Rejecting faulty vehicle

Jenni_D

macman said:

'VGC' is equally vague: you need to specifically ask if the vendor is aware of any mechanical faults. 
Subject to being roadworthy, the buyer seller does not have to voluntarily disclose anything.

As this was a commercial sale (business seller to a consumer) then the seller is recognised as being the expert and must disclose any material facts about the vehicle that would impact the sale and/or value. Leaking brakes and exhaust should have been obvious to the (professional) seller.

Your advice is correct for a private sale where Caveat Emptor applies.  

macman

Which is why I asked about the status of the last MOT test. Just because the sale is not private does not mean that a buyer should not do the most basic checks before handing over their cash, which means, most importantly, an HPI check, checking the service history and last MOT, and examining the V5C.
Going by numerous tales of woe on here, it is depressing how many buyers fail to do the most basic checks before parting with large amounts of money, especially when purchasing a high mileage vehicle such as this, which has averaged 28K miles per year. Given 18m of lockdown, that is extremely high.
The good news here is that neither fault is difficult nor expensive to remedy, so rejecting an otherwise satisfactory vehicle may not be the best course of action. The real problem here is that the dealer has now been shown to be a cowboy, and the OP has no confidence in them.
The OP has not replied to my query about the MOT status.

beavere38

ok thanks everyone, things have moved on this morning. I returned the vehicle and have been given a full refund, transferred into my account while I was there.

What a thoroughly horrible person I've had to deal with though. I recorded everything on a phone again and the most notable parts of the 20 minute clip are:

As we arrived and were stepping into the showroom he said to my son "You stay outside" and then went on about something covid related

He tried to tell me that the exhaust leak was the car doing a "regen" (the dpf regenerating as it is a diesel vehicle). I told him that was wrong as the car does it from cold and a regen only happens on a run. We argued the point until he said "Look I'm a f...ing car dealer" and "please don't tell me" etc.

He put a code reader on the car and show me 2 glow plug fault codes then tried to convince me that these codes meant the car was doing a regen. I told him "no, that means two glow plugs are faulty as well"

He mentioned a Ford Dealership he owns and he has mentioned this to me previously so I pressed him on that point as I had researched all the Ford dealerships locally before today's visit. He told me he owned Bristol Street motors. I told him that wasn't possible, it was a publicly owned company traded on the London stock exchange. We went back and forth a bit and I explained Vertu Motors owns Bristol Street and they are owned by the shareholders as it is a company listed on the LSE. He told me Vertu were in trouble so were selling off some showrooms and he was in the process of finalising buying it. I can find no mention of this in the news or on the Vertu website?

At one point when I was sick of listening to lies I said to him "can you do what you need to do then we can both get on with the rest of our lives?" and he replied "do me a favour - don't talk to me like I'm off the floor"

I WILL be reporting this to Trading Standards via Citizens Advice. He has committed numerous offences under the road traffic act, the consumer rights act and the consumer protection from unfair trading regulations