garage issue

[quattrogal]

him indoors got me my golf for my birthday , he got it off ebay for 350 notes ,its  a jreg 1.8 driver with power steering and off i went to bristol to pick it up and drove all the way back to scotland in it and i was quite pleased with her except she was making this chattering noise at idle speed so next day i did the oil change spark plugs and leads and also changed all the belts .As Betty is used for  work i need her to be reliable i booked her into a local garage to investigate this noise ,and they thought it was the timing belt  tensioner so i had it done and the timing belt (she had done 128 k ) the noise went for a couple of days and then came back so off to the garage we went and they then said i think its the pas pump , so i did this myself with a second hand one and it made no difference at all , had already changed the alternater so had a discussion with him indoors and he took a belt off and the noise stopped so we agreed to change the water pump and again this made no difference except that i am now feeling arsey about the whole thing, so after reading my stars in the local paper (something i never do ) and it said a car needs attention so i booked her to go to the local vw dealer .
Next day i pick up the car and she is fixed no more noise ,the dealer said that the garage had tensioned the belt the wrong way so i have had to pay for the job to be done twice.
I was most annoyed by this so have written a firm letter to the first garage explaining their mistake and asking for a contribution towards the labour costs of redoing it.
Today the T*sser rang me and said
when i did the tensioner i did it up the same way as the other one (which was obviously wrong) now i am not admitting i did wrong but as i dont want to fall out with you i am offering you a free mot

now i have told him that when i asked him to do the job i expected it to be done right not just to slapit on the same way and if he was unsure he should have phoned vw and asked.

I paid the fella £96 inc parts to do the belt and the tensioner and fix an oil leak


so do i accept his offer or press him further for a partial refund

 

[Judderi]

Push Push Push! I would want a full refund!

[Bazzer]

Too true... An MOT is 3/4 hour labour. I would guess he would charge about £40 per hour so get the refund. Speak to your local citizen's advice if he says no... It's simple - he didn't do the job!
Good luck though...

[Mart8V]

Write to your local trading standards office detailing the incident and his phone calls with you.  Time and date all the calls / conversations etc and tell him you are sending it, along with your original letter to him.

As he has admitted that he didn't really know what he hasn't got much of a leg to stand on, and the MOT is worthless, IMO.  You may even get him to pay for some of the VAG bill, as well!

[Rhyso]

Ay - take him to the cleaners!! 

Trading standards is a good start - also ask the VW garage for details about their work as they should know how incorrect the previous work was. A statement off them would give your claim some clout.

Good job you got it sorted before it went BANG!!

[mix]

push it.....you know you want to ....

[16valve]

Err not so sure i'd let them do my Mot ..  i.e if he sees your wheel nuts are loose he leaves them loose as thats how he found it?     as he's already admitted he just followed the original problem on your car and did not rectify the mistake? 

Ok above seems harsh but makes you wonder? Shame it wasn't recorded like that program that used to be on, Rogue Garages.

Might be worth while getting a written report from VW Garage stating it hadn't been fixed properly and would have caused £Â£Ã‚£ damage if it had been left ...

Good Luck Dave

[The Hoax]

Pesonally, I would take the free MOT. He probably would be in a mind to give you the benefit of the doubt for any faults that are borderline. He may just mark things down as observations

The mot is worth say £42. He has fixed an oill leak and that must be worth about £30 to you. So I reckon you will ony be about £25 down.

I think that putting my car into a station where the guy feels that he has already let you down is worth more than £25.

Also, I do not think that it is worth the hassle of compalining, letter writing, possible small claims court action for £25

[Tornado]

Steady On

Making official complaints can be a long and tedious process and may not achieve anything.
Much better to accept the offer of the MOT and trust that he will be keen to do a good job .You may eventually succeed with officialdom but is it really worth the grief?

[quattrogal]

i have spoken with trading standards today ,and she said that she would go with the free mot as  i am only likely to get the money for the 1.5 hr labour charge at £28 an hr,also she said that if i take it further then he is likely to dig his heels in and i would get nothing but stress and further costs.
On reflection i was really pleased with their service the car was ready on time and at the price quoted and sorted out a few running issues  that the car had before.
I will get a pre mot check done by another garage , not sure of the costs ,but at least it will give me a rough idea of wether it will pass or not (altho she definitely wont at the mo)