Car failed MOT for incorrect reasons, what can I do?

Al_Ross

Members are missing the point here.Halfords told you you  your car needed new  shocks it didn't,thats oldest garage scam there is.

Heres a similar example,the garage this time it was Quick Fit,this was many years ago though.

Was at Quick fit getting a trye replaced,the office guy came out with the clipboard and was doing a free check on my  two year old car.He initially told me I needed two new shocks,then later he said his manager had re-checked it said I needed four.I new my shocks were fine so said no.

I kept this car for several years and had it pass four mot tests after that and there was never a problem with the shocks.

So,the morale of the story here is do not got to these type of fast fit places to have a car mot'd you will get ripped off.

Mickey666

Hasbeen said:

The ops post does give an insight to what people think these days though 

True, but I think people are judging him harshly.  Yes, the car may have been ‘unroadworthy’ by the letter of the law but assuming the OP was driving in daylight and not even needing headlights then it doesn’t sound overly dangerous to me.  Not as if he was driving with four bald tyres and defective brakes was it?  How many people here have had their cars fail an MoT test but were previously happily driving them everyday unaware?

born_again

Mickey666 said:

Hasbeen said:

The ops post does give an insight to what people think these days though 

True, but I think people are judging him harshly.  Yes, the car may have been ‘unroadworthy’ by the letter of the law but assuming the OP was driving in daylight and not even needing headlights then it doesn’t sound overly dangerous to me.  Not as if he was driving with four bald tyres and defective brakes was it?  How many people here have had their cars fail an MoT test but were previously happily driving them everyday unaware?

You have to take it that Halfords fixed the headlight & hand brake. Just the OP did not want the socks done.

Unless they want to tell us otherwise?

OP did say >> I knew it would fail on the headlights and handbrake << So were well aware of major issues with the car.

DiddyDavies

Mickey666 said:

True, but I think people are judging him harshly.  Yes, the car may have been ‘unroadworthy’ by the letter of the law but assuming the OP was driving in daylight and not even needing headlights then it doesn’t sound overly dangerous to me.  Not as if he was driving with four bald tyres and defective brakes was it?  How many people here have had their cars fail an MoT test but were previously happily driving them everyday unaware?

By their own admission, that's exactly what they were doing.

MrDoppler said:

I knew it would fail on the headlights and handbrake but not the shocks as they seemed perfectly fine. 

The OP knew that the handbrake was so ineffective as to fail the MOT but they kept on using the car regardless.

williamgriffin

Mickey666 said:

Hasbeen said:

The ops post does give an insight to what people think these days though 

True, but I think people are judging him harshly.  Yes, the car may have been ‘unroadworthy’ by the letter of the law but assuming the OP was driving in daylight and not even needing headlights then it doesn’t sound overly dangerous to me.  Not as if he was driving with four bald tyres and defective brakes was it?  How many people here have had their cars fail an MoT test but were previously happily driving them everyday unaware?

I see you chose to glance over it failed on corrosion, which in itself could make it unroadworthy.

IvanOpinion

MOTs can be a bit of a grey area and rely on a certain amount of judgement from the tester.  One piece of equipment may give a fail while similar equipment in a different garage may give a pass.  It sounds like Halfords saw a problem with the suspension and deemed it to be a fail and maybe saw a problem with rust but felt it wasn't bad enough to warrant a fail this year.  Meanwhile a second garage thought the suspensions was fine and the rust was a fail.

Who is to say that while checking the suspension Halfords didn't clean it up a  bit to examine it more closely so the second garage didn't see the real impact?  Who is to say that it isn't the second garage that are turning a blind eye to the suspension issue but found a bit of work in fixing some border line rust?  If you took it around enough MOT centres you should find at least one that wants to fix both the rust and the suspension and one that thinks both are fine.

MrDoppler

williamgriffin said:

MrDoppler said:

Hi all!

Recently my car was in for an MOT at my nearby Halfords, I've taken my other cars there in past years and they've been perfectly fine. This year I took mine there and they failed it on its shock absorbers, headlight adjustment and handbrake efficiency. I knew it would fail on the headlights and handbrake but not the shocks as they seemed perfectly fine. They quoted me nearly £700 to replace them.

I took the car to another garage to, hopefully, get a cheaper quote. After booking my car in at the garage the next day, as they didn't have one of the replacement shocks yet, I decided to leave the car there. The next day I got a call from them to as me to come in to check something, upon arriving I was informed that there was nothing wrong with the shocks at all but there was some pretty bad rust. Three different qualified MOT examiners had checked the shocks along with myself and the car is still in that garage now for repairs to the rust, handbrake and headlight and won't get it back until Monday next week which they will also be MOTing it.

I'm self-employed and now losing a week of earnings while the car is in for repairs, half of that was because of Halfords failing to MOT the car properly, the car would've been repaired by now if Halfords had done their job properly. What can I do about this? How can I potentially go about getting a refund? I've tried searching online but can't really find any answers that I understand.

Thanks for any help!

Your car failed you took it elsewhere for repair so what have Halfords done wrong?

Maybe you misread it. They failed to MOT the car correctly as there was no problem with the shocks. I took it elsewhere as I wasn't ready to pay £500+ for two new shocks. The other garage informed me that there was nothing wrong with the shocks at all.

MrDoppler

DiddyDavies said:

What exactly was the reason for the shock absorber failure? and how many of them failed?
This will be shown on the paperwork that you received 

They failed it on two of the shocks due to some sort of "leak" however there is nothing wrong with the shocks at all.

MrDoppler

photome said:

I am at a bit of a loss, it reads to me that you took your car to another garage who kept it for repair ( regardless of wether it was shocks or rust)  so how did Halfords cost you a week without a vehicle

They cost me half a week of trying to get the shocks replaced. I got the MOT on Monday, Monday afternoon I took it elsewhere to get another quote, got a much cheaper one so took it back there on Tuesday when it was booked in for but was informed they couldn't get one of the shocks until the next day so I wait until Wednesday. On Wednesday the garage called me and told me there wasn't anything wrong with the shocks at all. In total Halfords cost me three days of earnings trying to get something sorted that didn't need it.

MrDoppler

Ditzy_Mitzy said:

The way I read this is that the OP was happily driving around in a car with defective headlights and a dud handbrake.  He took it to Halfords for an MOT test, which the car failed on the known issues plus dodgy shock absorbers.  Halfords's quote to repair the suspension was excessive so he took it to another garage and asked them to quote for repair to the suspension.  Doing that is legal, as I understand it.  
The second garage examined the suspension in preparation for fitment of the new shock absorbers and, to the OP's benefit, declared the shocks that were on there O.K.  Or possibly just about good enough to hang in there for another year, which means they would pass the MOT test.  To the OP's chagrin, however, the second garage also discovered rust underneath the car which would result in MOT failure.  As a result the car has been/is being welded and will then be put through for a year's test, which we assume it will pass.
OP now seems irritated because Halfords didn't identify the rust issue and apparently would have passed the car in its rusty state.  The OP feels that would have been a good thing, although common sense may say otherwise.  He also believes Halfords should not have failed the car on the shock absorbers as the second garage was happy with them.  
In sum:  OP wanted the car to pass its MOT without repairs to either the bodywork or the suspension.  That did not happen, so he now wants a refund from God only knows who because it took a week to have his unroadworthy car made roadworthy.  
I think....  

In total, pretty much. Maybe I used the phrase "knew it would fail" too literally, I was half asleep typing it. The car was roadworthy, the handbrake had life in it, it wasn't 100% but I can guarantee that about most other peoples cars here. The headlight still worked perfectly however didn't adjust up and down. I think people are ignoring the fact that Halfords failed the car and tried to charge me for the shocks even though there was nothing wrong with them at all, they also didn't notice the rust problem under it, which some here are trying to blame me for, as if I could get under the car to check myself.