My car was stolen a week or so ago. it has now been recovered. Does anyone know what my rights are as as far as I am concerned the car is now worthless and who knows what mechanical damage might make itself known months from now.

The car ws stolen from a dealer who have been woefully poor at keeping me updated and have been unable to provide the keys to my vehicle. A member of thier staff has also told my girlfriend it was an inside job ! I have also asked for thier insurance details which have not been provided yet.

I'm inclined to reject the car and ask for compensation over and above the value of replacing the car which won't be easy due to the unusual spec .

Any advice you can give would be most welcome as I've not been in this situation before.


Thanks


Allan

 

Sorry cant help but I would name the dealer if it doesn't damage your case.
Sounds like someone to be avoided

 

I'd rather not at this stage as they have been good in the past but if this doesn't get sorted sharpish and to my total satisfaction I certainly will make them known to all.


AllanB

 

you need a brief m8, don't **** around get legal on there case!!

 

Any idea how many miles it has done since stolen?

If you do have to have the car back you need to check whether it has been put on the HPI register. If it is recorded as stolen recovered it will be difficult to sell on and the value will be substantially reduced.

Hope everything works out ok.

Cheers,

Ian.

 

I'm not sure that naming the dealer would help. The culprit, IF its an inside job, is unlikely to be the owner of the garage, so it would be unfair to make him (her?) suffer.

get insurance details from the garage. unfortunately you are unlikely to get compensation for what may have happened to your car beyond actual physical damage, as insurance people tend to work with 'tangible' claims.

i had a MY01 stolen and recovered (within 24 hours), and it stank of clutch / gearbox when i got it back. the insurance weren't interested, as the clutch and gearbox were fine. they would not listen to the 'excess strain, and what if in the future' arguments.

if i were you i would speak to a friendly solicitor or the citizens advice bureaux, and see what they say.

after all, although i want to help, i'm full of ****

simon

[Edited by RRH - 5/19/2003 11:15:52 PM]

 

IMHO: Your car was in their hands at the time it went missing. You were paying for them to carry out work in good faith, therefore your car should have been covered by their insurance.
A slight comparison would be they have your car, a mechanic knocks something heavy against the car damaging a panel, they have to repair it to the standard it was previously. Theres not much difference. Fight them all the way...

 

is it an official subaru dealer ??

 

It seems to me that the dealer or the garage owner is ultimately responsible for the good care of your car while in the Garage's possession. Inside job or not, his insurance should compensate you fully for the loss of and any kind of damage, physical or mechanical to your car.

Good luck

Les

 

Glad to see you got it back
Hope it's not to badly damaged.
I'd insist on finding out exactly what went on at the dealership.
Sounds as if they are trying to cover something up [img]images/smilies/mad.gif[/img]
Once youv'e got an explination then sting em for engine checking / rebuild , door dint removal ,tyre wear, stone chips that wern't there b4 - you catch my drift

 

AllanB

 

AllanB

I know the dealer in question and of the incident. I have used them in the past and they have been OK . I too have also heard of it being an inside job, but, regardless if it is or isn't, I would strongly reccomend getting legal advice on this matter, as insurance is a very complicated subject.

Good luck

Mr Gee

 

sorry guys, but i disagree. i think u should name and shame. i'm fcuked off with those pr1cks taking our pride and joys, and its even worse when your car is taken from a garange cos its an inside job.

just my opinion

 

Let's not hang 'em out to dry yet - it will serve no purpose and may prejudice any action either party takes.

I suggest you take good qualified legal advice. IANAL, but it is the garage's problem to sort it out to your satisfaction from a moral standpoint alone. Legally, take advice - first port of call is the CAB.

Please let's not assume that it is an inside job: the suspicions of one member of staff having a word with your girlfriend are probably libellous.

Good luck, I hope you get it sorted, but I think you need legal advice, even informal at this point.

Nick.

 

try to stay as cool as possible and go and get some legal advice. most solicitors will offer a 1hr free introductory chat. spend an afternoon logging down the incident from start to finish including names, times, work which was due to be carried out etc.

 

I agree with the rest of the guys, in the fact you need to speak to a legal guru.

If it was me, I know I wouldn't want the car back, purely you don't know what was done to the car, it would of had the t*ts ragged off it (buggered clutch, gearbox, engine, suspension, brakes etc), plus its resale value will be affected massively.

I'd personally tell them you want to claim on their insurance and get a payment for what the car is worth. Don't take any bull**** from the dealer about what its worth, go to Auto trader and try and find a very very similar cars i.e. if your brought from a dealer etc, one of the similar miles, age, extras and condition, print them off as you’ll need these as evidence.

At the end of the day, the dealer won't want to help as their will have to pay some form of excess normally £1000 plus they premium will go up next year, but that's not your problem.

Good Luck mate, if you need any other advice insurance wise, email me offline as my girlfriend is a negotiator for a large insurance company and knows the in and outs of insurance.

Best of luck

Dan

 

cant believe their not sorting it out mate, i know the dealers in question & have always found them more than helpful & genuinly go out of their way to help out, they must have a duty to you whilst the car is on their premises, was it on the forecourt or in the workshop though, as i have left my car there in the past & they give the key to the attendant sometimes which i think is very risky indeed. good luck, where did the car turn up in the end?

 

Surely if your mate nicked a courtesy car, then a week later you gave it them back, the dealer would be a little excited!!

The only thing worse than having a car nicked is some f**ker finding it later. Happened to me when I was 17, beautifully prepared 2 door MK2 Escort, arches etc. Nicked, trashed, found 4 days later, f**ked. TPF&T insurance!!

I guess the dealer is trying to resolve their slight internal problem before sorting you out.

Hope it get's sorted favourably.

 

The car is now back at the dealers and not too bad at all. I had visions of it coming back in a jiffy bag !

It has some light scratches on the body that they should be able to polish out but it will need a new front bumper. The alarm has been ripped out . The interior has some bad scratches on the dash and rear drivers door. One of the OZs is badly scuffed and there is some damage to the tyre on that wheel and the other rear tyres is punctured ( damn things are just a few weeks old)

Also they have admitted the key went "missing" 4 days before the car was stolen.

I have put a proposal forward to them which is for them to do all the work to bring the car back to top condition, drop the charge for the service it was in there for and extended the warranty to give me some confidence back in the car . They will also need to replace the items stolen from in the car such as a camera, phone, cleaning stuff and worst of all my Monkeyworld Monkey !

The worst thign in this whole situation is has been the lack of response form the people there at the time. Promised calls did not happen and worst of all the garage did not notify me of the theft and left that to the police whoi also have been shockingly bad. I found iother items in the car which they could have used as evidence. They've not even contacted me to get a set of my prints to eliminate them from those on the car.

Anyway I'm glad its back and hope it all works out OK.

Thanks for your support on this, its helped a great deals as this has been really stressful !

I won't name them at this stage as they do seem to be making an honest effort to get this sorted out now the management team are back from thier holidays.

AllanB

 

nice one mate, reduce the service charge??????????? hows about dropping it + the next one! + a free loan car, i take it you'll be getting a trakcer fitted? glad to hear its all being sorted anyway, DM will see you right i'm sure of it, the staff there are decent honest people in my experience. good luck

 

AllanB,

just had a word with my dad who is a soliciter and he says you should 'deffinitly' take legal advice, because if what you have said is true they are supposed to provide adequate security for your car while it is in there care.

Dan

 

wasnt a place nr uxbridge cos i've seen some threads of cars going missing after being booked in

 

I only know about criminal law but I would think that you should get legal advice from a specialist on this subject.

My initial thoughts are that you should not be liable at all for any damage, it should be the garage under their insurance.

You could always investigate taking the garage to the small claims court (county court). I think you are looking at more than a free service here!! If you don't want to take it as far as a solicitor go to citizen's advice centre.

If it was my car I'd want compensation for the car, cos I wouldn't want it back classed as stolen/recovered.

If your car has been reported as stolen it is classed as stolen/recovered and will be worth a lot less than when you took it to the garage. So the garage will be liable.

 

The dealer has now refused to offer any goodwill by dropping the service charge or extedning the warranty. They have also said they cannot claim for the items taken from my car which value abot 1200. They also claim they were not responsible for looking after the car and it was unreasonable of me to leave the vehicle with them for a week despite me making this arrangement prior to leaving the car with them. I find this amazing as they should have said no if they were not willing to do this and take responsibility.

They have agreed to make good any damage and agree to fix any fault that appear as a result of the theft and get the car inspected by Subaru to identify any issues.

Considering the keys were "lost" a few days before the theft I'm not at all happy with this and am now going to consider legal action.

I'll keep you posted and name the dealer if this doesn't come to a satisfactory conclusion so nobody else has to go through this !


very unhappy

AllanB

 

W@NKERS

Get legal on their ***

And let us know who the dealer is so that we can avoid taking our business there.

If this is how they're going to treat a customer then i want nothing to do with them ever.

They should be ashamed of themselves

 

Sorry to hear that mate, I really think its time to consult a solicitor. I think they will change their tune when they know you’re not backing down.

In my opinion I wouldn't accept the car back, it was a straight car when you sent it to them, and now you'll get a car back with a "history" anyone with any sense wouldn't touch a stolen/recovered performance vehicle, you will suffer massive lose on the value of the car but also it may prove hard to sell with a history.

I’ve just spoken to my garage I use (Subaru Dealer) I’ll give you the name offline if you need it, but they said if the car is with them its under their policy, if you parked the car on the road and gave them the keys its on your policy as the car is considered un-secure but if you left the car on site i.e. a secure site and gave them the keys its under their policy.

Don’t back down mate!

Best of luck

Dan

 

I won't say who it is yet but you might guess by looking at my profile.

Legal eagles here I come.

AllanB

 

DM is not dealing with it as his father has taken over the matter.

With me dealing with the newspaper industry on a daily basis they may change thier minds soon.

I am not sure if the police are aware the keys went " missing" and will notify them later today.

Thier lack of goodwill is , in my opinion, disgusting. They are unwilling to compromise whcih considering the lack of security and neglegence in the loss of the keys is poor, in my opinion. They have alredy lost the sale of one car through poor service in the past once before and unless this is sorted I won't be dealing with them again.


AllanB

 

It's frustrating, but keep the "softly softly" approach and keep some aces up your sleeve.

I would not use a company like this for servicing and would suspect neither would many others. At the end of the day, there's nothing to stop you handing out leaflets outside the garage IMHO, but that's the final straw as you're really burning bridges then

Take legal advice.

 

You also need to contact IM group, West Bromwich, or Subaru Uk as most know them. Contact the Customer service manager. They like to konw about issues with dealers and may be able to help with some ranting and raving.