Anonymous

If I could give 0 stars, I would

Brought my car from DAK Cars in October last year, only for lots of things to go wrong with it within 6 months (so of course, my warranty had ended after 3 months, not that I would have trusted them to fix it anyway!). To start with, I was fully aware that the car was 15 years old when I bought it but as I was assured of a full service history alongside the fact that it had only done 47,000 miles and had "two careful owners", I bought it. 1st problem: The central locking stopped working on the back right passenger door. I had a new key made, as when I took it it a garage they said it was most likely a battery issue in the key. This did nothing to help. I didn't want to spend hundreds of pounds on getting a new door or having the electrics fixed for a door I hardly used, so I got used to manually locking the door myself. 2nd problem: The battery died, so I had a new one fitted and replaced, which was £69.00. The battery was fine for about a month and then it went flat again. My breakdown cover said it was probably because I only drove the car once a week. However, this was NOT the case - I took it to a highly recommended garage and they diagnosed the problem as a broken alternator. This was over £200 to fix. Luckily, this also solved the central locking problem. The broken alternator was obviously an old fault in the car that had not been passed on to me when I bought it. 3rd problem: One of my tyres got a puncture (could happen to anyone...) and when someone came to fix it, they had to knock the old wheel off with a hammer - the break pads and discs were horribly corroded and old. I took it to the garage to have the spare wheel replaced with a new one and upon inspecting all of the tyres, they noticed that not only were the back pads and discs corroded, the lug nuts were breaking apart and all 4 tyres would need replacing too. They checked the brake oil for me and it was leaking, as was the transmission oil. He said the engine has been done up to look very good from the outside to an unknowing customer like myself, but once under the engine, the damage was apparent. He actually asked me if i wanted to SCRAP the car rtaher than spending money fixing it, that's how bad the problems are. If I had driven it another 100 miles, the engine would have blown. Having spent so much money on the car only 12 months ago, I was adamant to have the work done (so at least I could possibly sell it on in decent condition in a year or 2). This was another £465. I have been told they have made the fixes necessary to get it back on the road, however it will only last for about 6-12 months and then should be scrapped. So, although I feel partially to blame for not inquiring more into the cars condition and I am kicking myself for being so naive when I bought the car, I feel completely swindled and have given someone £2300 for a piece of junk that I've had to now spend over £1000 fixing up. He must have seen me coming a mile off!!