Taxi Driver Online

My mate is in a situation
His engine blew, timing belt snapped, [40 thou miles after the garage owner fitted timing belt] engine rebuild, was told it will take a week, [all verbal contract,] [nothing written down] to get back on the road, 3 months later the vehicle is ready for collection, he has used the garage for years for all his needs and had a form of credit, ie pay later

Now the garage owner wants 3 grand, wants the cash now, no credit, plus a charge of £10 per day storage
The driver is unable to get a bank loan to pay, the vehicle is 3 years old and on finance, it was discussed that the vehicle could still be on warranty but something to do with excess mileage has voided this

He has lost 3 months school contract at value of 300 quid per week[ = £3600,] plus all his normal rank work for 3 months, has been unable to work or earn

so he now has to rent another taxi, still pay for the finance of the vehicle which is locked in a garage
His thoughts are that the origional belt was not fitted properly in the first place

The garage has put a Lien on his tools of his trade.


Your thoughts

I always thought you got mileage warranty from a cam belt when fitted and the onus was a claim on the garage using the garage insurance oif it broke or snapped.

but as the same garage fitted the belt who knows what other fault they can blame it on to get out of the claim situation

I am sure the main dealers have a "tool" of some description to accurately check the cambelt tension after it is fitted

You don't often hear of a cambelt snap nowadays, or am I out of touch

all of our motors are chain driven now.

I would contact the manufactors and/or your local trading standards.

It's a night-mare situation, but I can't believe they will be able to justify the three grand bill.

If nothing was written down then on what basis did the garage do the work i.e. who authorised that sort of expenditure.

Is he a member of the AA or RAC, or dare I say a union?

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IDFIMH

A verbal contract is as binding as a written contract.

Regards

JD

But I bet he didn't say spend up to three grand on a job that could and should be done for half that.

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IDFIMH

Maybe not, we don't know the details of the contract so I suppose it would be wrong to speculate, what do you think? How much would a rebuild cost with labour?

Regards

JD

I suppose it depends on the motor, but I've never been a fan of re-building engines. They never seem the same again.

I would have thought a re-con engine would be better, and the labour shouldn't be more than £400 IMO.

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IDFIMH

Labour in this case was well over a grand, seen the bill, I would imagine he is priced around the 30 quid per hour mark, thats works out short of 40 hours work or around, yet the repairer had the vehicle for 3 months, the driver was told it took 3 weeks to get parts !!!!!!!!! it doesn't state how many hours tho, every little nut and washer listed, next highest item was nearly £800 for a cyl head

The vehicle was transported to the main dealer by recovery [who pays for this then ] vehicle for main dealer specialist work after the vehicle was repaired, it just shows a cost on the invoice as ....specialist main dealer work £50, suppose that was the charge to check the belt tension is correct

I thought a recon might be the best solution but it depends if they could get hold of an engine at the right price? Maybe the mechanic told the owner it would be cheaper to rebuild it? Perhaps the vehicle owner should have agreed a price and method of payment at and got it in writing?

Normally accounts are invoiced on a monthly basis, but it would appear from what we are told this person might have had a special relationship with the garage? However, it would also appear that the Garage owner must have put a different interpretation on the special relationship than the owner of the vehicle? What say you?

Regards

JD

The owner has used the garage for years with the same relationship, the owner was told in this case the reason was full cash payment now was because of the size of the bill and he can't allow credit for this amount, look where thats got him, the garage has stated that if it isn't paid by tomorrow it county court, so the driver will now once thats gone through be able to pay, wot something like 10 pounds a month to court to keep everybody happy

Doesn't the stupid goon at the garage not realise that the only way the driver is going to be able to pay the £3,000 is by working like a so and so for a month or two.

I would defo get trading standards involved.

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IDFIMH

He's got an appointement with his "brief" on monday morning

Somehow I doubt if there's any comeback on a timing belt fitted by an independent garage after 40,000 miles, unless specific negligence of some kind could be proved, but presumably that's unlikely now.

And irrespective of previous dealings I suppose it's legally reasonably to expect payment there and then because of the size of the bill. But on the other hand the garage will probably be no better off going to court as compared to accepting a reasonable proposal to pay the bill by instalments.

Has your friend made a reasonable offer of this kind to the garage?

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Taxi Driver Online
www.taxi-driver.co.uk

Afraid my mates given up, re his vehicle, the "brief" wanted cash up front, to which I suspected would happen, you ain't paid his bill so you may not pay mine attitude, he resigned himself, rollocks, contacting the finance company to take the vehicle off him, he's paid over half, and do whatever they want to do, the garage bill as well, thats his choice