Returning a second hand car bought at distance

born_again

Wonka_2 said:

Your legal rights are one thing - getting a car dealer to comply with them is another matter. 

What sort of dealer are we talking about ? One with premises/a registered company or a Facebook special ? 

And finally how did you pay ? 

Chances are that fixing the oil leak/seat are going to be cheaper/easier than trying to return it - but it depends on how much time/energy you have to throw at it

Purely out of interest what’s the car ? Something special enough to buy at 160k miles or something that looked like a bargain ? 

Not forgetting that cars are tempered by age etc.
So expecting a car of this age (which has not been mentioned) so guess 10 years old. Issues never going to be perfect.

Ergates

djneils98 said:

The dealer got back to me this evening and is trying to claim i've put 1000 miles on the car (!!) and want to charge me £450!!! 
The mileage is currently 160007 and i'd estimate (generously) that I did 100 miles in the car, most of that on the first day it was delivered. The paperwork I have with the car states the mileage on delivery as just "159k" (i.e not 159000) so not properly accurate to the mile. The dealer said he got that figure fromt the sales team and will check in the morning and get back to me. I really hope they realise this is a mistake on their part as this is starting to really stress me

That charge is absurd (if they're even allowed to charge at all)

A car with 160k miles on the clock doesn't drop 5% in value due to another 1k miles (certainly not another 100 miles).

Kim_13

I wonder if the dealer has accepted a return (because they could then levy some charges) rather than recognising that they have the right to reject. If the bar for rejection is reached the trader will lose more than merely accepting a return. If the bar is reached and the trader is refusing to recognise this, that in itself may cost the OP (at least until they can reclaim their expenses.) There’s also the risk that a court would find rejection wasn’t warranted - but claiming 1,000 miles at 45p per mile certainly isn’t reasonable on the part of the trader.

Okell

Kim_13 said:

I wonder if the dealer has accepted a return (because they could then levy some charges) rather than recognising that they have the right to reject. If the bar for rejection is reached the trader will lose more than merely accepting a return. If the bar is reached and the trader is refusing to recognise this, that in itself may cost the OP (at least until they can reclaim their expenses.) There’s also the risk that a court would find rejection wasn’t warranted - but claiming 1,000 miles at 45p per mile certainly isn’t reasonable on the part of the trader.

You're right that a court might decide that the faults did not warrant rejection*.  As I've said in my previous posts I'm not making any judgment as to whether they do or not.  (Although it sounds to me as if the dealer has accepted that the OP is rejecting the vehicle.  If the dealer has done that thinking he can screw some money out of the OP for mileage, I think the trader is mistaken)

If the faults do justify rejection* then:

1. so long as the OP exercises the short term right to reject within 30 days, the dealer is not allowed to make any deduction for usage or mileage, and the OP is entitled to a full refund; and 

2. to answer the question the OP originally asked, unless he picked the car up personally or the sale agreement says that the OP is responsible for returning the car, then the dealer is reponsible for collecting it.  (See links in previous post to the legislation)


*The water may be muddied by the OP originally agreeing to a repair?  But the OP seems to have subsequently gone back to the dealer saying he wants a refund, and the dealer hasn't said "No.  You agreed to a repair, you can't have a refund".  I'm not sure if that would be a problem or not