Renault Battery Lease Hostage

born_again

"I'm sorry to hear that the battery is beyond repair.

Is it the battery or is it the car?

Ectophile

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82166171#Comment_82166171

If the battery has failed, they should be giving you a new one under the terms of the lease.

If some other part of the car has failed, that's the problem. Returning the battery to RCI is difficult and expensive, and you are supposed to pay for that.

There are some legalities around buying out the lease, which means you can't actually buy the battery from RCI. If you could, then their "lease" would actually be a disguised hire purchase agreement, similar to a PCP where there's a balloon payment at the end. So instead, RCI sells the battery to a third party who aren't involved in the lease, and the third party then sells the battery to you.

I wouldn't have too much hope that an MCOL claim for the full cost of the battery would succeed. Gary C on YouTube found that out. If the court thinks it's a complicated contractual dispute, then it won't go through the small claims procedure, and the lawyers' fees will probably exceed £399. You might get away with a claim for the extra months' lease.

Mob_Barley

Update: after some more assurances from RCI Financial Services Ltd, we have decided to go ahead and pay the £399.60 offered battery buy-out price.

They say they will immediately stop the monthly direct debit. Then if everything goes OK we can then sell/scrap the Renault Zoe.

If any problems I'll update this forum in case it helps anyone else.