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You would probably be surprised at the number of times I’m asked about the ability to fit a mix and match of 3 baby and booster seats in the back of a particular car. It doesn’t just apply to facilitating babies and youngsters, having say 3 teenagers in the back of your car can be equally demanding spacewise, if not more so than three baby seats.

If you like stats. 180,000 British families have a third or fourth child each year with 13% of families in the EU having 3 or more children. So not surprising that I get asked the question about seating. Now obviously with a 7 seater you have enough space to accommodate your 3 children, albeit you may have to stagger between the 2nd and 3rd row of seats.

According to What Car, who carried out some tests, even the bigger SUV’ s struggle with space. For example the Audi Q7, whilst it is a 7 seater you can accommodate all three of your darlings in one row. On the other hand, the BMW X5 requires you to stagger. As most questions relate to sitting all three children in the one row I’ve pulled out from What Car’s list of cars those that can do just that (even when they still have two more seats behind).

First is the Audi Q7 then the Citroen Grand C4 Spacetourer, it is a 7 seater but can accommodate three in one row. Others are Seat Alhambra (7 Seat), Vauxhall Zafira Tourer (7 Seat), VW Touran (7 Seat). Clearly, by fitting the kids in the one row, it leaves more space in the boot area for luggage. By Graham Hill

According to the findings of the BBC, who surveyed 245 local authorities, yes you should. Because 4 in 10 parking and bus lane fines have been overturned by local authorities during the 5 years 2012 – 2017, During this period 4.3 million appeals were lodged with 1.8 million being successful.

Basingstoke and Dean council in Hampshire overturned the highest proportion of tickets at 90% of the 12,804 appeals lodged. In addition, a quarter of all parking and bus lane fines were eventually canceled. Couldn’t be arsed I guess!

Their excuse was aging equipment meant that often the machines were faulty causing problems with the issuing of tickets. New ticket machines installed in 2017 have apparently reduced the number of successful appeals. Aberdeen council overturned 70% of tickets on appeal, they said that if they had a first time offender it could often cost more to collect the fine than simply overturn it.

That’s what I like to hear, if you appeal a ticket, you are unlikely to pay it if they don’t overturn it so they may as well overturn it and save the bother of chasing the fine. The BBC found that 84 authorities overturned over 50% of all tickets issued on appeal.

When asked by Auto Express an RAC spokesman took a slightly different approach than me, suggesting that with so many appeals succeeding should the tickets have been issued in the first place so should the local authorities review their ticketing procedures? I tend to agree!  By Graham Hill

The Chancellor announced last November that grants would be extended till 2020 but they are still to clarify the rules. For the moment the Government has confirmed that the current grants will last till at least the end of April whilst they continue their review.

Whilst the Chancellor confirmed that a scheme would last till 2020 they only confirmed that the current rates would last till the end of March. I hope that for the sake of the industry the DfT doesn’t simply extend the current rules a month at a time, especially where orders are placed on cars that won’t be delivered till after the end of April.

The best information we have at the moment is that the Department for Transport will advise any changes in due course. However, this hasn’t encouraged manufacturers to come up with some cheap rates for this month although we have just had a reduction on the all-electric Nissan Leaf.

The current structure, that many think will continue, is as follows: Cars with CO2 emissions less than 50g/km and a range of at least 70 miles with zero CO2 emissions – the grant is up to 35% of the cost of the car, up to a maximum of £4,500. Cars with CO2 emissions less than 50g/km and a range of at least 10 miles with zero CO2 emissions – the grant is up to 35% of the cost of the car, up to a maximum of £2,500.

Finally, cars with CO2 emissions of between 50g/km and 75g/km that can travel a minimum of 20 miles emission free – the grant is up to 35% of the cost of the car, up to a maximum of £2,500. The latter two categories exclude cars costing over £60,000.

I somehow feel that if we are to encourage investment by manufacturers in low and zero-emission cars we need a more serious approach by the Government. We are badly lagging behind Europe when it comes to fast charge points and if they end up lowering the grants we will be back to fighting over the emission differences between petrol and diesel. By Graham Hill

Over the past 3 years car thefts are up by 30%. In the past the cars were stolen by joyriders or in the case of prestige cars, stolen to order, stuffed into a container and on its way to India or South Africa within 24 hours of being stolen.

But these days there is a higher likelihood that cars will be stolen to sell on to unsuspecting buyers after changing its identity. As 50% of stolen cars are never recovered and with only a small proportion being shipped abroad you have to be on your guard if you are buying a car privately.

If you buy from a dealer and the car was found to be stolen you will still lose the car but you have much greater legal protection. But if you buy the car privately and the car is discovered to be stolen you could lose the car and the money you paid for it.

But even worse you could be arrested for handling stolen goods. To add to the pain it’s highly unlikely that your insurer will pay out if you make a claim. Andy Barrs, head of Police Liason at TRACKER, has some suggestions as to how you can protect yourself.

When inspecting the car check to see if new registration plates have been fitted and if they have ask why? Thieves may be trying to disguise its identity. Make sure that both sets of keys are present and working as this could also indicate that the car is stolen.

Check the Vehicle Identification Number (VIN) for visible signs of alteration. Also, go to the GOV.UK ‘check you’re not buying a stolen vehicle’ website for valuable advice. An HPI check records mileage so if a car has been cloned you may see a discrepancy in mileage records. Take care there’s a thief about as they say! By Graham Hill

We still measure the environmental cleanliness of cars by the number of CO2’s that they emit even though, according to many experts, it’s NOx and particulate emissions from older diesels that are causing the most damage. Having said that, those running city and town centres, seem to have ignored the word ‘older’ and tar all diesel cars with the same brush.

Could this be because by demonising all diesels they can screw every diesel driver, who thought he was helping the planet and doing the correct thing by going diesel, and charge premiums for entering and parking in the centre of town, irrespective of the age of the vehicle. And as a result, contribute to the coffers of the Government and local authorities. Or am I being cynical?

Anyway, off my soapbox, do you know who produces the cleanest cars, by CO2 emissions, in Europe? Do you want to know? I’ll tell you anyway, the top five are:

1.    Toyota – 101.2g/km,
2.   Peugeot –  104.5g/km
3.   Citroen – 105.5g/km
4.    Renault – 106.6g/km
5.   Suzuki – 114.9

So there you have it, a choice list for your next car! By Graham Hill

One of my biggest gripes in life is the misinformation that is readily available on the Internet with the owners of the websites, on which the information appears, taking no responsibility whatsoever. Top of the list is Google along with other search engines who rank search results by their economic contribution to their coffers rather than accuracy or even the chronological sequence of posting.

People are relying on the accuracy of the results to make decisions and could end up heavily out of pocket because the advice is either inaccurate or out of date.Other sites such as themoneysavingexpert.com allow anyone to comment on their blog, something that has filled their blog with data and links, enabling its owner, Martin Lewis, to  sell the company for £87 million but taking no responsibility for the accuracy of the information imparted, often by people with as much legal knowledge as my sister’s Old English sheepdog, called Izzie by the way and as daft as a doughnut!

A question raised by a firm of lawyers who advise dealers on their legal rights, when in a dispute against a customer, caused me to raise the issue again because a member of their client base asked what would happen if the dealer bought a car having checked that the car wasn’t on finance on HPI. He sold the car and checked HPI again, each time the report showed that it was clear of credit.

3 months later the dealer received a demand from the solicitors of a finance company that claim to have outstanding finance on the car to the tune of £20,000. Having checked HPI, which showed that the car was clear of finance, the dealer claims that title has passed and certainly, as an ‘innocent buyer’ title has passed to the buyer of the car from the dealer. But thanks to a ruling by the House of Lords in 1975 (Moorgate Mercantile Company Limited vs Twitchings) as there is no legal obligation on the part of the finance company to record finance details on HPI, the fact that the finance company forgot to record the car on HPI is irrelevant.

But here’s the twist. Whilst the finance company can apply to the dealer to get his money back, what if they are unaware of the dealer’s involvement? Some will buy to order so let’s say you are looking for a Ford Focus in a particular colour etc. and your local dealer says he’ll look out for a car for you. He finds one privately for sale, buys it, has a service on it, valets it then has a new MOT on it then sells it to you for a nice little profit, he may well not let the DVLA know that he had ownership of the car.

Or supposing the dealership went bust in the meantime, either way the solicitor is directed to you and you receive a demand for the outstanding finance or hand the car back. That is in fact illegal as long as you were told by the seller that the car was free of finance you are now the legal owner. However, I have seen numerous posts on various blogs blaming the innocent buyer and suggesting that he should hand the car over and pursue the person he bought the car from.

This is wrong and I recall reading about an Audi A4 owner who handed his car over to the finance company, having followed the advice on one of the blogs by a complete donkey, or it could have been Izzie. Trouble is if you voluntarily hand over the keys you are highly unlikely to get the car back. Never ever hand over the keys to your car to anyone calling at your door, tell them to put their demands in writing.

In the case illustrated above I have total sympathy with the dealer, what’s he supposed to do, contact every lender in the land and ask if they have finance on the car? And if you are an innocent buyer you shouldn’t be misled by posts on blogs accusing you of being an idiot if you bought a car that was still on finance.

It’s about time that the Government stepped in and forced every lender to record their financial interest in a car via the DVLA – it wouldn’t be rocket science. By Graham Hill

Each year since 2014 Cox Automotive have pulled together 27 leading motoring journalists to decide upon their choice of best cars in the current year, in this case it’s 2018. Their car of the year is the somewhat understated XC60. The car only just pipped the number two car, the Skoda Kodiaq by a single point with the 5 Series BMW coming in 3^rd. Alongside the Car of the Year award the XC60 also won Best Medium Crossover award.

The award is not before time. For years the Volvo range has led the field when it comes to safety equipment but they are now shaking off the ‘old person’s’ image and bringing them up to date with some of the best equipment fitted as standard. Well done Volvo. The other winners were:

• Best Supermini – SEAT Ibiza
• Best Small Hatch – VW Golf
• Best Family – Peugeot 3008
• Best Executive – BMW 5 Series
• Best Luxury – Rolls-Royce Phantom
• Best Estate – BMW 5 Series
• Best Small Crossover – Citroen C3 Aircross
• Best Medium Crossover – Volvo XC60
• Best Large Crossover – Skoda Kodiaq
• Best Coupe – Lexus LC
• Best Cabriolet – Mazda MX-5 RF
• Best Hot Hatch – Hyundai i30 N
• Best Performance – Kia Stinger

So there you have it with several cars on our latest list of deals and offers. By Graham Hill

I read loads of motor magazines and just about every week, in at least one, I read complaints from drivers who have had a warranty claim turned down. The motor magazines try to help out, usually by contacting the dealer, manufacturer or warranty provider. Some warranty providers, realising that they are acting illegally, offer to settle the claim ‘as a gesture of goodwill’, which normally infuriates me because it isn’t a gesture of goodwill it’s a legal obligation.

That aside the advice from the dealer goes nowhere near far enough. Once they have challenged the warranty provider, and in the latest case I’ve seen, that is the RAC, and they refuse to settle the claim it seems to be game over. In the latest story, the buyer of a Mini took out a warranty on his 2010 Cooper D bought from an RAC approved dealer. 10 months later the timing chain snapped and caused serious damage to the engine.

The cost of a replacement engine varied between £4,000 and £7,000 which the driver assumed would be covered by his RAC Platinum Warranty but they rejected the claim arguing that the timing chain had reached the end of its ‘normal working life’. As a result of Auto Express’s intervention RAC warranties sent out an RAC engineer to inspect the car.

Unsurprisingly the engineer claimed that the driver should have noticed the problems with the chain prior to it snapping due to a ‘rattling type noise from the timing chain area of the engine’. The report also argued that ‘reasonable steps have not been taken to mitigate the loss’. The driver argued that he hadn’t heard any rattle or noise from the engine prior to the chain failure. The driver also explained that the car had been serviced twice since he bought the car so it had been properly maintained.

Despite the intervention of Auto Express the claim was still thrown out causing me to get very angry! First of all one has to ask if RAC warranties are worth having in the first place? Secondly, why did they not pursue a claim through the Financial Ombudsman Service as the warranty claim was not fit for purpose and the report, that should really have been independent, confused the issue.

The RAC refused the claim because the timing chain had ‘reached the end of its working life’. So why report that the driver should have heard the noise from the timing area of the engine, are they now saying that had he heard it and made a claim he would have been successful?

Then to confuse matters further they say that ‘reasonable steps have not been taken to mitigate the loss’. So are they saying that they would have paid out for a new timing chain but would not pay out for the engine because the driver should have stopped the car as soon as he was aware of a problem as a result of the noisy engine?

There was a very strong case to take to the Financial Ombudsman as well as a complaint to Trading Standards for breach of the Consumer Rights Act 2015. As the car had been recently serviced the engineer would have been the one to identify the noise from the engine, not the driver sitting in the soundproofed cabin.

To be honest I would also have made a claim to the EU Consumer Centre under the EU 2 year guarantee scheme. That normally sends anyone against whom the claim is made into a tailspin!

I applaud the efforts made by all the motor magazines but they really ought to be more aware of the remedies available. By Graham Hill

As you know I find out some very strange things and like to share them with you and all my other readers. When rear parking sensors came out I met a fitter who was making loadsamoney out of retrofitting rear parking sensors. I assumed this was a very complex exercise but it turned out to be incredibly simple and really cheap.

He told me that in virtually all the cars, into which he fitted sensors, they were already pre-wired for parking sensors. It turned out that it was cheaper for manufacturers to fit standard electric looms, including parking sensor wiring, to all cars whether they had sensors fitted or not.

In some cases, he would have to drill holes in the bumper to match up with the connectors. But there were many with blank plates inserted into pre-drilled holes that simply needed to be popped out and sensors popped in and connected. The crazy thing was that the actual sensors only cost a few pennies each so why didn’t the manufacturers simply make them a standard feature?

They would have only had to connect the sensors and connect the light and sound control units to each end of the loom, again costing no more than a couple of pounds in total, and they were good to go. So why not include the sensors as standard?

So what has all that to do with speakers? Well, it turns out that many cars without sound upgrades or sound packs have all the wiring installed but with blanking plates fitted where it looks like speakers are fitted.

Why not fit speakers as standard? They only cost a few pounds each and all the wiring is there. When you look around the inside of your car you may believe that all the speaker grills are covering speakers when in fact they don’t. When was the last time you squashed your ear to a speaker to check whether there was any sound coming out? An Audi Q2 driver didn’t actually go that far but could tell that there seemed to be no sound balance in his car.

It turned out that all four front speakers were wired up but none in the rear. It looked impressive and when questioned Audi initially said that all speakers were wired but eventually admitted that only 4 speakers were live and all of those were in the front of the car.

In the first place, they should have wired two at the front and two at the rear but better still, as all the wiring was there, why not connect up all the speakers, again for just a few pounds. I sometimes despair of the manufacturers. By Graham Hill