Faulty car return responsibility

nathalie62

1st post so please be gentle.
Bought car, 2 hour drive away, from AA approved dealer.
Coolant light appeared on drive home, so stopped, topped it up and carried on. Next day appeared again after further topping up. Took to garage who said coolant unit was faulty and further driving could make matters much worse. Contacted dealer who after much toing and froing said we could return for a refund. Explained it couldn't be driven but they wouldn't collect. It says in small print on the sales receipt it is buyers responsibility to return but this wasn't pointed out. AA website says it's dealers responsibility to collect. Tried to access warranty but as deemed to be pre existing fault, not covered. Tried to access AA but they said we should have been given a pre sales checklist (asked dealer, they said it had been done but archived away) and minimum of 6 months MOT, it had 3. The checklist was important as when the garage inspected they found all levels to be low so a full service was needed too.
The bonnet struts were also defective but the salesman held it open when we looked at the engine. I offered to pay 50% of costs of coolant unit and cover the costs of service and struts ourselves if we could repair locally. No reply for 4 days. Went ahead and had repairs done. Garage refused any contribution towards repairs as they offered to refund.
What do you think?

born_again

As you bought in person, it is your responsibility to return. 

As you now have paid for the repairs. Not much you can do, as garage offered a refund. 

One of the dangers of buying at a distance.

macman

Link to AA website which says it is their responsibility to collect it?
This would only apply has they delivered the car to you in the first place, which they clearly did not.

nathalie62

It doesn't say anything, anywhere about the car having to be delivered by the dealer. Have you seen this somewhere?
 

oldagetraveller1

As an aside, if it's been necessary to top up the coolant level twice, it's losing coolant? I would suggest the level sensor, if that's what a "coolant unit" is, must be doing it's job and working as it should?

nathalie62

The sensor was working but the unit was cracked and leaking so had to be replaced unfortunately.

Ditzy_Mitzy

nathalie62 said:

The sensor was working but the unit was cracked and leaking so had to be replaced unfortunately.

The plastic header tank?  If so, maketh not mountains from molehills and enjoy your new (to you) car.  The majority of second hand cars will have minor niggles, sometimes it's necessary to repair them.  

nathalie62

Ditzy_Mitzy said:

nathalie62 said:

The sensor was working but the unit was cracked and leaking so had to be replaced unfortunately.

The plastic header tank?  If so, maketh not mountains from molehills and enjoy your new (to you) car.  The majority of second hand cars will have minor niggles, sometimes it's necessary to repair them.  

It was an £1100 to repair and the car was undriveable so hardly a mountain from a molehill?

400ixl

I hope it was more than the expansion tank and the level sensor that needed replacing for £1100 as thats about £100-200 worth of work for pretty much most cars.

If it hasn't been repaired, and the issue is a cracked expansion tank then this can usually be temporarily sealed to be able to returned to the supplying dealer. As long as the expansion bottle does not become empty there would be no additional damage to the engine.

nathalie62

400ixl said:

I hope it was more than the expansion tank and the level sensor that needed replacing for £1100 as thats about £100-200 worth of work for pretty much most cars.

If it hasn't been repaired, and the issue is a cracked expansion tank then this can usually be temporarily sealed to be able to returned to the supplying dealer. As long as the expansion bottle does not become empty there would be no additional damage to the engine.

Hi. No it was the EGR (or ERG) unit and we rang around before authorising the works and that seemed to be the price.

nathalie62

UPDATE. Took the dealer to small claims court and won.