Halfords refusing to refund or replace faulty car battery

icandy069

Hi, I purchased a car battery from Halfords 18 months ago. The battery has a sticker on the side stating 4 year guarantee. The store has refused to refund or replace as they said I'd let battery go too flat. They pulled out from behind the counter a long list of reasons the battery would not be covered. Nothing at point of purchasing was I shown this. I told them of course the battery is flat I've not been able to use the car for 2 months...due to a faulty battery. I have another car I use so it wasn't necessarly urgent. The last thing I thought would be the actual battery at fault as it fairly new.

Since then I've complained to customer care on the phone. I've reveived 3 emails refusing to replace/refund telling me I didn't use the car enough. I've had the car around 8 years and had replaced the original BMW battery that had lasted many years.

Any advice please.

cannugec5

How do you know the battery is faulty?
Have you tried to charge it and it won’t? 

Have you charged it but it won’t hold the charge? 

Essentially, as I understand it, vehicle batteries need regular charging in order to retain a charge. I have a van that is used infrequently. It has a new battery (Dec 23) but still requires starting up at least fortnightly to keep the battery charged. This is not a fault but just the nature of the thing. 

eskbanker

https://www.halfords.com/motoring/services/halfords-battery-guarantee.html explains the exclusions, one of which is

• Sulphation: This tends to happen if your vehicle isn't driven for extended periods.

Is this what they're relying on?

I'm not sure of the extent to which they're obliged to highlight the guarantee Ts & Cs to you, but any such guarantee will always have some small print associated with it, and it wasn't difficult to locate the above in a quick search.

icandy069

Thank you for your reply. Yes that is what they said. As soon as I said its my weekend car they immediately told me I didn't use the car enough. My argument was it was fine for years on the old battery. And the fact the new battery was fine until it suddenly lost charge....then it wouldn't take any charge from a charger. I had it independently checked before and they said one of the cells has gone....this was before taking back to the store.

Yes I'm not sure on the law...but I wasn't told/shown or supplied details of the exemptions on the guartantee until trying to get a replacement.

Okell

RAC fitted a new battery for me and it was made explicitly clear both by the technician and in the paperwork that you had to do a minimum of 2000 miles pa otherwise the warranty/guarantee would not be honoured.

Dunno what mileage you've done but I think traders ought to make clear at the point of sale what significant limitations and exclusions are on a guarantee if the product is marketed as having a guarantee.

Depending on how annoyed you are and how much this has cost you you could consider sending them a letter before claim and then sue them.  Your argument being that they should have made this exclusion clear to you whan you bought it - but they didn't.

(Top tip:  Best way to avoid this hassle if a guarantee/warranty is important to you when buying something is to check T&Cs beforehand)

eskbanker

icandy069 said:

I had it independently checked before and they said one of the cells has gone....this was before taking back to the store.

Did the independent mechanic/expert document their findings?  If you have something in writing that confirms that the battery had an inherent fault that would have been present at the time of purchase then this grants you rights under the Consumer Rights Act (which can't be overridden by Ts & Cs), although you'd probably need to pursue them via small claims if they're uncooperative.

fatbelly

At some point you are going to have to fire off a letter before action, setting out what has happened, what you require and giving them 14 days to reply or 'I will commence county court action against you'

I had a similar experience with a local garage whose battery failed in a matter of weeks, and was reimbursed in full very easily. I'm surprised by how Halfords seem to be digging their heels in here.

They don't do their reputation any favours, do they?

icandy069

cannugec5 said:

How do you know the battery is faulty?
Have you tried to charge it and it won’t? 

Have you charged it but it won’t hold the charge? 

Essentially, as I understand it, vehicle batteries need regular charging in order to retain a charge. I have a van that is used infrequently. It has a new battery (Dec 23) but still requires starting up at least fortnightly to keep the battery charged. This is not a fault but just the nature of the thing. 

Thanks for your reply. Yes I used the car every week...but just weekends...the last few years I've had use of a company car...so I keep my old BMW as a weekend car.

icandy069

Okell said:

RAC fitted a new battery for me and it was made explicitly clear both by the technician and in the paperwork that you had to do a minimum of 2000 miles pa otherwise the warranty/guarantee would not be honoured.

Dunno what mileage you've done but I think traders ought to make clear at the point of sale what significant limitations and exclusions are on a guarantee if the product is marketed as having a guarantee.

Depending on how annoyed you are and how much this has cost you you could consider sending them a letter before claim and then sue them.  Your argument being that they should have made this exclusion clear to you whan you bought it - but they didn't.

(Top tip:  Best way to avoid this hassle if a guarantee/warranty is important to you when buying something is to check T&Cs beforehand)

Thanks for your reply: My Dad recently got a new battery also from the RAC and yes he just has to do at least 2000 miles to be covered on the guarantee.

icandy069

fatbelly said:

At some point you are going to have to fire off a letter before action, setting out what has happened, what you require and giving them 14 days to reply or 'I will commence county court action against you'

I had a similar experience with a local garage whose battery failed in a matter of weeks, and was reimbursed in full very easily. I'm surprised by how Halfords seem to be digging their heels in here.

They don't do their reputation any favours, do they?

Thanks for your reply: Halfords have got my back up even more with their smug attitude in store...they couldn't wait to tell me they were not going to replace/refund...also the 3 x replys on email they didn't answer most of my points/questions.

icandy069

eskbanker said:

icandy069 said:

I had it independently checked before and they said one of the cells has gone....this was before taking back to the store.

Did the independent mechanic/expert document their findings?  If you have something in writing that confirms that the battery had an inherent fault that would have been present at the time of purchase then this grants you rights under the Consumer Rights Act (which can't be overridden by Ts & Cs), although you'd probably need to pursue them via small claims if they're uncooperative.

There tried to do a repair on the battery but no luck...and was told 1 of the cells has gone...when they knew it was only 18months old plus the guarantee they told me to take it back to Halfords. Unfortunately I didn't get a print out of their diagnosis. I may have to go back. I did tell Halfords no wonder its dead flat anyway as its not been used for 2 months due to the battery failure.