Claiming on Consumers act 2015 for a used car

brennancarly

Hi, I am hoping somebody can help. No judgement please I've never brought a used car before. I bought a used car from a dealer 5 months ago, I found out a few weeks back it's Cat N, the dealer didn't disclose this, nor advertise it in his listing.

I know I should have done a check but isn't this a false advertisement? I wouldn't have brought the car knowing it was Cat N.

We have recently gone to sell it after finding out and offer 10% of the price I paid.

I have the original listing and recipe which neither say Cat N.

Where do I stand on this? Since buying the car it's constantly leaked oil which I took back to him as he gave us 31 day warranty, he fixed it initially but the problem has still persisted.

I have looked at the Consumer Act 2015 which says we can exercised our rights for a full refund but my husband thinks its going to be alot of work just for an oil leak.

Has anybody been through this process before and won?

The dealer I brought from is an independent dealer operating from his home. 

Mark_d

Do you have car insurance for driving this Cat N vehicle on a public road?

brennancarly

Yes I have car insurance 

Mildly_Miffed

What age/value of car are we talking about?

When was the car written off?

Cat N is non-structural. It simply means that the insurer chose to pay the value of the car to their policyholder rather than repair. All the damage was expected to be to bolt-on bits.

Should they have flagged it? Yes. If they knew. Sometimes, the classification doesn't show for a while after the insurance claim.

Is the oil leak enough to bring a rejection? Unlikely. Consumer rights for used cars are tempered by reasonable expectations for a car of that age, value, apparent condition. An oil leak on a year-old used car is regarded very differently to a 12yo one.

How bad is the leak? MOT fail standard is a 75mm pool in five minutes while the engine's idling - which is pretty damn substantial.

brennancarly

The car was registered in 2011, 

I don’t know when it was written off

The leak isn’t 75mm in 5 minutes, I took it to a garage and they couldn’t locate the leak but it’s still leaking over my drive 

Mildly_Miffed

So we're talking about a 13yo car - the average age of cars in the UK at scrapping.

Have you done an HPI check, or are you just going on the word of the buyer that decided they didn't want it?

How much oil do you have to add?

Arunmor

Mark_d said:

Do you have car insurance for driving this Cat N vehicle on a public road?

Why wouldn't they have insurance?  Strange question.   

brennancarly

It’s not really the point if the car is at the average scrapping age. The dealer has still been dishonest with the sale leaving me out of pocket. 

We couldn’t afford a newer car which is why we went for an older one. 

Or clarity, I am the buyer, I haven’t just decided I didn’t want it. I’ve paid more for a purchase and been misled which is why I am seeing if there is a case. 

lincroft1710

Have you found out exactly what the damage was which caused the car to be written off? Depending on its value, a 13 yr old car with very minor damage would most probably be written off as hire car costs could make it uneconomic to repair

brennancarly

lincroft1710 said:

Have you found out exactly what the damage was which caused the car to be written off? Depending on its value, a 13 yr old car with very minor damage would most probably be written off as hire car costs could make it uneconomic to repair

I haven’t found out what the damage is, I got a report but it didn’t say it just said Cat N. The only reason I found out as I got a trade in quote and the dealership said. 

I’ve resided to the fact it was my error of judgement, and lesson learnt. 

brennancarly

lincroft1710 said:

Have you found out exactly what the damage was which caused the car to be written off? Depending on its value, a 13 yr old car with very minor damage would most probably be written off as hire car costs could make it uneconomic to repair

I paid 4k for the car