Right car peeps, I know a girl with a garage problem...

[Fox]

Unfortunately 5lab, you are wrong. The law was changed recently.

The dealer would, in your case, have to proove beyond all reasonable doubt that the car did not have a damaged head gasket when it was sold. This is so difficult to do, that effectively, he must accept responsbility for it. This applies up to 6 months after purchase, when it then becomes the customers responsbility to proove it was there at the time of purchase.

It sucks, and its why lots of garages no longer sell sub £1000 cars. It isn't worth the hassle.

[Rave]

Ultimately the law is applied in a fairly sensible fashion- and dealers know how it works. A dealer with any sense who wants to clear out a trade in banger will advertise it as a trade-in clearance- and express, clearly, that it's clearance and sold as seen.

That isn't going to work for a 3-5 year old Focus though- have you ever seen a car up for £5k with a 'sold as seen' sticker on it? I haven't- and in that case the secondhand car is being sold as a sound car with a reasonable expectation that it has plenty of life in it. Since it clearly is not reasonable to expect the gearbox of a five year old (and sub 100,000 mile) car to let go at a cost of £2000, Matt's friend has a perfectly valid claim.

For reference, my car (a Toyota MR2 Mk1) has a gearbox that's notorious for wearing- and after 17 years and 120,000 miles mine's still pretty damn sound. A failure after 5 years in a modern car simply is not good enough unless that car has been utterly abused by the owner who's claiming.

[5lab]

the law quotes 'reasonable time' - which could be seen as anything (i mean, a gearbox going isnt really something that can be predicted), but if it did happen within 6 months they have to proove the problem wasnt there when they sold teh car.

this document may be very useful -> http://www.tradingstandards.gov.uk/m...and%20Cars.pdf

[MD]

Well got more details this evening, X plate car, its ONLY done 27,000 miles, and the gearbox has gone, and ford think they will get away with this, yeah right.

Speaking to thier customer relations in the morning

m@

[cm_uk]

If the car was sold with a faulty gearbox, it wasn't fit for the purpose it was sold for and she has a right to reject it under the sale of goods act. Just tell them that either they fix it or she sues them for the full value of the car.

couldn't have put it better

[Fox]

What dealer is it?

[Durzel]

I saw the title of this thread and thought for a moment that "garage" might've been a euphemism.....

[Lee H]

Good Luck with Ford Matt - keep us informed as to the outcome