Dispute with a garage

imnotamechanic

My car broke down miles away from home on a Sunday and was towed to a non AA garage by the AA. The garage was closed so the car was left there but I had to return home. They did not answer their phone when I rang first thing the next day.

I could not phone them the day after but had one missed call from them with no message left for me. When I rang them back the day after they had carried out work on my car without first speaking to me, with no discussion and no authorisation.

They said their diagnostic test did not reveal what the problem was, but they did work anyway. It’s not work I would have had done. They are ignoring my emails and recorded delivery correspondence and are demanding ( by voicemail) that I pay the bill and collect my car or they will charge storage! Any advice appreciated.

Keep_pedalling

Did they actually fix the problem?

Baldytyke88

What instructions did you give them, what was the wording?

You need to communicate with them much better. Your car broke down, is it now working?

born_again

imnotamechanic said:

My car broke down miles away from home on a Sunday and was towed to a non AA garage by the AA. The garage was closed so the car was left there but I had to return home. They did not answer their phone when I rang first thing the next day.

I could not phone them the day after but had one missed call from them with no message left for me. When I rang them back the day after they had carried out work on my car without first speaking to me, with no discussion and no authorisation.

They said their diagnostic test did not reveal what the problem was, but they did work anyway. It’s not work I would have had done. They are ignoring my emails and recorded delivery correspondence and are demanding ( by voicemail) that I pay the bill and collect my car or they will charge storage! Any advice appreciated.

So who told the garage what was wrong with the car, if they were closed?

Alderbank

You say,
'My car broke down miles away from home on a Sunday and was towed to a non AA garage by the AA. The garage was closed so the car was left there...they had carried out work on my car without first speaking to me, with no discussion and no authorisation...and are demanding ( by voicemail) that I pay the bill and collect my car or they will charge storage!'

You need to check the specific T&Cs of your Breakdown Recovery contract with the AA.

On their website they give summaries of the T&Cs of their various policies which include:

If, following a Breakdown, we can’t fix your Vehicle, it’ll be taken to our choice of local repairer or to a local destination of your choice, provided it is no further.We can't guarantee that any recovery to a local repairer will be within the opening hours of the repairer, or that the repairer will be immediately available to undertake any work. We’ll try to check that the chosen repairer carries out the type of repair work required, but we can’t guarantee this.

What is not covered:
 Labour charges or any work that occurs once you’ve been taken away from the scene of a Breakdown or to a garage. These are costs you’ll have to pay. Storage costs. We may be entitled to sell your Vehicle if you don't pay pre-agreed fees or collect the Vehicle when we ask you to.

So they don't randomly dump your vehicle on just anyone's forecourt. That seems reasonable. They use the term 'repairer'. It sounds as though their T&Cs are that they choose a repairer who has given the AA advance permission to leave a vehicle on their premises out of hours so that the repair which the AA's mechanic was unable to do at the roadside can be completed.

flaneurs_lobster

Might help if you could give some idea of what the problem was, what's been done to fix it, and how much the garage has billed for the work.

There seems to have been a complete breakdown (no pun intended) in communication if you are already at the Recorded Delivery letter writing stage.

How long since the breakdown? How long have the garage had your vehicle?

Ergates

Presumably you had to hand the keys over to someone at the garage?  Otherwise how could they have worked on it?

imnotamechanic said:

They did not answer their phone when I rang first thing the next day.

Did you try to ring back later?

I could not phone them the day after but had one missed call from them with no message left for me. When I rang them back the day after they had carried out work on my car without first speaking to me, with no discussion and no authorisation.

They tried to phone you, but you didn't answer the phone.

At this point, you car had been left with them for 2 days with no communication from you at all.  It seems reasonable for them to assume you leaving the car with them (with the keys) was authorisation for them to carry out repairs.  When they tried to contact you to confirm this, you were unavailable.   What do you suggest they should have done?

Alfrescodave

Surely this is a Scam posting, none of it makes any sense. 

LightFlare

Alfrescodave said:

Surely this is a Scam posting, none of it makes any sense. 

 Not sure how the “scam” would work

eskbanker

Alfrescodave said:

Surely this is a Scam posting, none of it makes any sense. 

Not sure what you mean by a 'scam posting', but OP is effectively asserting that the garage is scamming them (albeit it's a vague term) by carrying out unauthorised work, and is seeking guidance about the legality of that, which is what this board is for?

Alderbank

I vaguely remember that some years ago an AA roadside mechanic was caught and dismissed for towing occasional customers to his mate's garage rather than the nearest authorised one or completing the repair himself and accepting a small kickback from his friend in return.

But we'd need to see a lot more evidence before considering anything like that.