Mercedes-Benz Dealership - 2+ Months without my car

TheCodeFox

Hi everyone.

New to the site and looking for some advice. I've had an absolutely atrocious experience with Mercedes-Benz since I bought a car with them late last year. I'll break down the timeline below.

• Octoboer 2020 - Bought a 2019 Mercedes-Benz E Class with around 11k miles on it from Mercedes-Benz of Grangemouth online via the arnold clark site as that's an AC branch.
• Delivery of the car takes an eternity. The salesman tells me the delay is because one of the wheels looks scruffy so he's getting it refurbed.
• I go to collect the car late in November. The first time I try to get the car I'm turned away because apparently my signature (which I was trying to sign outside in the freezing rain and cold for an HOUR) didn't match my driving licence signature PERFECTLY. This resulted in me having to re-instate my insurance on my old car whilst I waited to try and sort the signature mess out. Long story short I sorted it out and managed to get £220 back off the dealership to cover the hike in insurance premiums due to changing my policy three times in one week.
• As soon as I received the car, I noticed there was a ridiculously loud rattle coming from the engine bay. I managed to get the car booked in with the Mercedes-Benz Dealership in Bolton to take a look at it in December. 
• The rattle was rectified for a little while, but then we were going through another massive wave of covid so I thought it'd be best holding off booking it back in again until things settle down a little bit.
• Around may time I finally decide to book the car in for the rattle again, I have to wait 2 weeks before they can look at as that's the soonest they'd have a courtesy car available and I can't be without a car. During the 2 weeks of waiting for the appointment my car begins to have intermittent brake failures. So I get them to add that onto the job sheet for when it's booked in for the rattle (for a second time).
• June 10th my car finally goes to the dealership and they tell me my car will be ready to collect by the end of the day. 
• Late that afternoon they call me and tell me that the high vacuum pump is broken and that's why the brakes had brake failure. I'm told that the part is on back order for a MONTH and as the issue is with the brakes I'm not allowed to have my car back so I'll be stuck in the C200 loan car I was given on that day.
• At the end of the month period I hear nothing, so I chase and chase and I just keep getting told that they don't know when they're going to receive the part.
• Whilst my car was with the Bolton Dealership I contacted Grangemouth dealership about one of the alloys as it looks like the finish was coming off it and it's not what you expect on a car that's only done 11k miles. As he told me it'd had a refurb when buying it I figured there'd be some kind of warranty on the refurb. To my surprise he tells me that a refurb was never done to any of the alloys as there's no paperwork there. So he basically admitted that he lied to me about this just to delay sending the car. I figure they were going to refurb it but just couldn't be bothered in the end.
• During this time I ended up getting a puncture on the tyre of the loan car and had to fork out £225 to Mercedes-Benz breakdown cover as the tyre is top end pirelli runflats. I complain to the dealership saying it's not even my choice to be in this crappy loan car, a week before I took my E Class in I'd spent around £500 on new rear tyres for it. I'm told it's my responsibility and tough titties pretty much. 
• I sent an email to the CEO of MBUK Gary Savage, their customer service team opens a complaint.
• July 27th I'm contacted by both the Bolton Dealership and MBUK Customer Services call me on the same day. The dealership tell me that they've finally received the part so the end is in sight. I'm told the job will take 5 days to complete which means I should have my car back on Tuesday 3rd August (If i only counted working days).
• Wednesday 4th august arrives and I've heard nothing from the dealership as usual, so I chase them. I'm told there's been delays as their technicians are being pinged by test and trace to self isolate. They tell me that the car will be sorted on the friday (6th August) if not then DEFINITELY the Monday (today 9th August).
• So I called the dealership today asking if I'm definitely collecting my car, I was told the technician that was working on my car and was part way through has now been told to self isolate so they'll have to find another technician that'll speak to that one to see where he was up to and they'll call me tomorrow with an update (which they probably won't).

It's coming up to 10 weeks without my car whilst in the meantime I'm still paying my monthly payment for the car of £450.50 a month. During this whole time I've been stuck in a hideous C200 Estate car which I can't stand.

As the fault is entirely down to them I just wondered where I stand, I have an ongoing complaint with MBUK from the last I heard with them they didn't even read my complaint as they basically told the alloy wheel was never refurbed which was the whole point I added it to the complaint since they lied to me. After that I heard nothing.

Surely there's some form of compensation I should get for being without my car for this long? It was only 2 years old in June and has about 15k miles on it, it's certainly not normal to expect these sort of issues so early on. I shouldn't also have to suffer because their supply chain is bad and they clearly haven't bothered to work on contingencies for staff absences almost 2 years into a pandemic.

Any advice/guidance would be very much appreciated. 

Thanks,
Scott

NSG666

An unfortunate set of events and I'm unable to advise you but just wanted to point out that the 'they' are all separate entities.
You bought the car from Arnold Clarke
The repairs are being carried out by Marshall's
The warranty is with MBUK

DrEskimo

Of course you're still paying monthly for it. The fact you chose to pay a finance company to loan you the money to buy it rather than use your own money upfront is irrelevant.

Whether you are owed compensation will depend on what your losses are. By all means make a complaint as they seem to have made a pigs ears of this, but be objective. The fact you don't like the loaner car or that you had to pay for a puncture you got on it (presumably you would have had to buy a new tyre for your car had you been using that instead...) are not likely to be valid reasons IMHO.

Try a different dealer after this. Preferably from a different group if within reasonable distance.

BOWFER

DrEskimo said:

The fact you don't like the loaner car or that you had to pay for a puncture you got on it (presumably you would have had to buy a new tyre for your car had you been using that instead...) 

He'd have been free to choose the replacement tyre on his own car though, it would appear they made him buy a very expensive tyre so it matched the rest on their loaner.

BOWFER

The signature thing is a truly baffling one.
This past week I've signed for 2 x new cars using online electronic signatures that are so impossible to do that they end up bearing little relation to my actual signature....

BOWFER

First place I'd start is working out how many days actual use of the car you've had since taking ownership.
Then, once that calculated, I'd be formulating a letter of rejection.

jimjames

One thing to bear in mind is that your car now has 10 weeks less mileage on it so although you are paying for a car that you've not used, you have actually had a car to drive and have put less wear and tear on your own one.

Some of these things can probably be put down to a global pandemic which does give a bit of leeway

TheCodeFox

NSG666 said:

An unfortunate set of events and I'm unable to advise you but just wanted to point out that the 'they' are all separate entities.
You bought the car from Arnold Clarke
The repairs are being carried out by Marshall's
The warranty is with MBUK

Yeah very aware of that but I have complaints over each one, even including MB Breakdown assistance who let me down with the puncture. Bloke told me he was coming back at 10am the next day, I'm chasing them at 12 asking where he is and they tell me he only starts his shift at 2pm. Mercedes end to end is a joke so far!

DrEskimo said:

Of course you're still paying monthly for it. The fact you chose to pay a finance company to loan you the money to buy it rather than use your own money upfront is irrelevant.

Whether you are owed compensation will depend on what your losses are. By all means make a complaint as they seem to have made a pigs ears of this, but be objective. The fact you don't like the loaner car or that you had to pay for a puncture you got on it (presumably you would have had to buy a new tyre for your car had you been using that instead...) are not likely to be valid reasons IMHO.

Try a different dealer after this. Preferably from a different group if within reasonable distance.

There's consumer rights for being sold faulty cars though, especially when it's on finance. The puncture I was mostly p*ssed off about because I used their mercedes breakdown assistance and the guy shows up and tells me he can't do anything because he wasn't sure if I was paying or if the dealership were paying so he said he'd come back at 10am the next day and take me to the dealership after I'd spoken to them. He never turned up and I called the dealership at 8am telling them I'd gotten a puncture on it and needed to get sorted - said they'd call me back when someone was available and never did. Yeah the first trip in the car will be to a different brand!

BOWFER said:

DrEskimo said:

The fact you don't like the loaner car or that you had to pay for a puncture you got on it (presumably you would have had to buy a new tyre for your car had you been using that instead...) 

He'd have been free to choose the replacement tyre on his own car though, it would appear they made him buy a very expensive tyre so it matched the rest on their loaner.

Exactly! On my own I could have got some generic part worn tyre, but because it isn't mine I couldn't hand it back with a completely different tyre on there. 

BOWFER said:

The signature thing is a truly baffling one.
This past week I've signed for 2 x new cars using online electronic signatures that are so impossible to do that they end up bearing little relation to my actual signature....

I think the arnold clark guy was just being an !!!!!! to be honest with you. Because when I scanned the signature over to grangemouth they told me they can't see what the problem is. They legitimately wasted an hour of my time, but Grangemouth forked out anyway as "a gesture of good will". I just mentioned it here just so people can see what a joke it's been all the way through getting this car. I don't know how they can expect anybody to recreate a signature that's 10 years old, I even told him I had repetitive strain injury and asked what they do for disabled people, do they have those stood there for an hour trying to sign. He told me they'd know in advance. If they told me in advance I'd have to create my signature like for like I'd have told them that was impossible.

jimjames said:

One thiong to bear in mind is that your car now has 10 weeks less mileage on it so although you are paying for a car that you've not used, you have actually had a car to drive and have put less wear and tear on your own one.

Some of these things can probably be put down to a global pandemic which does give a bit of leeway

Yeah that has been on my mind. It's also 10 weeks less wear and tear so the brand new tyres I'd put on there are still like new. On the other hand the car hasn't moved for two months which isn't good for all the fluids/parts and the battery is critical too. 

From what I've heard from other people that work at dealerships, the part taking a month is down to brexit as well as covid.

I wouldn't mind if they'd have kept me updated throughout the whole process, like after a month I chased and they still didn't know when to expect it, I could have cancelled my insurance for two months since it's just been sat in their lot not moving.

DrEskimo

TheCodeFox said:

DrEskimo said:

Of course you're still paying monthly for it. The fact you chose to pay a finance company to loan you the money to buy it rather than use your own money upfront is irrelevant.

Whether you are owed compensation will depend on what your losses are. By all means make a complaint as they seem to have made a pigs ears of this, but be objective. The fact you don't like the loaner car or that you had to pay for a puncture you got on it (presumably you would have had to buy a new tyre for your car had you been using that instead...) are not likely to be valid reasons IMHO.

Try a different dealer after this. Preferably from a different group if within reasonable distance.

There's consumer rights for being sold faulty cars though, especially when it's on finance. 

Has nothing to do with being on finance or not. Your consumer rights to rejecting the car are the same. What changes is that you do it through the finance company who speak with the dealership (as they own the car) rather than yourself.

It wasn't clear from your post whether you wanted to reject the car though? Your post only mentioned compensation.

NSG666

The reason I pointed out the separate entities is because it makes it difficult to put forward a claim for compensation:
Marshalls could have communicated better but the delay in obtaining the parts is outside of their control as is Covid absence.
Arnold Clarke sold you the car but have not been involved in trying to repair it.
MBUK are honouring the warranty but there have been delays beyond their control.

With this in mind you might struggle to justify and claim compensation. If the car was sold as a Mercedes Approved Used tehn once it is repaired MBUK and Arnold Clarke might be persuaded to offer a goodwill gesture.

If you are looking to reject the car then you need to speak with your finance company.

Although this is motoring related it might be better posting in the Consumer Advice forum as that's where the legal experts lurk.

Grumpy_chap

This sounds like an unfortunate chain of events, but overall it seems as though MB have been reasonable. 

There have been some parts on genuine back-order delays, so I'd be inclined to trust that as true.  There have also been some "pingdemic" events that can affect a garage as much as any business.  Again. I'd be inclined to say it is true.  Ultimately, MB have no interest in keeping your car taking up space while you rack up mileage on their loan car.

You may not like the C-Class but it would possibly be similar monthly payment as the E-Class.  You are still paying the finance for the E-Class and will still own the E-Class to the same timetable.

The tyre puncture is unfortunate, but you'd have had to pay for that if the puncture happened on your own car.  A puncture can happen to any car at any time - just bad luck.

You've already had £200 compensation for the initial disruption at the vehicle collection.

I can't see that any compensation is really due, but what level of compensation do you think you should receive? 
What are your losses?
OR, is the real issue here that you want to reject the car and get your money back? 

If you are after getting rid of this car, ask MB what they'll do.  If they don't give an amicable outcome, then once you get the car back, you may be able to sell the car anyway to recoup as much or more than you paid last year if this thread is anything to go by https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6287638/car-prices-what-the/p1