How To Get A Free Car For A Month
Friday, 22. April 2016
The Consumer Rights Act came into force in October 2015. The biggest change to consumer rights, included in the Act, was the right to return goods within 30 days for a full refund. This applies to all goods not just cars so please bear in mind if your 3 piece suite arrives damaged or the TV arrives with a scratch on it.
The question is, what constitutes a fault? My reading of the Act was anything that makes the car imperfect. But this view isn’t shared by lawyers who have challenged the right to reject by some customers when representing dealer clients. It’s down to interpretation and degree. The emerging fear from dealers is the freeloader who simply wants a free car for 30 days then return it to the dealer saying he wants his money back claiming that the car is faulty.
In this respect I have a little sympathy with the dealers (yes I did actually say that), because as with most English Law it lacks total clarity leaving it up to a judge to interpret it on a case by case basis and I have to say few judges are actually car experts. In order to protect their long term position some dealers have chosen to fight customer rejections citing that if a car is to be rejected and the client have his money refunded, according to the law, the ‘faults must be present at the point of sale’ AND render ‘the vehicle not satisfactory quality and/or fit for purpose.’
The files of a lawyer showed recent claims by consumers to reject their cars to appear to be extreme and misuse of the law. For example ‘The parcel shelf clip was missing’, ‘The cup holder does not work’ and ‘The FM button on the radio doesn’t work. As a consumer you have the right to either reject the car, if you feel that the fault satisfies the test shown above, or you can allow the dealer to fix it.
What the files didn’t show was if the customer had already allowed the dealer to attempt to repair or replace the faulty items, other circumstances that may have prevailed to cause the customer to reject and how long after taking delivery the customer chose to reject. The fact is that the law was created to prevent dealers taking anything up to a year to correct a fault that existed on a car at the point of sale, constantly fobbing of the customer who was left without a car for most of the time.
Was it intended that drivers should be able to drive around in a car for a month then simply return it for a refund because the cigarette lighter doesn’t work? Probably not but without tighter legal tests it is going to happen. Incidentally, this law may not only help the ‘freeloader’ but also customers who suffer from a condition, known in selling as ‘Customer Remorse’. These are customers who buy something then within hours, for often unexplainable reasons, regret the purchase.
It is why a good salesman will often congratulate you on your purchase after he has made the sale. Many people fail to see why the salesperson says things like, ‘I’m so pleased you chose that model, it is my favourite in the range and I should know I’ve been selling these for over 20 years’. It may seem daft – but it works! By Graham Hill
