Paying a garage which hasn’t fixed my car

statebabe4

Help!!!
we have an old motorhome car which has electrical issues.. it’s a very old, simple system BUT yet is proving elusive to fix.
so far we have spent over £1500 on various mechanics and various bits that they have said will fix the issue but didn’t.
now we’ve taken it to a proper garage  it the bill now stands at £800 already and still no solution or fix.
What’s the position with paying a garage to fix your vehicle if they can’t actually fix it?!
part of me thinks, they’ve done the work so should be paid regardless but part of me also thinks.. am I just paying for someone with no idea to ‘tinker’ and not resolve the problem, in which case that doesn’t seem fair.
advice PLEASE

Supersonos

statebabe4 said:

part of me thinks, they’ve done the work so should be paid regardless 

Pay what you owe so far and then take it to another garage and say, very clearly, that you'd like them to spend time taking apart your motorhome to identify the problem, install replacement parts as necessary and reassemble the motorhome, but on no cirumstances will you pay them a penny unless the problem is completely fixed.

I'm sure they'll be more than happy to oblige.

Goudy

As it's electrical, would you not consider taking it to an auto electrician?

AdrianC

Is this an issue with the leisure side of the motorhome electrics, or with the vehicle side?

What is the issue?

Supersonos said:

statebabe4 said:

part of me thinks, they’ve done the work so should be paid regardless 

Pay what you owe so far and then take it to another garage and say, very clearly, that you'd like them to spend time taking apart your motorhome to identify the problem, install replacement parts as necessary and reassemble the motorhome, but on no cirumstances will you pay them a penny unless the problem is completely fixed.

I'm sure they'll be more than happy to oblige.

...then look very surprised at the size of the final bill, with all time and components used listed.

Herzlos

Supersonos said:

say, very clearly, that you'd like them to spend time taking apart your motorhome to identify the problem, install replacement parts as necessary and reassemble the motorhome, but on no cirumstances will you pay them a penny unless the problem is completely fixed.

I'm sure they'll be more than happy to oblige.

I can't see many garages agreeing to take on a gremlin that's already eluded multiple mechanics without getting paid. No Labour is fair enough if they have down time, but no reimbursement for the parts is a no go.
You should by now have a pretty comprehensive list of what's not wrong, so take it to a specialist and explain exactly what's happened and your reluctance to keep throwing money at it.

fred246

Call me old fashioned but if I paid for a repair I would expect the problem to be fixed. The job of the garage is to find what is wrong and sort it out. Ultimately if you ever ended up in court I think a judge would agree with that point of view. They need to be better than someone with no skill whatsoever.

born_again

fred246 said:

Call me old fashioned but if I paid for a repair I would expect the problem to be fixed. The job of the garage is to find what is wrong and sort it out. Ultimately if you ever ended up in court I think a judge would agree with that point of view. They need to be better than someone with no skill whatsoever.

No, you are paying them to trace & fix the problem. 
Remember that someone has to do that (Labour charges) the car is sat taking up space that another paying customer car could be using....

Perhaps you would like to offer your services to fix it (once you have spent a few weeks looking for a u-tube video of how too, of course) 🤷‍♀️🤣 then the OP can pay you.

fred246

If I took my car to a zoo and gave it to the monkeys for them to fix they probably wouldn't be able to do it. If you take it to a garage they should be better than the monkeys. They should be able to show some skill.

Mickey666

fred246 said:

Call me old fashioned but if I paid for a repair I would expect the problem to be fixed. The job of the garage is to find what is wrong and sort it out. Ultimately if you ever ended up in court I think a judge would agree with that point of view. They need to be better than someone with no skill whatsoever.

Flawed logic. Repairing something requires the fault to be known. In this case (as in so many) the fault is not known. It therefore requires work to be done to identify the fault. Some faults are easy to diagnose, some are difficult to diagnose. it follows that a difficult-to-diagnose fault is going to take longer to find, and will therefore be more expensive, than an easy-to-diagnose fault. As long as the garage concerned has not been obviously incompetent in their attempt to diagnose the fault (eg, changing the engine oil to see if that fixes an electrical fault) then I suspect it would be difficult for a court to decide that their time spent in diagnosing the fault should not be paid . . . . even if the fault is not actually found - because they will have eliminated a number of things, which would be of value in itself. Of course, you could stamp your foot and lay down the terms of your business - exactly as Supersonos has suggested - which would avoid this sort of situation but good luck with finding a garage that would accept such terms . . . and please let us all know when you do

pallyman

What is the problem and have you been on a forum that members may be able to help you solve,That is what i did when i had a Bedford CF a few years ago.

fred246

So basically the garage can change loads of parts randomly and then charge whatever they want? Their job is to diagnose and fix the fault. The last time I took my car to a 'specialist' he couldn't fix it and didn't charge me.