Claim back cost of work carried out by a garage

km1500

I expect you know this but just to say that just because you have got the money back it does not mean it's the end of the matter

you may still owe the garage the money and they may well go after you in a different way to get it

pjs493

km1500 said:

I expect you know this but just to say that just because you have got the money back it does not mean it's the end of the matter

you may still owe the garage the money and they may well go after you in a different way to get it

Could you explain more about what you mean? Do you mean in the way Ryanair refused service to people who’d been refunded via their CC when flights were cancelled due to COVID until they repaid their refunds?

The garage has the opportunity to dispute my dispute via my CC company. If the CC company for some reason found in their favour the charge would be added back to my CC balance. If the garage refuse to give me a refund but the CC company agree with me, my CC company has already given me the credit under the protection/insurance of paying by credit card.

If the garage does not acquiesce and refuses to refund me directly, I’ve already had the credit from my CC company. My understanding is that the garage would still have my money in that scenario because they would have chosen not to give me my money back. 

Under what grounds would the garage come after me for money they feel I owe them? The only contact information they have for me is a phone number anyway. Even if they somehow managed to acquire my address, are they really likely to go to the effort of claiming I owe them money when they’ve lost the case with the CC company and take me to a small claims court over the sum of £500? £500 that they’ve kept anyway (if they refuse to refund me directly). 

I can’t see the issue getting far in a small claims court if they decided to do that, the cost of time and effort alone for them to try that wouldn’t be worth their while. I’d be able to turn up with all my evidence and they’d have nothing to produce because I’ve already asked them for that when I raised the dispute with them initially. Presumably the CC company will ask for any evidence too. It’s hard to argue with a report from an independent garage who correctly diagnosed the issue and fixed my car. 

born_again

pjs493 said:

km1500 said:

I expect you know this but just to say that just because you have got the money back it does not mean it's the end of the matter

you may still owe the garage the money and they may well go after you in a different way to get it

Could you explain more about what you mean? Do you mean in the way Ryanair refused service to people who’d been refunded via their CC when flights were cancelled due to COVID until they repaid their refunds?

The garage has the opportunity to dispute my dispute via my CC company. If the CC company for some reason found in their favour the charge would be added back to my CC balance. If the garage refuse to give me a refund but the CC company agree with me, my CC company has already given me the credit under the protection/insurance of paying by credit card.

If the garage does not acquiesce and refuses to refund me directly, I’ve already had the credit from my CC company. My understanding is that the garage would still have my money in that scenario because they would have chosen not to give me my money back. 

Under what grounds would the garage come after me for money they feel I owe them? The only contact information they have for me is a phone number anyway. Even if they somehow managed to acquire my address, are they really likely to go to the effort of claiming I owe them money when they’ve lost the case with the CC company and take me to a small claims court over the sum of £500? £500 that they’ve kept anyway (if they refuse to refund me directly). 

I can’t see the issue getting far in a small claims court if they decided to do that, the cost of time and effort alone for them to try that wouldn’t be worth their while. I’d be able to turn up with all my evidence and they’d have nothing to produce because I’ve already asked them for that when I raised the dispute with them initially. Presumably the CC company will ask for any evidence too. It’s hard to argue with a report from an independent garage who correctly diagnosed the issue and fixed my car. 

Yes, garage does have a right to dispute the chargeback, but many do not & will go the legal route to claim the money back.

Chargebacks are only card regulations & have no legal standing.

pjs493

born_again said:

pjs493 said:

km1500 said:

I expect you know this but just to say that just because you have got the money back it does not mean it's the end of the matter

you may still owe the garage the money and they may well go after you in a different way to get it

Could you explain more about what you mean? Do you mean in the way Ryanair refused service to people who’d been refunded via their CC when flights were cancelled due to COVID until they repaid their refunds?

The garage has the opportunity to dispute my dispute via my CC company. If the CC company for some reason found in their favour the charge would be added back to my CC balance. If the garage refuse to give me a refund but the CC company agree with me, my CC company has already given me the credit under the protection/insurance of paying by credit card.

If the garage does not acquiesce and refuses to refund me directly, I’ve already had the credit from my CC company. My understanding is that the garage would still have my money in that scenario because they would have chosen not to give me my money back. 

Under what grounds would the garage come after me for money they feel I owe them? The only contact information they have for me is a phone number anyway. Even if they somehow managed to acquire my address, are they really likely to go to the effort of claiming I owe them money when they’ve lost the case with the CC company and take me to a small claims court over the sum of £500? £500 that they’ve kept anyway (if they refuse to refund me directly). 

I can’t see the issue getting far in a small claims court if they decided to do that, the cost of time and effort alone for them to try that wouldn’t be worth their while. I’d be able to turn up with all my evidence and they’d have nothing to produce because I’ve already asked them for that when I raised the dispute with them initially. Presumably the CC company will ask for any evidence too. It’s hard to argue with a report from an independent garage who correctly diagnosed the issue and fixed my car. 

Yes, garage does have a right to dispute the chargeback, but many do not & will go the legal route to claim the money back.

Chargebacks are only card regulations & have no legal standing.

I’m still failing to see what legal route they’d take for such a small amount of money when they have zero evidence to support their frequently changing story and I’ve got independent reports stating that what they did was a cowboy job and not what was needed for my car. And again, the only information they have for me is a name and a phone number. I’m not sure how they would even start to pursue when they have no or very flimsy grounds on which to do so and they know what evidence I have. 

Under the chargeback, I didn’t think the money came from the retailer but from the CC company. Otherwise, why would the CC company state in an email that the garage may decide to issue me a refund in which case the chargeback credit would be removed from my account (obviously to avoid me being refunded twice).

km1500

with a chargeback the money comes from the merchant's account not the card account.

 therefore your garage will have their bank account debited by the amount that they give to you 

what I mean is that you may well find that the garage comes after you to get the money back - by this I mean take you to court

they could issue a summons in the small claims court and ask for you to pay the amount owing for the work done plus any other costs. 

pjs493

They could certainly try to take me to a small claims court if they wanted to, but it would cost them more in time and effort than the disputed amount and I have a mountain of evidence to demonstrate their dishonesty. They literally don’t have a leg to stand on. 

And as mentioned above, the only information they have about me is my name (which is fairly common) and my phone number. They possibly have a record of the reg number of my car, but it isn’t anywhere on the invoice they gave me. They took no other details from me when they did the work to the car. They’re not even in a position to write me a letter without substantial leg work to try and find my address. 

born_again

pjs493 said:

born_again said:

pjs493 said:

km1500 said:

I expect you know this but just to say that just because you have got the money back it does not mean it's the end of the matter

you may still owe the garage the money and they may well go after you in a different way to get it

Could you explain more about what you mean? Do you mean in the way Ryanair refused service to people who’d been refunded via their CC when flights were cancelled due to COVID until they repaid their refunds?

The garage has the opportunity to dispute my dispute via my CC company. If the CC company for some reason found in their favour the charge would be added back to my CC balance. If the garage refuse to give me a refund but the CC company agree with me, my CC company has already given me the credit under the protection/insurance of paying by credit card.

If the garage does not acquiesce and refuses to refund me directly, I’ve already had the credit from my CC company. My understanding is that the garage would still have my money in that scenario because they would have chosen not to give me my money back. 

Under what grounds would the garage come after me for money they feel I owe them? The only contact information they have for me is a phone number anyway. Even if they somehow managed to acquire my address, are they really likely to go to the effort of claiming I owe them money when they’ve lost the case with the CC company and take me to a small claims court over the sum of £500? £500 that they’ve kept anyway (if they refuse to refund me directly). 

I can’t see the issue getting far in a small claims court if they decided to do that, the cost of time and effort alone for them to try that wouldn’t be worth their while. I’d be able to turn up with all my evidence and they’d have nothing to produce because I’ve already asked them for that when I raised the dispute with them initially. Presumably the CC company will ask for any evidence too. It’s hard to argue with a report from an independent garage who correctly diagnosed the issue and fixed my car. 

Yes, garage does have a right to dispute the chargeback, but many do not & will go the legal route to claim the money back.

Chargebacks are only card regulations & have no legal standing.

I’m still failing to see what legal route they’d take for such a small amount of money when they have zero evidence to support their frequently changing story and I’ve got independent reports stating that what they did was a cowboy job and not what was needed for my car. And again, the only information they have for me is a name and a phone number. I’m not sure how they would even start to pursue when they have no or very flimsy grounds on which to do so and they know what evidence I have. 

Under the chargeback, I didn’t think the money came from the retailer but from the CC company. Otherwise, why would the CC company state in an email that the garage may decide to issue me a refund in which case the chargeback credit would be removed from my account (obviously to avoid me being refunded twice).

Comes from the retailer merchant bank, who then contact retailer. Who have 45 days to contest. 
Which is why CC say if retailer refunds they will redebit you. 

Legal route would be either small claims, or they go for a CCJ.
Don't forget that they can request car details from DVLA to get the rest of your details, or employ a trace service.

Not trying to scare you. Just make you aware that chargeback is not always the end of these matters. Bank can not help you if they do chase to get funds back 👍