Anonymous

HORRENDOUS!!!!

First of all I would most definitely NOT recommend this car dealer to anyone! Does not even deserve 1 star but I couldn't select 0. We had the worst experience after purchasing a Ford Kuga from this garage. First of all we saw this car advertised on Autotrader advertised at £4995. My partner messaged the dealer via Autotrader to ask what the lowest he would take for the car is, to which he replied '£4700' (this was a lie). Our budget was a little less than this but a few day later we went to view the car (2 hour journey from our house), when we got there we looked at the car etc. It looked ok from what we could see just a few scratches on the bodywork therefore, my partner went to speak to martin about the lowest he'd take taking into account the scratches thay were pretty visible but somehow not on the pictures on the ad. He said the absolute lowest he'd take would be £4800 (more than he said before). He wasnt going to budge, my partner asked to take a look at the service book and other paperwork to then go on to discover this car was in need of a cambelt and water pump straight away. The guy claimed he didnt know about it needing a cambelt despite the fact the car had been sat on his forecourt for 5 months, I don't believe this wouldn't have been brought to his attention within this time by someone else hence the reason the car hadn't sold in that space of time. He wasn't willing to pay to get this done so we was but if he knocked some more of the price. We got a quote of £200 to get this done so we asked if he would take £4600 to cover the cost of this work being done with him already agreeing to take £4800 (that is generally how it works anyway isnt it? Advertise a car a little higher than what you'd take because buyers always want to get you down), also bearing in mind the scratches and other minor mechanical problems we noticed that we'd have been willing to sort. The dealer said that he would take £4700 (bearing in mind this is what he said he'd take via autotrader before we even saw any issues with the car), he said he wasn't doing any less even though we said somewhere in the middle at £4650. We left the garage and just gave that one up to continue the search for another car. When we got home, after our 2 hour drive back to which he knew! We got a phonecall from him saying I'll take 4650 to which we laughed and said we offered this when we was there and you didnt accept for us to come back and get the car we'd only do 4600 as we've got the journey back to get the car. After a long pause he then accepted this (probably realised hes not going to get a better offer when the car is in need of cambelt and waterpump). So... my partner then went back to pick the car up the following evening. Arrived back home, the next morning in the daylight we noticed a huge crack in the panoramic roof which we could only see in daylight so we were unable to see it when collecting the car. This was a £1600 repair so instantly takes a great value off the car, insurance also wouldnt cover it. So we contacted the dealer about this, we really wanted to find a solution to this as we really loved the car aside from this. It went backwards and forwards for ages, the dealer said cant you just put a tint over it, you won't see it then. We was quite shocked to hear this as it completely affects the structure of the car and i have 2 young children, it simply wasn't safe!! It went on a week going backwards and forwards with him, in the end the crack was clearly getting worse because we started to hear it creaking when the car was moving. In the end the dealer said to just bring it back and in his words he said very shockingly to us "bring the car back because what I'd do is get the cambelt done and just get a tint over the roof to disguise the crack and stick it back up for sale for £5500" this was the most shocking bit the fact he was willing to falsely advertise a car knowing it has a very large crack in the roof which affects the structure and safety of the car and put the car up for sale £500 more than it was up for orginally. The aa also got involved as he was an aa approved dealer but that is no more after this! We were very frustrated because we spent a lot of money in petrol to the garage and back after being messed around and for taking the car back, we spent a lot of money in insurance changeover etc. All of which were classed as a consequential loss for us. Martin agreed to pay us an extra £100 plus the full amount of what we paid for the car, that £100 wouldnt have covered our losses however, we were so fed up and just wanted to forget about it so we accepted. My partner took the car back once he got there he refused to pay the £100 HE offered. We did go on to speakto trading standards who advised we were entitled to full consequential losses but the guy was still being a pain and it probably would have ended up going to court which we couldnt really be doing with the hassle of. Anyway we saw he had relisted the car and it was up for sale as he said at £5500 whether he actually tinted the window i dont know and the ad didnt advertise that it had a brand new cambelt either which if it had it would be a good selling point. AVOID!!!