Thanks Richard,
The car is a mondeo TD and is a y reg. There is some overspray of paint suggesting that it has had some bodywork carried out on it. That could be why it has such low milage. The car gets used for motorway driving so the handbrake does not get used often. The sub frame bushes certainly were present before I bought the car (30 jan 05 - or 6k miles ago) and were something which should have come up as part of their 120 point check.
I have contacted trading standards. My complaints are this -
1 - The deal for this car swung on the warranty. The sales guy stated that the warranty covered everything and that I should get it "serviced at the main dealers since, at the end of the day, I would not be paying for it". I don't expect any redress here as I should not have been taken in by the sales (lying) rep. It annoys me that they can sell a car with a complete and full 'garuntee' only to find that it is not the case when anything goes wrong.
2 - The problems which the car has predate my purchase. I noticed the handbrake slipping shortly after buying it and was going to get it fixed as part of its first service. Now it fails to hold the car at all. The brushes problem definately predates the sale - the Ford guy said as much! I'm looking to get them to fix this for me under the sale of goods act
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Hello Tony,
First lets deal with the "warranty" issue.
These are "Mechanical Breakdown" covers, and will only threfore pay out, if there is a "Breakdown" (That said we have had some that have payed for what I would call wear and tear, but VERY few.)We often have customers that, like you, saw the long list of items shown, only then to read the policy fully, and realize that it was only covered if it failed. The salesman should not have lead you be belive otherwise.
The auxillary drive belt is a normal wear and tear item for a vehicle of this age, and so it is fair for it to be repalced during servicing.
The hand brake faul may well be "self inflicted". If the hand brake is not being used, then it will seize up. The hand brake should always be used, including automatics.
The suspension bushes MAY be a little bit like thae recent AUDI thread regarding an "Estimate" after a service. The Ford dealer will have to service the car to "As new" standards, or loose its franchise. If you had had the car servived, and then MOT'd elsewhere, and they said that the rear suspension bushes where perrished, you would want to know why the dealer had not noticed it. Get the bushes checked at another garage, it may well be that they are not as bad as you have been led to belive.
Regards Tony
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Tony,
The sales rep specifically stated that the warranty was not a warranty but a guarantee and that it covered everything. He mentioned that all the suspension, brakes and all the belts were covered because I queried him on this. The simple fact is, he lied plain and simple. There is nothing I can do on that point.
Looking at the past service history of the car it seems that it was hardly used over the last 12 month prior to me buying it. Judging from the evidence of over sprayed paint I would say that it was probably off the road having bodywork repairs done. This would be a more likely reason to the handbrake seizing. Since where I live is very flat, and so was the carpark at work, then this problem did not really show itself for some time. I always park with it in gear and with the handbrake on.
However, I would say that this seizing is completely the opposite to wear and tear. Wear and Tear is failure due to excessive use. The handbrake here has failed because it has not been used enough.
The Brushes did not become 'severely worn' (rather than just worn) in the 6k miles which I did. The guy at Ford stated that their state would have been noticeable when I bought it(although he would not put anything in writing). So it should have been noted on the 120 point check and also on the MOT which came from the same place.
The Aux drive belt I agree is my responsibility, even though the sales rep stated all belts were covered by the warranty
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It might be worth doing an HPI or similar check on your car. Should really have been done before purchase, though.
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They state that all their cars are HPI checked and mine got a clean bill of health. How much does a HPI check cost and what does (should) it show?
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Did you see the print-out of the HPI check? Dealers don't normally HPI check every car individually, they're done in batches and the results, from the ones I've seen, are all on a single computer print-out, but all the required information is still there. You should have asked to see this, not just take a dealers word for it!
To do a single HPI check, I think, costs you about £40. This will tell you things like date of original registration, number of owners and last recorded change, might tell you the mileage at particular points e.g. when car was last sold, or a previous check was done. Will indicate whether car has been subject to a major insurance claim, e.g. written off due to accident damage, fire, stolen/recovered, or similar. Will tell if car has outstanding finance on it, or is a stolen vehicle which the police are currently looking for.
Have I missed anything?
I'm sure HPI have a website which will tell you much more. Give the following website a try:
www.hpi.co.uk
The AA also do these checks, as do many other organisations. I believe they all use essentially the same database.
I did an HPI check on a car that my brother was about to purchase, in spite of the fact that he told me not to bother. Just as well I did! It turned out that the car was stolen/ recovered and was on the insurance companies loss register as this. We had only paid a deposit and pulled out of the deal; deposit was fortunately returned.
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I stand to be corrected here but, by my own understanding, on a Y reg Mondeo you have to purchase and fit a complete rear subframe; you can't buy the bushes on their own, at least, not from Ford, which is what makes the job so very expensive, as you have found.
I'm sorry to hear there are so many problems with this car, and I hope you are able to obtain satisfaction from the dealer concerned.
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I have heard of rear sub frames being replaced due to worn bushes 2000 on model Mondeos (hatch/saloon, estate has different rear suspension) also normally with a contribution from Ford if full service history, however I had mine checked by the main dealer (May '02 89k miles) and they are fine. £500 + seems pricey for this though even from a main dealer, a figure nearer £300 was mentioned to me before and that is without a contribution from Ford.
With regard to hand brake, it has been acknowledged that the hand brake can stick on, IIRC this is weakness in the return springs on the caliper and not the cable (though I guess a stiff cable would not help) and is helped by lubing the pivot shaft on the caliper being very carefull not to get WD40 or similar on the disc or pads. Symptoms are wheel getting warm due to brake binding slightly plus sometimes slight squeaking/squeeling from brake in question.
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Had similar problems with the 2nd hand car I bought from a Ford dealer. Told the guarantee covered everything except for tyres, exhausts and brake disks and pads. What a joke, having read through the document, I dont think there is in fact anything covered by it!!
Within days I had a bill of £300 to pay for a replacement handbrake cable (it was severly corroded - no one could understand how it got through the MOT test), replacement tail lights (car had clear ones with no additional rear reflectors, again no one could understand how it got through the MOT) and a replacement exhaust (it fell apart). Dealers didnt want to know, said they were all "wear and tear" items so could not claim against the guarantee.
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"Within days I had a bill of £300"
So close to time of purchase you don't need the benefit of any warranty. Take car back and demand it's put right, with the promise of, if not, it's a visit to trading standards. I think they will change their minds about charging £300 very quickly!
Did you appeal against the MOT pass? If not, why not? Had it been issued too long ago to be able to put in an appeal? Was it the Ford Dealer who carried out the MOT or someone else?
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Threatened them with trading standards, they did agree to look at my car and do the necessary repairs, but after 3 return visits nothing was fixed.
Told me I had to prove I had not changed the lights following colection of the car - only wish I had photographed it before driving away.
Trading standards were not interested, told me garage was registered with them as a "good garage" (or some other stupid name) and they had received no other complaints. Suggested I could appeal against the MOT (which the garage had carried out the day I collected the car) but it would take several months during which time I would be without a car!!!
I was so upset about the whole situation and the fact that no one seemed to be supporting me, I ended up giving in and paying for a garage I could trust to do the repairs.
As for the so called guarantee, it turns out the car has to have been serviced throughout its life by a dealership, but the previous owner had taken it to a local garage so the guarantee was invalid!!
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Doesn't take much guesswork to work out where you're car came from, and what you have stated is pretty much par for the course. Poor quality vehicles bought cheap, tarted up and sold on at inflated prices with nigh on useless guarantees that most garages won't deal with and overpriced finance.
As has been said, the aux belt on a 4 year old car is nothing out of the ordinary.
The subframe bushes are a known problem on the Mondeo's and Ford do not sell the bushes as a spare part line. £500+ is a rip off though - when mine was swapped under warranty I was told the parts are about £150 and its 2.5 hrs labour to do the job. However, a company called Powerflex who specialise in the manufacture of aftermarket polyurethane suspension bushes (for the performance car market primarily) now manufacture a polyurethane replacement for the 4 big bushes that fail and they cost about £70 but will last a lot longer than rubber. If the originals are badly worn (ie. you can pull them out) you can actually fit these without removing the frame apparently which should take no more than half an hour. Powerflex don't sell direct, but if you contact www.powerengineering.co.uk they are a Powerflex dealer and do mail order. Bear in mind that the new parts Ford fit are not modified so more than likely the problem will recur 3 or 4 yrs down the line.
As for the handbrake, there have been several modifications and recalls on the Mondeo. Make sure these have been done before forking out for anything else. If its just seized up, then it really isn't a warranty issue - more like a lack of maintenance.
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Quinny,
The point I was trying to make was that both the brushes and the handbrake fault were there when I bought the car. With these faults it passed their 120 point check and the MOT they carried out on it. The fact is, neither should have occured due to my 6k miles/4moths of ownership.
As I understood it, any major defect (I'd call £500 major) should be the responsibility of the dealer I bought the car from if they crop up in the first 6 months.
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From their website....
"All vehicles go through a 120 point Pre Delivery Inspection where all aspects of the vehicle are checked. Any faulty units are replaced, ?worn? consumables are replaced (if nearing legal limit). "
Surely that should cover a handbrake mechanism which has siezed and the sverely work bushes. Both must have been near their end of their days.
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Looked at some major dealers 120 point check, things like 1. check condition of O/S Front tyre 2. Ditto N/s Front tyre 3. Ditto O/s Rear tyre etc. You get the picture.
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As has been posted many times before in the BR, most of these 'warranties' are not worth the paper they are written on. Anything likely to fail is usually excluded. Likewise the various '120 point' checks and similar.
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I would have thought that Trading Standards have GOT to be interested; they are a public funded body, there to provide a service and the fact that they say nobody has complained about this garage before doesn't mean that your complaint is unjustified. Further to this, as has been stated earlier, new legislation now gives you the right to assume that any fault in the car was present when it was given to you (I think) and it is up to them to rectify the fault. Why does an appeal against an MOT take months? Consider the possibilty of having another one done; if they fail your car you would have some leverage against the garage that passed it in the first place.
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IIRC MoT appeal has to be within one month of test (or three months for corrosion appeals).
Trading Standards are public funded - but like most UK public bodies are kept seriously starved of funds. I suspect they are struggling to keep up with more serious cases like dodgy electrical stuff that kills people, real rouge dealers, pirate DVD's (film companies always breathing down their necks on this one).
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Have you actually approached the dealer yet?
If the experence of a friend of mine is anything to go on, if you kick up a big enough stink, preferably in the showroom, they will offer to take the car into their own workshop and sort the faults out. This is however something of a gamble becuase it may well come out with more faults than it went in with! You won't in a million years get them to pay Ford to do the work.
The bushes you've got a pretty good case under the legislation, the handbrake I'm not so sure about - IMO it would be reasonable for such a fault to be spotted well before 3 1/2 months is up and there's nothing to say you haven't used it for 3 months and let it sieze.
As an aside, I notice the said company issue their own MOT's - their sites are approved testing stations but only test their own stock. Surely there is a big conflict of interest there, although granted a lot of MOT stations sell cars I've never come across one that doesn't offer MOT's to the public as well.
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I notice the said company issue their own MOT's -
Didnt think that was allowed.Ie car should be MOT`d by independant.Not by selling company??.If this is allowed tester is/maybe under obligation to pass a vehicle not fit to be on the road..I have noticed companys sell cars with MOT done by themselves.But would have thought if caught they the tester is likely to lose his/her certificate.Correct if wrong?
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Steve
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I believe it's quite legal for a company to MOT it's own vehicles for sale. I even think it's legal for a qualified MOT tester to test his own vehicle. Strange, but true!
Of course, it goes without saying that it would be far more satisfactory for a prospective purchaser if the MOT had been carried out elsewhere, but it doesn't usually happen.
I did hear, though, of a used car dealer who told a purchaser that he was willing to get the car MOT'd at a garage of the purchasers choosing, which would go some way to making it independent.
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Quote
"The point I was trying to make was that both the brushes and the handbrake fault were there when I bought the car."
Why accept the car with the above faults? Did you ask if they were fixed when you collected it? If the dealer promised to fix them then take it back as unresolved. If you accept the ca with the faults then you don't have a claim against the dealer as the faults were pointed out to you and you accept the car with them present.
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They were there but I wasn't aware of them. The bushes I only became aware of last week. The handbrake I decided I would have fixed on my 'all singing all dancing warranty'. Because I live on a very flat street and parked at work on a very flat car park then I wasn't aware until quite late on that it wasn't working.
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