Car issues

johnandtanyaoxley

Hi,

my wife bought a car in January trading in her old car and using money from a cancer insurance to buy a newer car outright.

After a couple of months things started going wrong, we had to pay for road tax then MOT, shortly after the car had to go to a main dealer for some remedial work where a head gasket failure along with others where discovered. Due to a failure of the dealer informing us that the car was due a service MG refused to honour any warranties, the car was repaired by the car seller, since then we’ve experienced problems after problems and they have now said that they have did what they could and are refusing any responsibility.
where do we stand with this please?

Mildly_Miffed

More information required…

You bought a used car nine months ago.
You were surprised you needed to tax it, and that the MOT needed renewing?
You were surprised that, due to it not having been serviced to schedule, the manufacturer warranty was void?
You're now surprised that, due to the warranty being void, the manufacturer are refusing to honour warranty claims? But the vendor DID cover the issues?

sheramber

Did you ask about / see the service history?

Stubod

….and I would change your username???

UnsureAboutthis

I’m a little confused by the timeline here.

Did the car not show any warning lights or messages indicating a service was due or overdue? Furthermore, what led you to believe the MG manufacturer warranty was still intact, and did you ask for written proof before buying?

I also find it unusual that the seller repaired the car themselves—was that because they admitted to hiding the missed service history?

Please don't take these questions the wrong way; I'm just trying to help untangle what happened so you have a clearer picture. I hope you get this sorted out soon!

Robin9

Did you look up the car on ……….. Check the MOT status of a vehicle - GOV.UK

Ayr_Rage

You said "newer" car, however it needed an MOT shortly after purchase, exactly how old is it?

How many miles has it covered?

How much servicing has been missed?

As @Stubod said, if those are your real names as your username, change it asap.

paul_c123

MG is widely known for poor parts inventory stocking, and not honouring warranty claims.

Its a bit vague but there is hope where you suggest "after a couple of months things went wrong". If its less than 6 months, and the fault has been attempted to be fixed but isn't, you have a valid claim to reject the car under the CRA2015 (the clock stops at the point of you informing them of the fault). If they fixed those issues but more have occurred after 6 months, its your issue (unless you can prove they were present at time of purchase - which will be very difficult).

As a general guide, cars which are the same age/mileage/size of an equivalent European well known brand, but are half the price, are usually cheap for a reason.

tacpot12

If the seller was a car dealer, then they can't avoid their responsibilities under the Consumer Rights Act 2015.

Your rights are:

• Right to Repair or Replace: You can request that the dealer repairs or replaces the vehicle. The dealer generally gets one chance to fix or replace it.
• Burden of Proof: The law assumes the fault was present when you bought the car (unless the dealer can prove otherwise). You do not have to prove the defect was there at sale.
• If the Repair Fails: If the single repair or replacement attempt fails, or if it is not done within a reasonable time, you can:
  • Reject the vehicle for a refund (the dealer can deduct a fair amount for the mileage/usage you put on the car).
  • Keep the vehicle and ask for a price reduction.

If a new problem occured within 6 months of purchase and after the head gasket was repaired, the dealer is still liable under the Consumer Rights Act, assuming that the fault is serious enough and that it unreasonable for a car of that age to have such a fault. (As the car gets old, faults have to get more serious before the law says that you have the rights above.)

A failed head gasket is serious, a window that won't go up or down might not be serious enough IF the car is old enough that all cars of that age are starting to have window motors fail. This latter fault falls under the heading of Fair Wear and Tear.

If you have home insurance, check to see if you have Legal Expenses cover. If you do, you can call the Legal Helpline provided by your insurer for advice. If you don't have this valuable cover, you can call the Citizens Advice Consumer Line (0808 223 1133) for advice. You will need the list of faults, when they happened, how old the car is and how many miles it has done.

tacpot12

The issue with MG not honouring the warranty because the car wasn't serviced is somewhat seperate. All cars need servicing, and buying a used car should alway involve a check to see whether the servicing has been carried out correctly AND making a note of when the car needs servicing again. This is important if you want to rely on any remaining manufacturer's warranty as they will always check that the car has been serviced correctly.

She will not get far with any argument that the dealer should have told her when the car needed servicing UNLESS she asked them the question directly and they told her something that was wrong. She would need to be able to prove to that they gave her the wrong information. The standard of proof she would have to meet is "on the balance of probabilities". This means that it needs to be more than her recollection from the time. If your wife made a co-temporaneous note that "Chris says the next service isn't due until December" and she still has her notes from that time and with all the other details about the car she noted, that would probably be sufficient, but even then any judge might expect her to have done some due diligence herself when she had the service book in front of her.

This is going to be a hard argument to win. If you ave Legal Expenses cover as part of your home insurance, she can ask them what they think her chances are, but they won't represent her themselves unless they think there is at least a 51% chance of winning the case.

Any damages would be limited to what the warranty would have covered.

dnpark38

@tacpot12

I have an MG and it does not have the traditional paper logbook. When it is serviced by my MG dealer he records it on the MG Computer, so only MG and their dealers can access the record.

OP needs to visit a local MG dealer to find out the service history that was done by an authorised MG dealer.