Rights under 1975 consumer credit act

[RobertoMercini]

Also, oil leak, water pump leak, battery attached in unroadworthy fashion (again, not that I noticed, as a layman) not to mention the misrepresentation by the seller that the car came with (and the receipt States this) an independent 3 month parts and labour warranty - which it did not, and never would have. He hedged his bets with selling a dodgy vehicle and lost

 

[Spinal]

To be fair, you thought the clutch was OK and indeed it worked for 40 odd miles.

In what way did it fail? They can just go.

Obviously I don't know anything about you and your circumstances, but cars are designed to last 10 years. You bought one that was 12 years old. It's not like you owned yourself from new and cherished it - so you're going to have to massively lucky to be able to pick up a 12yr old Ka that isn't very much on its last legs.

I'm not questioning your figures, but any goods sold need to be fit for purpose, of satisfactory quality and last a reasonable time. If a dealer is selling a 25 year old car, a 10 year old car, or a 1 year old car, they all need to be fit for purpose, of satisfactory quality and last a reasonable time.

A car breaking down 40 miles after being bought is not fit for purpose, didn't last a reasonable time, and imo not of satisfactory quality.

So the dealer fails on all three...

M.

 

[Rory]

Rory, the sale of goods act is (quoted above in another post) there to protect consumers from spending a lot of money on things that don't work / last. If cars are only meant to last ten years these days then perhaps you could explain the amount of 11 years plus cars on the road?

I'm well aware of the SoGA but it's very wishy washy and it does take account of age, price paid etc. It doesn't expect a 12 year old car to be like a new one. The only way you can enforce it is through the small claims court and that's not guaranteed to be successful.

I do agree you should be refunded though - obviously the car should get you home! It's also a criminal offence to sell an uproadworthy car, so it may be relevant what else is wrong with it.

The snag with rigourous enforcement would be that cars like the one you bought would be unsellable by any legitimate means - it just wouldn't be worth it. So the market would be driven underground.

 

[Rory]

I'm not questioning your figures, but any goods sold need to be fit for purpose, of satisfactory quality and last a reasonable time. If a dealer is selling a 25 year old car, a 10 year old car, or a 1 year old car, they all need to be fit for purpose, of satisfactory quality and last a reasonable time.

A car breaking down 40 miles after being bought is not fit for purpose, didn't last a reasonable time, and imo not of satisfactory quality.

So the dealer fails on all three...

M.

The problem is that none of these things are well defined. Self-evidently the car was OK on examination and it drove 40 miles OK. Then the clutch failed. Why?

If the OP paid £500 for the car a court might shrug and say "hard luck".


There was a thread in either this or the other forum not long ago where the clutch failed after a few hundred miles on a brand new A Class and at first the dealer and Mercedes blamed the driver and the owner had to pay £3K to get it fixed. He did get it refunded in the end.

 

[RobertoMercini]

I'm well aware of the SoGA but it's very wishy washy and it does take account of age, price paid etc. It doesn't expect a 12 year old car to be like a new one. The only way you can enforce it is through the small claims court and that's not guaranteed to be successful. I do agree you should be refunded though - obviously the car should get you home! It's also a criminal offence to sell an uproadworthy car, so it may be relevant what else is wrong with it. The snag with rigourous enforcement would be that cars like the one you bought would be unsellable by any legitimate means - it just wouldn't be worth it. So the market would be driven underground.

it's not the only way to enforce it thankfully as I'm pursuing under section 75 of the cca but if cash was paid then you're right. I've already been to trading standards about the misrepresentation / breach of contract aspect of the whole scenario but they don't 'deal' with individual cases

 

[KennyN]

If the car runs OK and all that a mechanic could find was £550 worth of repairs then why not get the clutch fixed and be done with it ?

£550 is nothing in repairs especially if that includes the labour and I am sure that most cars on the road that are 5+ years old will be needing similar or more money spending on them.

Apart from the principle of the whole thing (being stung) and the legalities then the £1000 car that you have bought would have cost the seller no more than £750, if that, so you have bought a £750 car and what would you expect from a car of that value and what would be the courts findings based on a car of that age and value.

Was the car fit for purpose ?- IMHO it seems to have been as it was driven 40 miles , who is to say the driver wasn't excessively hard on the clutch on the way home , can you prove otherwise ????

The main sticking point as I see it is that you now want to claim on the 90 day warranty that you have paid for and the seller never put it in place ??

Can`t you get the warranty money refunded and use that to repair the clutch ??

The fact that the seller has cut all ties and is not returning any calls tells me the kind of person he is and being that type of person then a bit of paper is not going to worry him , these people only understand one kind of language I am afraid and unless you can "talk" to him at his level then sometimes it is better putting it down to experience and moving on as any action you take could be opening a can of worms. It is wrong that these chancers can get away with blatantly ripping people off but sometimes that is the way of things , sadly

Kenny

 

[RobertoMercini]

If the car runs OK and all that a mechanic could find was £550 worth of repairs then why not get the clutch fixed and be done with it ? £550 is nothing in repairs especially if that includes the labour and I am sure that most cars on the road that are 5+ years old will be needing similar or more money spending on them. Apart from the principle of the whole thing (being stung) and the legalities then the £1000 car that you have bought would have cost the seller no more than £750, if that, so you have bought a £750 car and what would you expect from a car of that value and what would be the courts findings based on a car of that age and value. Was the car fit for purpose ?- IMHO it seems to have been as it was driven 40 miles , who is to say the driver wasn't excessively hard on the clutch on the way home , can you prove otherwise ???? The main sticking point as I see it is that you now want to claim on the 90 day warranty that you have paid for and the seller never put it in place ?? Can`t you get the warranty money refunded and use that to repair the clutch ?? The fact that the seller has cut all ties and is not returning any calls tells me the kind of person he is and being that type of person then a bit of paper is not going to worry him , these people only understand one kind of language I am afraid and unless you can "talk" to him at his level then sometimes it is better putting it down to experience and moving on as any action you take could be opening a can of worms. It is wrong that these chancers can get away with blatantly ripping people off but sometimes that is the way of things , sadly Kenny

kenny - 550 of repairs on something you've just bought for 1000 is NOT acceptable in any sane persons eyes, unless the car was already worth that amount (ie 1550 quid). The pertinent point under the sale of goods act is not that it should be fit for purpose but that it should "last for a reasonable amount of time". It obviously didn't. I'm putting the consequential losses down to experience but not the money I paid for the car. That's why I used a credit card. The warranty came with the vehicle and was the only reason I bought - whatever dealers pay for these warranties would nowhere near cover the repairs besides which the point is, he never actually paid for one!
Private sellers can almost do what they like and it's very much 'caveat emptor' but as a trader he has to adhere to much more, I'm ensuring he does.

Let's not forget the clutch is only one of several issues here.

I know this forum is about difference of opinions at times but I'm amazed at the amount of people willing to put up with an injustice that can be resolved several ways. Those happy to put it down to experience must be loaded. Trust me, if I didn't have a career to think of, I'd have been 'speaking his language' a long time ago!

 

[meeeb]

...... but cars are designed to last 10 years

That's a new one on me. Out of curiosity, where did that come from?

------------------------

Just a couple of thoughts from a layman.

Detailed advice regarding purchase of cars from a dealer is set out on the Citizen's Advice Bureau website.

In regard to purchases made by credit card, I've had two such issues albeit for much smaller sums of money, one for a couple of hundred pounds, one for only £27.

In the first instance I bought some seat covers via mail order, from a company that made them to order, but which was incompetent in more ways than one. Firstly they made covers to the wrong pattern, and then were totally unaware of their responsibilities under the Distance Selling Regs. in regard to returning unwanted goods.

In the second case I bought from an online cosmetics company which accepted my order whilst in the process of ceasing trading, and kept the money I'd paid.

The relevance is that in both cases my credit card company paid me out, and in quick time. They told me that in each case they would ultimately retrieve the money from the 'offender's' bank.

In both cases I had presented to them a detailed, documented case. There was no argument and no delay.

If the circumstances of the car purchase subject of this thread fits in with the consumer legislation, then my advice to the OP would be to go down the credit card route.

If the dealer handles a significant number of credit card transactions, he probably won't want to risk offending the card companies, which could potentially have a detrimental effect on his dealings with them. They will be able to put more pressure on him than you can.

 

[KennyN]

Let's not forget the clutch is only one of several issues here.

I know this forum is about difference of opinions at times but I'm amazed at the amount of people willing to put up with an injustice that can be resolved several ways

At no point was I saying that anyone should but up with being ripped off , I was merely pointing out a few things regarding your purchase and situation you now find yourself in.

Without kicking the hornets nest and I do genuinely mean it , did you seriously expect a £1000 car from "Fred in a Shed Car Sales" that is 12 years old to need nothing in the way of repairs ?

By your own admission (layman) you should maybe have taken someone with you when you inspected the car or paid for an independent inspection or did you expect the "free" warranty to sort everything ?

You mentioned an oil leak and a leak from the water pump and the fact that the battery is unsecured , the above "could" be fixed for <£100 depending on where the oil leak is coming from and you DIY.

We paid £1200 for a Clio for my daughter last year and had to spend a further £300 putting it "right" over the first two months of ownership but that was only to be expected with a car of that vintage (`06) and mileage (70k) .

I sincerely hope you get this resolved through the official channels but sometimes it is just not worth the hassle and grief that these situations can create.

Good luck - Kenny

 

[Spinal]

At no point was I saying that anyone should but up with being ripped off , I was merely pointing out a few things regarding your purchase and situation you now find yourself in.

Without kicking the hornets nest and I do genuinely mean it , did you seriously expect a £1000 car from "Fred in a Shed Car Sales" that is 12 years old to need nothing in the way of repairs ?

By your own admission (layman) you should maybe have taken someone with you when you inspected the car or paid for an independent inspection or did you expect the "free" warranty to sort everything ?

You mentioned an oil leak and a leak from the water pump and the fact that the battery is unsecured , the above "could" be fixed for <£100 depending on where the oil leak is coming from and you DIY.

We paid £1200 for a Clio for my daughter last year and had to spend a further £300 putting it "right" over the first two months of ownership but that was only to be expected with a car of that vintage (`06) and mileage (70k) .

I sincerely hope you get this resolved through the official channels but sometimes it is just not worth the hassle and grief that these situations can create.

Good luck - Kenny

This is something that has always bugged me. Regardless of the price/age of a product, I expect it to meet the legal baseline of being as advertised and fit for purpose.

I buy bangers all the time, spending always less than £500 (for charity rallies - usually about one a month). As such, yes, I do expect to find cars for £500 or less that need no work. I do get stung every now and then, and most times I take the hit on the chin because life isn't worth the aggro for a few hundred pounds (and I tend to buy from privates not dealers).

If I buy a car advertised as working and with warranty, I expect a few things; nominally:
- a car
- a working car that is fit for purpose
- a working car that is going to last a reasonable amount of time*
- a warranty

Anything less isn't acceptable.

* (a note on reasonable time, your 10 year figure, while not contested earlier sounds way too little for me. I would expect a modern, cheap, car to last 25 years or so. Our very own government has removed the automated 25-year cutoff for tax discs for "old" cars as they last so much longer. A premium car like a merc, I would expect to last 30-40 years with normal use, much longer if cherished.)
M.

 

[danch]

The 3 month warranty is a scam as most garage's do not invest in a third party warranty & take a game which in this case has caught him out, just ask to hand the car back & get a refund, you are quite within your rights to do that & go find another car.

If I buy a car from a dealer then I would not expect to be paying out any money for a clutch within 40 miles of buying it, let alone putting things right, if the car has issues that a dealer cannot sort out for the customer then the car should go to auction not be punted out to a poor unsuspecting person !!

Why should we expect to pay to put things right when buying a second hand car...?

One problem which seems to crop up is with these newer cars is second hand garages get them traded in & they have underlying errors which need the likes of STAR/IMPA/VAGCOM to get to the bottom of which they don't have & cannot see the issues so end up selling them on with the errors which can then manifest into larger issues.

 

[bolide]

Kas are rust-buckets anyway. I asked the tester at my local MOT station what the worst car was that they see regularly and he said Ford Ka

Evidently lots turn up completely rotten and are never driven again. Invariably the owner (almost always a young woman) doesn't want to pay for the car to be fixed so it's scrapped

A decent Focus would be my choice

Don't pick a fight with the garage - get the CC company to sort it out

Nick Froome

 

[KennyN]

If I buy a car advertised as working and with warranty, I expect a few things; nominally:

- a car
- a working car that is fit for purpose
- a working car that is going to last a reasonable amount of time*
- a warranty

Anything less isn't acceptable.

* (a note on reasonable time, your 10 year figure, while not contested earlier sounds way too little for me. I would expect a modern, cheap, car to last 25 years or so..

The OP got a car that he test drove and deemed it worthy of purchase ,it was driven 40 miles with a working clutch (which is a consumable at the end of the day) at which point it expired how could anyone predict that unless it was making expensive noises on the test drive.

The main issue ,as I see it, is the fact that the supplying garage did not initiate the warranty that was included in the price which IS unacceptable and they should be taken to task on that without question.

The loose battery , water leak and oil leak are "non arguments" in my book as the battery may just need the clamp refitted as the garage may have had the battery out for charging , the waterpump is a consumable and may have come to the end of its serviceable life and was the oil leak caused by the clutch going pop and damaging something .

There cant be many cars of that vintage that are still water / oil tight.

Just playing the devils advocate here , nothing more - honestly.

Kenny

 

[markjay]

The OP got a car that he test drove and deemed it worthy of purchase ,it was driven 40 miles with a working clutch (which is a consumable at the end of the day) at which point it expired.

The main issue ,as I see it, is the fact that the supplying garage did not initiate the warranty that was included in the price which IS unacceptable and they should be taken to task on that without question.

The loose battery , water leak and oil leak are "non arguments" in my book as the battery may just need the clamp refitted as the garage may have had the battery out for charging , the waterpump is a consumable and may have come to the end of its serviceable life and was the oil leak caused by the clutch going pop and damaging something .

There cant be many cars of that vintage that are still water / oil tight.

Just playing the devils advocate here , nothing more - honestly.

Kenny

I can see two potential issues here.

The first is the 3-months warranty - which apparently was not applied, presumably due to the seller's negligence - in which case the seller is responsible for fixing anything that would have otherwise been covered by the warranty - and if the warranty would not have covered the clutch and water-pump, then the seller is not responsible for these either.

The second is the Sales of Goods Act. The seller's responsibility under this Act is unrelated to the warranty issue. i.e., the seller may or may not be responsible for the clutch and water-pump, depending on what the Act implies, and regardless of the T&C of the missing warranty.

 

[danch]

Here's the facts :
Trading Standards

The clutch although a consumable should deb replaced & the car should be sorted to satisfactory condition, that is the garage's responsibility, if they don't like it then don't sell second hand cars!

Too many bodgers out there in the second hand car market...

 

[KennyN]

Here's the facts :
Trading Standards

The clutch although a consumable should deb replaced & the car should be sorted to satisfactory condition, that is the garage's responsibility, if they don't like it then don't sell second hand cars!

Too many bodgers out there in the second hand car market...

100% agreed with both points noted in the above and I do hope the OP gets a satisfactory resolution.

The fact that the seller has severed all lines of communication with the OP then it doesn't look good so it may be up to Trading Stds etc. to get it resolved.

Kenny

 

[flat6buster]

As an aside, I'd love to see the warranty from a trader of cars for a bag of sand (watching too much wheeler dealers) that covered a clutch. ......

Sent from my SM-N9005 using MBClub UK

 

[219]

Also, oil leak, water pump leak, battery attached in unroadworthy fashion (again, not that I noticed, as a layman) not to mention the misrepresentation by the seller that the car came with (and the receipt States this) an independent 3 month parts and labour warranty - which it did not, and never would have. He hedged his bets with selling a dodgy vehicle and lost

Battery security is an MOT item . Was the MOT recent ? There may be cause for action by VOSA here .

 

[RobertoMercini]

At no point was I saying that anyone should but up with being ripped off , I was merely pointing out a few things regarding your purchase and situation you now find yourself in. Without kicking the hornets nest and I do genuinely mean it , did you seriously expect a £1000 car from "Fred in a Shed Car Sales" that is 12 years old to need nothing in the way of repairs ? By your own admission (layman) you should maybe have taken someone with you when you inspected the car or paid for an independent inspection or did you expect the "free" warranty to sort everything ? You mentioned an oil leak and a leak from the water pump and the fact that the battery is unsecured , the above "could" be fixed for <£100 depending on where the oil leak is coming from and you DIY. We paid £1200 for a Clio for my daughter last year and had to spend a further £300 putting it "right" over the first two months of ownership but that was only to be expected with a car of that vintage (`06) and mileage (70k) . I sincerely hope you get this resolved through the official channels but sometimes it is just not worth the hassle and grief that these situations can create. Good luck - Kenny

to answer your question, no I didn't expect the car to ever need any work but more than half the car's value after 40 miles is pushing it. I didn't expect the free warranty to sort everything - as you'll have hopefully learned by now, I'm not stupid - but I would expect a 'free' warranty to exist. Regardless of what it covers, it's there as a selling point; if it doesn't exist it's wrong. If you can find someone to fix an oil and water pump leak (parts and labour) for less than 100 pounds, please let me know and then start your own business - you'll make a packet

 

[RobertoMercini]

As an aside, I'd love to see the warranty from a trader of cars for a bag of sand (watching too much wheeler dealers) that covered a clutch. ...... Sent from my SM-N9005 using MBClub UK

clutch and slave cylinder were covered in the 'warranty' which, as stated numerous times is irrelevant to the issue here. Lack of warranty is misrepresentation - the rest is soga