trade in offer?

2) People usually get a single price from their dealer and assume that's it's value. Valuations vary massively and so you could be negative equity with one, and positive with another. Do we know that the OP got many quotes?

Just as a final point about why its weird to think of this as 'good', but the PCP contract is forcing the OP to hand the car back during a market down turn. Who in their right mind would sell a car privately now if they didn't have to be forced to by a finance contract? A private seller would wait and then be able to get more for their car rather than have to hand it back and accept the GFV as a trade in price (which is usually a underestimate of the true cars value).

The_Fat_Controller

It's a bit late now to complain that you didn't understand what you were getting into several years ago.

Brock_and_Roll

PCP is actually just Hire Purchase with a few extra add ons bolted on for the customer - in fact some readers may recall that Ford actually originally called this product "Options" back in the day.
If you look at the basics here - lets say the customer has made a decision to buy a new VW, the next question is how it should be financed
Aside from paying cash, directly or via a bank loan, the primary options are:
1) Lease
2) HP
3) PCP
Option 1 is rarely attractive to private individuals as lease rentals are VATable.
The only real difference between 2) and 3) is that in 3) the manufacturer will offer to buy the car back for a fixed price the end of the contract. So in normal times, this might persuade a buy to purchase a car with a historically dodgy reputation as a depreciation monster - lets say an Alfa Romeo.  So the buyer has all the upside (if the Alfa turns out to be a classic) their their potential downside is fixed.
Along comes Covid hammering used all car values.....unless there are some very unusual terms in the OP's contract, it is very difficult to see how they are not much better placed than if they had taken a regular HP for the same model.